Divorce still hurts, Consequences a decade later for all…

One of the hardest things about being a mom in a step situation is that there are times you are legally powerless to to run to your children and comfort them…in my case temporarily. I know a tiny bit of the pain of what it must be to not have your children near you when they want you or when you want them. My children are on spring break in Arkansas with their natural dad and new step mom. They were excited to be on spring break there. They love their grandparents and extended family there as well and are so loved there. This is usually a really good place and time for them, however yesterday when Chase’s Dixie Mae pup died after being hit by a car there, my children simply wanted to come to our home to be comforted. It was not an option for them. I cannot tell you the heart tears that burned my face when the phone rang and text from Chase devestated telling me “mom, my girl is gone, I can’t talk about it, I am so stunned…” Dixie had died in an accident with a car. Their natural father had been at work, a grandparent supervising them, and things simply sometimes happen. I know for a fact, you can be watching every second and things just happen. No one is truly to blame, a puppy in an unfamiliar setting broke free looking for someone she knew, she didn’t know about roads and they live on a busy country highway. Safety measures had been taken, but a door was left cracked open while they went less than 300 feet to the barn and back… However it was very very hard for me as Mom and lover of that sweet girl too, to know the children’s hearts were broken (and ours) and I could not comfort them in my arms for seven more days. With texting and cell phones they could have access to me and did for five hours after the accident, but of course their dad and step mom need to be there with them too. When they arrived home after work that night I tried very hard to let them be the parents, for they are their other parents. Bedtime came and yet two quiet, crying voices called from their beds with their dad’s blessing…wanting to be comforted, which made Mom cry again too. How hard on their natural dad as well, knowing that when the children were upset, they wanted their mom. It must have been awful for him as well…wanting to be their comforter.

I offered to come down, to drive to them, but of course that would be somewhat unfair and hard on their dad and step mom, for they have to be allowed time to connect to the children as well, and so often do not get to spend their time with them due to distance. I had talked to their natural dad, given him a heads up, enroute home from work so he knew what he was walking into at late afternoon 20 minutes from work. He is more than capable of comforting them, it’s just hard for them to be away when they are sad like this. I want to comfort them too!
Children in step and blended families have to ride the waves of two families. In this case, dogs are part of our family at home, in the other family,dogs are simply creatures to be fed, enjoyed but not part of the family that way. No judgement here, simply an example of what a child has to deal with in two homes. When they are devestated in one, they are told “I am so sorry you’re hurting, this IS sad” and in the other “Its just a dog, we can get another one tomorrow, it’ll be okay.” Now I”m not saying their other family is not sensitive….but its simply a different perspective on what is important and how animals are handled. This is not about slamming anyone. My point is that a child who is hurting from divorce, remarriage, anger, or loss has to learn to surf it alone or on two different waves some days in a blended family.

That is something I had hoped my children would not learn as children. God is God of their lives too, and yesterday we spent alot of time praying with them on the phone, their hearts full of guilt for not protecting what they could not have known would happen to Dixie Mae. I felt guilty for not insisting they leave their beloved dog here in Alabama…but they regularly travel with their pets and there was no reason not to allow it… she brings them comfort and joy most days in her presence with them, she was a part of our lives that didn’t have to be left behind.
My son has had a hard year. New school, custody issues earlier, now he loses his dog. It breaks my heart most of all because this special girl was “his” dog. She slept near him, was so attached to him she’d cry if he left the room, yet she was “mine” as well, for when he left for school she lived with me in the office in my chair next to me most early mornings.