Dear readers, instead of my normal post today, I will share this popular poem from my past blog. I have been busy this week with a different project, but I will return to a normal writing schedule next week.
Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy today’s devotional poem. Blessings to you!
You lift me up
in the valley of despair
above shadowy sorrows
downcast discouragement
ground-level grief.
If you are an adult child of divorce, I know how deeply your heart has been torn. Even if your parents divorced decades ago, you still have scars that sometimes hurt. I have learned how to repair my heart with God’s help, and I want to give you hope through my story.
Like many children of divorce, I was torn between two homes. My mom had full custody of me and my sister, but we visited my dad on a regular basis. He lived less than 10 miles away. I looked forward to seeing him, but I had learned with experience that it wouldn’t be easy. I always left with a sense of loss and hurt.
One afternoon several years ago, I cried out to God from my prayer closet: “Why do you allow me to feel so much pain?”
I was standing in the intersection of old grief and new grief. That summer I wrote many memories in the form of poems, an excruciating process of reliving past hurts. I brought old hurts out in the open on paper, examined the pain, grieved the loss of what they revealed, and worked to put them to rest.
Too itchy. Too tight. Too breezy. As a highly sensitive child I was keen to feelings, especially to touch.