So, Incredibly Sad

I filed the papers for the Divorce at the court yesterday ... it was sickeningly easy. Easier than applying for a Centrelink payment. I couldn’t stop the tears, as I watched the lady stamp the papers and enter the data into the computer. There is no funeral, no ceremony, just a five minute hearing at the courts in a months time.

No rigmarole - the end of nearly 10 years of ‘marriage’.

It is so, incredibly sad.

I messaged him before I headed in - just letting him know what I was doing ... and that I was doing it with sadness. ‘It’s up to you’, was his reply. Yes .... it is up to me. If only he could have at least seen once, that it had actually been up to him. No begging for me to reconsider. No declarations of love. No tears and remorse. No repentant life changes. No responsibility taken - for anything ... ‘it’s up to you’. Why does even that feel like a blow, on the dullness of my despondent heart.

It took me weeks to even print the papers off - I felt sick, just looking at the title. In the end my sister did it for me. It took me several more, to fill in a simple 6 page document, the majority of which was circling yes or no. How could this ‘self-driven’ process, be a gift out of Gods hands? It felt so mean. So nasty. So cold. So uncaring. So unloving. So final.

The same accusing thoughts come flying in and clash with the painful memories and the justifications. They wage war, wear me out, confuse me. My emotions swing like a pendulum. One minute I defend myself, the next I accuse myself of blowing things out of proportion, of not being willing to forgive, of not being willing to love enough, to work hard enough .... The thoughts whirl around and around - they swarm and attack. My heart feels like lead, my head aches - there is no relief.

Then a clear voice speaks, again and again, over and over - soft and kind ‘listen to me, listen to me’. It whispers peace, peace in the Cross. And as this peace washes over me, the other voices go quiet ... and the joy in His grace fills me again.