DIVORCE is final

This is something I don't often write about but it is coming up on the 23 year mark when my divorce was final...It was the saddest season of my life next to my mama's death..  I am going to write a little about this experience without getting bogged down in the emotions of that time and then this will have been put down on paper for all to read..especially for those that have experienced it or know someone that has....so this part of my story is for you..you are not alone....and you will make it through to a better time..

I remember like it was yesterday when I was told by my ex that he  wanted a divorce..I just said NO and thought that was the end of it..can we say naive??   little did I know he meant it and had been planning it for a while..you see, our youngest was soon to be 18 and he thought his responsibility was over..  but what about me?  I had spent my grownup life raising the children and taking care of home...I had no job skills and no experience and no degrees to fall back on...I was terrified...I did not know what I would do...after he walked out on me one Sunday night after we got home from church, I called some friends..they were not surprised..they had seen it coming...QUEEN of denial speaking here.. :-)  in the very next day or so, a sweet friend, Julie, came over and brought her babies and a sack of hamburgers and we sat in my yard on the grass and talked...and I cried...I had no idea what I would do.. I called a lawyer friend of mine and he talked to me and took my case..I had no money...all of the money was in his name and he had taken it all out of the accounts..he filed for divorce 2 days after he left.  I was served the papers by the sheriffs deputy at my house....further humiliation...I did not want this divorce....we went for counseling...it was a joke..he just sat there with the divorce already in the works in the background..I was devastated, scared, and angry...my life was being torn apart against my will...I didn't want to be going through this at all.
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I had many friends that I would call and they would listen as I cried and talked..they were my absolute support system..I am forever grateful for their putting up with me....I was so afraid of what was happening to me...  I am not innocent in this but it felt like this was done to me..I tried everything I knew to do to talk him out of this divorce...nothing mattered to him except getting away from me...I thought I could change things.   I was wrong...but I don't like the victim role..it doesn't fit me well....so at some point, hope kicked in..well, I actually do remember when it happened....a day or two before Christmas, 1994...I was in my basement on my knees crying my eyes out, with snot streaming onto the floor mixed with my tears....LOUD crying...sobbing....saying what am I going to do????what am I going to do???  I called my counselor and she asked me if I wanted some medication..##*****##!!!!!!!!!   WAKEUP call...I said NO  and I meant it.....from that day forward I very slowly began to come out of this mess I was living in....I realized it was not the end of the world.  I was looking better..had lost 30 lbs in the first month..he left Nov 6, 1994..so this was almost 2 months later...I still sat in a chair and stared at the wall a lot with my dog, Daisy in my lap...the rejection was overpowering and never ending..it seemed like every week I got a letter from his attorney saying I had to do something else...I could not believe this was happening to me and at the same time I had to accept that it was and I had to deal with it..what a rollercoaster..if you are still reading, bless you and thank you.....

At some point, I decided that I was going to be the best divorced woman ever and that I would hold my head up and run through this fire and then help every woman I ever ran into that was going through a divorce to run though this too...I guess I should interject somewhere that I did not get a reason from my ex for why he was doing this..he would just say I wouldn't help him and he felt smothered....everyone else asked me if there was another woman...I always said NO, of course not...another one of those times S.T.U.P.I.D was stamped on my forehead...of course there was another woman for a loooong time.   she is now his wife..but, that is beside the point...

I fought against this thing for almost a year....the first lawyer visit I had, I said he can just have everything.. :-) my sweet ,wise lawyer waited on me for several months to come to my senses and then we talked again...he could NOT have everything.

I got a job in April 1995 and started on a new path for my life..

this verse was so meaningful to me.....He takes away the first in order to establish the second.....
I decided to let ALL of the first be taken away like a clean sweep and start again... I started to discover who I am ..really......I was single for the first time in my life.....I had to learn how to open a checking account and how to take my car to the mechanic, how to pay bills and do it on my own..My daughter was a rock to me during all of this...but I became too dependent on her and had to push her out of the nest so she would not be too screwed up by an overly dependent mama...my son would HUG me and he was strong for me during this...but I knew I had to remain the mama even if I didn't feel like it anymore...

I made it through this whole year of uncertainty and humiliation and growth, did I say GROWTH??  on Labor Day I went to my lawyers office and made the final adjustments to the papers...it was DONE..the next week, my lawyer called me and asked me to come to his office...I remember sitting at my work desk and lowering my head and hearing as plain as day these words.....Go and do what he tells you to do......I got up and went to his office and when I sat down ..he said sign here..I said is there anything I can do to stop this?  He looked at me and said.....EX has already signed the papers, you are divorced, sign here.......
so I DID......
it was finally FINAL....over..  a 22 year marriage gone...now what???

But God always has a plan if we follow Him....I came home and called my pastors wife and she read me this verse from the Bible...

  Yet if the unbelieving one leaves, LET HIM LEAVE......the brother or sister is not under bondage in such cases.....
so, that settled it for me....I let go.....

and

the very next week...I met Bryan Gabriel...the very best thing to ever happen to me...next to Jesus...and my life started to BLOSSOM.......

We dated for  a while before we decided to get married on April 1, 1997. God really did take this awful mess and turn it all for my good..  Best decision of this life was to marry Bryan. I have never doubted that he is just right for me.

I love happy endings, don't you?

Love,
Mona

Seasons do end

We rode up to the mountains yesterday to see a little beauty and to get away for a day...It is only 2 hours to get there so as often as we can, we do.... I had particularly wanted to see the dahlias that we had seen earlier in the summer right after they were planted..they bloom in the late summer and the cool nights make them even prettier...so here they are. My Grandmother used to grow them and I remember them so well...she had to use a shade house because of the intense south Georgia heat and sun..these are right out in an open field....enjoy....

Here is another slice of life that we saw...they are harvesting tomatoes and other vegetables like beans and eggplant.....All of the green was absolutely beautiful...

and here is the evidence that seasons do absolutely, without a doubt, positively come to an end...no matter how beautiful and amazing the season has been in your life...here is the proof that you need....things DO change....they do come to an end..this is the same field that I wrote about earlier in the summer in this post
All the beauty of these dahlias and the harvesting that was going on of the ripe vegetables was right next to this brown and ugly field of spent zinnias...they had served their purpose and they were finished..their season was over....are there seasons in your life that are over and you hesitate to let them go?

Don't miss the wonderfulness of the new season in your life and mine because we are hanging on to the season that has past.and is full of dead things ...Today I am thankful for the new season  and all of the beauty that it contains.  I choose to embrace the season I am in right now....I am not going to hang onto old, spent things that will cause me to miss the beauty and peace of where I am right now....

thank you for stopping by today....hope to see you again soon....

Mayday, Mayday....

There are times and seasons in life that the best part of them is this...they are OVER!  Today marks just one of those very long and barren seasons for us..we paid our very last child support payment today...this has been going on for 16 years...it has been so hard to finish....I can hardly believe the time has come for us to finish..we finished well..we paid it all even when the economy did what it did and we were without a steady paycheck..

my husband is the poster child for an UNdeadbeat Dad.....and this was all done in the face of very adverse circumstances...he has not seen his daughter in more than 4 years...we have a severe case of parental alienation.....she wanted her way..she wanted us to just pay her the money and go away...for 10 years we hung on and then we let her have her way..

I have so many thoughts about our unjust court system and lawyers and judges that do not think about what they are doing to tear apart a family...we have experienced our share...a mother should not be able to accept child support without allowing the father to participate in the child's life.....we did our part and she did NOT....and the courts could not care less.....we have an unjust court system when it comes to family law..

After today, we are DONE!!!!!!!  I mean DONE!!!!  our hope is that one day this child we supported with no feedback from her mother..will come around..maybe, just maybe..but she is now an adult and it is her choice whether she wants to know our side or not...it is a great travesty when a child is told and convinced that she does not need her father in her life..especially when he is a man of such good character.....

so after this is all said and done, we forgive and we remember the good times and we move on..and we are so very glad that we have gotten to the end of this thing that has been done against us..against our will.....but we persevered and we finished this part of our race.....

 Now the road is unending...the view is unobstructed...the future is bright...so bright that we need shades.....
I am thankful if you were able to stick it out and read this one..  say a prayer for us...we have had a hard row to hoe but now it is time for planting......the end is sometimes so very sweet......

Good Friday

Today is a day that represents a day that seemed very bleak for us when Jesus died on that cross...it seemed like all was lost and all had ended....it seemed like the enemy had won...
BUT.......
that was not the TRUTH..it had not ended..it had only just begun...there was LIFE on the other side of that cross..there was a resurrection for Jesus and life for all of eternity. so the enemy's victory turned around quickly on him...it was in reality..OUR VICTORY!!! God had taken death and turned it into something good....He took the sting out of death...He made it contain life ..eternal life...and it became a gift for us..to apply Jesus work on the cross to our own life and receive what He did as our very own sacrifice..and exchange His death for our life..it is a pretty good exchange....He died and we live..through Him..when He lives in us, we get resurrected life forever...because He did not just die and leave it at that...He AROSE!!!

My life has been a testament to this story....He took my life filled with death and turned it around for me...I gave it to Him..all of it..the good, bad, and the ugly..He took it in exchange for His life living through me...it was my very best choice...to give Jesus my life and let Him do whatever He wanted to do with me....He took bad things and turned them around for my good....what the enemy has meant for harm, He has meant for good...just like Winterpast, our home, as we have worked to restore and bring back to life the lifeless places..He has worked on me..where there were barren places, He has brought flowers that bloom....where there was heartache, He has filled me with healing..where there was rejection, He has accepted me just as I am....His love never fails...He is good...

Today just could not pass by without a tribute to the One who paid it all for me...Jesus...

               How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God ! How vast is the sum of them!
                                               Psalm 139:17-18 (New American Standard)

Happy Good Friday y'all....and Happy Easter.....remember..
from the tomb.....He is NOT HERE!!!!!  He is ALIVE.....

thank you for reading along with me...take time to reflect on the wonderful EXCHANGE! 

Remembering Mama

Mama

Today is my beautiful Mama's birthday..she would have been 81 years old.....but I will always remember her as a much younger woman because she died young....she had  just turned 73 years old when she was killed in a tragic car accident that instantly took her life and left my Daddy virtually unharmed except for a few bruises. He literally walked away from the fatal wreck. I will always believe that she was stolen away from this life before it was her time to go. she still had a lot of life to live and a lot of life to pass on to us.....It was because of an accident that she is no longer here.....I don't know if I will ever get over this loss...the pain is not as acute as it used to be but it is still grief, just not the gripping, cannot get away from it kind.......I can think about her without tears now.....there are good memories to focus on.. But I still miss her terribly sometimes...hardly a day goes by that I do not think of her and sometimes I really, really would like to talk things over with her just one more time..I could talk to her about anybody and she would keep it to herself and still love me. :-)

There is not much else like a mama's love... she and I had a rough and rocky relationship for years and years but had come to a place of real understanding and acceptance about 2 years before her death. I am most thankful for those 2 years, as they erased most of the pain of the decades before then.....and as silly as it sounds the Lord used a movie to speak to me, loudly.....to help me see that she was a woman just like me...and I was a woman just like her..... that bond can never be broken and her love for me and who she was will be passed on to my grandchildren...

Will and Mac often point to a picture of her and I tell them over and over who that is...my Mama.. I certainly see her showing up already in my grandsons....they love the dirt..the oldest one is a sure gardener in the making...she would be proud....there is already someone who will continue to grow daylilies.....I know she is smiling about that......

This is just one of the lilies she hybridized and now it grows in my yard....she had a good eye for this....it is one of my treasures....and will be passed along to future generations...it's just what we do..pass along flowers..LOL

Well, you have heard a little of my story involving my Mama....and if you have a mama or you are a mama, your job is very important....your mama is human just like you are.....even if you don't get along now, there is still hope..because how can a mama reject her own child?  it will not always be....I am so very thankful for the last 2 years of Mama's life..we made amends and when she died, I had NO REGRETS...that is a wonderful gift she left me....Peace about our relationship....so never give up...don't lose who you are but also never close the door completely..there might be a miracle around the next bend...there was for me....

So I remember the good things and do not dwell on the bad..I do wish she had lived longer but she didn't and I have come to have peace about that....

Here is a clip from that life changing movie for me....if you are having ANY trouble in your mama relationship, please watch this clip.....it will speak to you..and then watch the movie....it has lots of healing in the story.......




one of my favorite lines in the movie is  Daddy, did you get loved enough?
and he says my question to you is Did YOU get loved enough?

after it was all said and done.....I think I got loved enough.........

The Beginning and the End...

Can it really be the end of November?  it has been quite an eventful month for us.... a stepdaughter turning 18 and then a week of celebrating for us...going to Lyle Lovett concert, eating out, and then eating out some more.....then all of the preparations of Thanksgiving...and the beginnings of a cold for me...YUK!  But alas....the end has come.....the dish is empty..we ate it all up.....enjoyed every minute of it..well, almost every minute..LOL

It is time to turn the page......

 Christmas is still a blur........... but by tomorrow, it will really be December .  There will be a clarity to the season we are in.....and we will all be getting ready for the arrival of the most wonderful birthday of all....Jesus......
As we stand on this edge between months, let's ponder what Christmas is all about..and why we celebrate and don't go over budget...LOL

thank you my readers.....