A Happy Ending

Finally...It's Over

My parents recently signed the papers to end the twenty-some-odd-year season of hurt and struggle that many people commonly refer to as "marriage."

You might think that this is overstepping boundaries-that I have no right to share any such things with the world. After all, it wasn't my marriage right?

HA! WRONG!

You're right… it wasn't my marriage, but this grand catastrophe profoundly affects my life. Covering it up helps no one and only perpetuates the problem. My intent is not to share their junk, but to tell you my experiences and what I learned from living with a less-than-ideal marriage.

A child, though not fully able to comprehend his or her surroundings, can pick up on the subtle issues of his or her parents. I was no exception.

Here are the three things that I learned as a teen dealing with a broken marriage.

1. Fear Suffocates

Whether you cause it or experience it, fear is poisonous to a healthy home environment. Fear can cause us to say and do a lot of crazy things. It enslaves us to the whims of others, keeps us from speaking out against injustice, fosters irrational thought about our relationships, or isolates us from the very people who can help us.

Several kinds of fear wrecked our home. The fear of abandonment, the fear of pain (emotional and physical), the fear of failure, and the fear of social shame.

It was not loving.

Love is not oppressive. It isn't manipulative and controlling.

Instead, love fosters creativity, freedom of thought, safety and security to speak honestly (in a respectful manner) without fear of punishment. It is patient and it approaches others with grace and understanding. This is what my parents needed in their marriage. This is what our home needed as a whole. Instead, we all suffocated within the walls that were supposed to be our sanctuary and our family's place of safety.

Fear reigns when there isn't...

2. Humility and Honesty

Pride can lurk near environments of fear. It is often the very source of fear, or the root of what causes one to instill fear in others. Pride keeps us from being honest with ourselves and with others.

Pride kept certain members of my family from admitting their faults, while simultaneously keeping others from seeking community and processing with others; lest they be thought of as weak or stupid.

As a young adult, I still struggle with trust and with fear.

I fear I will be like my parents.

This is, in part, due to my parents pointing out my faults and manipulatively connecting these flaws to the other parent in an attempt to motivate change. This, of course, only made the whole of our family struggle much worse.

I wish I could have had the courage to speak my mind as a teen and had not lived on in fear. I wish I had been able to speak boldly what I knew was true and face the consequences of my actions with strength.

But sadly I was too deep in insecurity to know that I had what it took to stand up, to revolt.

The lack of humility and honesty was further cultivated by...

3. The Unhealthy Idolization of Family Ideals

I had a lot of pressure put on me to be happy and to be fully invested in a family that I didn't feel safe in. I often heard the phrase "if you can't trust family, you can't trust anyone" in response to my seeking external community and aid. This attempt to inspire me towards a family-centered worldview strongly influenced the way I approached the world.  

My desire to be free of the tension and stress and to build relationships elsewhere was met with shame and sought to keep me trapped within the social structure that bore down on my psyche and hindered my growth as an individual.

To compound these matters, I was often commanded to not share my pain. I was told "family issues stay within the family." This philosophy fosters fear in other areas of life: Fear of social reprimanding, fear of consequences, fear of dishonoring my parents, and fear of crossing boundaries.

I found myself believing that it was wrong to speak ill of anyone in my family, even if it was an attempt to process with a friend.

I was taught to have undying loyalty to family, even though it was family that was most disloyal to me of all of my relationships.

The bible does not center salvation around family, though it talks about families and family ideals. It does not permit that families behave as clichés nor as individualized communities. The gospel of Christ tears down these concepts and breaks the barriers between bloodlines.

It says we are all one family, one people under one King.

 "What happens in the family stays in the family" is false. It is a means of control that fosters fear and pride. We are bound and enslaved! The Church suffers far more disunity than the splitting of denominations, but in the separation of family units. Satan has masked a very serious threat as something that "God prioritizes." It is a subtle tactic that cut us off from meeting our true potential as a people unified under one Lord. Do not place trust and faith on family.

Place trust and faith on God.

This grim fairy tale has met its happy ending. Take my experiences and learn from these errors. Use them. Take the first steps to liberating your life where fear, pride, and false idols are enslaving you; preventing you from the healthy, fulfilling life that God wants you to live.

Grace and Peace,

Stephen