In Your Brokenness

Are there moments in your life when you have just felt so broken?

Broken from a promise not fulfilled?

Broken from dishonesty?

Broken from betrayal?

Broken from grief?

Broken from disappointment?

There are many moments during my divorce that I felt completely and utterly broken. 

I remember when I found out about things that would change the trust and hope I had in my marriage. I was devastated and so defeated to the core of my being. 

There was a moment where I felt as if I was going to lose my sanity. The disappointment, the heartache, the brokenness was so deep. It penetrated through my whole body and the hurt was undeniably the most unbearable pain.

Brokenness hurts. 

Brokenness is the undying attempt to reach for what is gone and what is no longer what it used to be. 

Brokenness is the butterfly with the injured wing.

 It is the small child who scraped their knee.

 It is the tear that falls and stays. 

It is the constant disappointment that eventually has nowhere to go but forward. 

It is the cries out to Jesus in desperation and anticipation of what is to come. 

It is the hope that things will eventually turn around and it will all be okay someday. 

In your brokenness, it may feel that the core of your being is deteriorating. It is taking every piece of your soul and breaking it in half. But, the broken road can lead to victory. 

How do you get out of the trenches of this brokenness when it takes all your energy to just get out of bed everyday?

 

In Your Brokenness you can find Faith

So I had to turn to my faith. I had to turn to my belief and the hope that I would pull through this pain that I thought was going to take control of my body and soul. I remember spending a lot of time listening to Jeremy Camp’s song, “Walk by Faith”.  The words became my mantra and my prayer. 

“ Well, I will walk by faith

Well, even when I cannot see

Well, because this broken road

Prepares Your will for me”

Through my brokenness, it was difficult to even anticipate the future or see further than the event right ahead of me. So if I was going to survive this brokenness, I needed to walk by faith. Lots of prayer and time with God pulled me through those moments when I thought my life was over. 

 

In Your Brokenness you can find Support

I knew that in order to not go deeper into my depression and sadness, I needed to seek out support. I needed to find someone whom I could speak to that would be free of judgment and who could help me see things from a different perspective. So, I immediately sought counseling.

I was able to find a therapist who compassionately listened to my story every week and guided me to more understanding of my life. She opened up my world and taught me how to begin to love myself. She helped me to begin to realize that I needed to work on myself. There were a lot of things that were broken before this crumbling of my marriage. It was truly an answer to my prayers. She taught me how to love me. She made me realize that my happiness does not come from someone else, but rather from myself.  

 

In Your Brokenness you can find Clarity

Through my prayer and therapy, I began to reach some clarity in my life. I started to see the clear picture and through my brokenness, I had the ability to create a much better version of myself. I began to realize that I was already broken before anything ever happened in my marriage. I was broken within myself. I was walking around in life as an invisible person who was following on the coattails of someone else. Many of my dreams had been put aside and I was just focusing on his dreams. I had alienated myself from the friendships that I had and was only building friendships that involved both of us. It was almost like we were two people, but so intertwined that we were one. I had lost myself, who I was and who I wanted to be.

I had prayed for so many years to find confidence, to have the ability to be independent and to be the person I wanted to be. Then my marriage began to fall apart. I fought and prayed for my marriage for a long time but in the end, I was doing it alone. So I had to make the decision to move on. Through my clarity, I realized that there were many things that I took for granted throughout the marriage and it became clear that I needed to work on myself in order to offer something to someone else. 

 

In Your Brokenness you can find Forgiveness

When I was deep in my brokenness, I blamed myself for everything that happened to my marriage. I spoke words of defeat and anger to myself. I walked around in shame and embarrassment. It took me many years to fully forgive myself and also to forgive him. Forgiveness is not something that happens one day and then all is better. Forgiveness is a commitment to wake up each day and forgive again. It is a constant battle with anger, hurt, resentment and bitterness.

To this day, many years later, I have to make the choice to forgive not only myself, but him also. But it was very evident that in my brokenness, that is what God wanted me to do. So this forgiveness journey has not been easy and there have been many struggles along the way. 

 

In Your Brokenness you can find Hope

Through all of this brokenness, I found hope. Hope that the future will be brighter. Hope that even though my children would grow up in two houses, that they would still have the love of their parents and extended family. The hope that God’s plan was way bigger than I could ever imagine. Hope is what sustained me and lifted me up from my pain, sadness, disappointment and shame. It was the only thing that I could reach for each morning when the sun rose and each night when I turned out the lights. 

 

The Broken Road can lead to Victory

It may seem like you will never survive this deep feeling of brokenness. There are moments when possibly you feel like your life is shattered and you will never be able to pick up the broken pieces. But if you reach for your faith and seek the support, it may help you reach some clarity. It also may provide you with the hope that you need to carry on and believe that better days are to come. The hope that the broken road you are traveling on will lead to a victory that is clearly unimaginable to you at this moment.