ACOD - pain - part 3

(part 1 is HERE)
(part 2 is HERE)

This is part three... even though i wrote it first & it has been sitting in my drafts folder for awhile now.
ACOD... Who knew there was an acronym for adult children of divorce? 
i'm learning new things these days... new language rolls off my tongue, and the jumbled mess of my feelings and thoughts heaves and lurches in my stomach leaving me feeling like a colicky babe.
Gravity isn't the same on this new planet i find myself on.  Temperatures, time and reactions all vary wildly from what i have been used to in previous years.  Gasping and choking - i'm trying to force my body to learn to breathe in this atmosphere that differs from the one i thought i would never leave... on that planet i'll never see again. 
My family is broken.
i have found that i spend a lot of time revisiting my childhood and trying to figure out just who exactly i am.  Sounds mellow dramatic?
i know.  Bear with me... or don't :)  i'm cool either way. 
i remember some of my besties when i was little were reeling from their parent's divorces.  i remember still the way they worshipped an absent parent, or looked jealously around our table at a family meal time.  i remember the bitter acceptance of new significant others in their parent's lives & a new patchwork of family that eventually became their new normal. 
It's different for me.  i don't have to choose where to live, and i'm all grown up with a marriage of my own, and tiny children to protect and nurture... It shouldn't affect me the same way it did for them... should it?
& yet here i am... a 35 year old child - who is gratefully clinging to the One Absolute that never falters, or wavers.  The more i seek Him, the more He reveals Himself... the more impossibilities i am presented with, the more i learn to bring them to Him, and He gently teaches me more and more... and impossibly more... Truth...
How can it be that though i find i don't even know myself, i find i know Him better than i thought possible?
i have been reminded through this (& i touched on it in my last post) that it seems to be a natural inclination in a believer's life to equate pain with sin... If you're grieving, or in pain - it must be as a consequence to your own sin... mustn't it? 
But i know that's not true. 
In this world... we're gonna have trouble.  (John 16:33) 
There's much to gain - much growth to do... many opportunities, in the midst of pain, to overcome, to submit, to love...
But God doesn't take marks off your test because you cried (& i'm so grateful He doesn't... i have cried too many tears these past months).  You won't fail because it took you awhile to work through your suffering.  He's not angry with you for not having had this understanding prior...
So, go ahead and grieve... bring your sorrows to the One who brings beauty from ashes.(< that's from isaiah 61).   Work through your suffering with honesty and diligence.


Psalm 18:16
He reached down from on high and took hold of me;
he drew me out of deep waters.
17 He rescued me from my powerful enemy,
from my foes, who were too strong for me.
18 They confronted me in the day of my disaster,
but the LORD was my support.
19 He brought me out into a spacious place;
he rescued me because he delighted in me.