Today is the first day of school for my kids. My son is a junior and my daugther a freshman. I love the first day - the anticipation of the new changes and the excitement. I thoroughly enjoy everyone's post on facebook and seeing how children have grown.
As I look at prior year's pictures, I'm feeling a bit sad. The youngest I happen to have on my computer is from 2004. It truly was a lifetime ago. They are so young - a complete contrast to these adult looking people smiling back at me from my computer screen today. Then there's the "fun" pictures where they hug too tightly and I capture the image of the barrel laughter that I can still hear when I look at it years later. There's the year where my daughter had the broken hand and very large cast. Her brother was amused, she was, well, not so much.
One of my favorite pictures is from 2009. They are truly laughing. Truly smiling. Truly happy. It's the last picture I have of them together before their world imploded...before my ex had the affair. We had a wonderful life - just not the life he wanted.
I guess its a day for reflection, for appreciating how far we've come and the amazing people they are, yet it saddens me that its yet another milestone their father misses. He made his choices and is far away from the chaos he created and abandoned. All of it changed who my children were. I'm a much different person than I was when I took that picture. I would not go back to the life I had, but there are still moments my heart breaks for the changes in their lives.
Today, they have blended well with their to-be step brothers and love, appreciate and respect my fiance as he does them. I am much happier, more fulfilled, stronger and truly appreciate everything we have in our lives. I realize that every day is a blessing. For me, I know what and who truly matters. I know what is worth the compromise and what is not. The woman who took that picture in 2009 believed everything happens for a reason and then I lost that for a long time. What do you think? Does everything happen for a reason? Would you go back and change it if you could?
No, I don't think everything happens for a reason, but I do think that's it's healthy and helpful to look for the positives and the "reasons" that emerge from bad situations.
Glad things are going better for you.
You know, to be honest, I don't think that things happen for a reason. Things just happen. It's what we choose to do next that shapes the situation. There are things that have happened in my life that I absolutely would go back and change, despite the fact that I did learn something from the situation, and despite the fact that things turned out okay in the end.
We should neither pat ourselves on the back nor berate ourselves for choices we've made, because all of our choices are at least half luck. We do the best we can with the information we have in hand, that's all.
I don't know if everything happens for a specific reason or if there is an agenda at play, but I do know that there are lessons to be learned from everything, big and small.
Sounds like you learned and important lesson the hard way and are a better person for it.
Reading your post makes me smile in a way, because we just started school, preschool and 1st grade this year and your post reminds me that there will be more first days and that time goes by too fast.
I don't think that everything happens for a reason. I think that life gets in the way of your plans and you have to figure out what's the best path to take. It's totally normal to mourn the loss of what you had. Since you are never in control over other people there's no way to go back and really change anything to make it come out better.
For what it's worth I think you have done an amazing job keeping your children grounded when their world was turn upside down. Their lives are different; not better or worse. The only one that will miss out in the long run is their father.
I don't know that everything happens for a reason, but you have certainly made lemonade with your lemons. :) I think when tragedies happen, we don't know right away how we will turn it into a triumph, but eventually, we will figure out how.
You're a fabulous writer, by the way.
Yes, I do believe in divine providence. No, I would not change the past. I know enough to know that I don't have sufficient wisdom to act as God.
Yes it does, but we aren't always privy to the reason :)
I think that each challenge we have, each joy, makes us the people we are. To change one experience, we change who we become. I think we have choices on how we deal with those experiences. Some get bitter, some work through it, some find a strong faith and some become very strong. I lost my son in 2010 and the person I was before then was a lot more carefree then now but I also have a stronger faith and know I can survive the unthinkable. I look back at pictures of my son's daughter and you can see the sadness in her eyes, the innocence lost. She was three when her daddy died and she is almost 6 now. She is starting to get that sparkle in her eyes again as she grows older and her daddy is a fading memory. Your children was older and I am sure the sadness, the lost sparkle will show for a long time. Did it happen for a reason? Perhaps, but it could just one of those learning experences we endure and grow from. Of course I would go back and change losing my son if I had the chance but I wouldn't lose the faith I have gained.
