i guess i have a bit of a bitterness thing going on toward my ex-father-in-law

It's true.  I'm struggling in the area of bitterness.

My ex-father-in-law wasn't the nicest man, but I always believed in him.  Always believed that I saw sincere kindness deep down in the very eyes most people perceived narrow scrutiny.  Few understood him, I believed.  Few were allowed access to him, because his bristles and growls warded most people off.

Right away, I made him my project.  I would dive in, searching for the wonderful man inside, believing in those eyes, that they weren't lying to me.  That there was sincere kindness in them.  Love, even.

He responded well to the grandchildren I gave him.  He approved of my mothering methods.  He approved of my devotion to his son.  After years of hard work, I believed he approved of me.

He approved of my decision to quit college all those years before, when his son and I first got engaged. The reasoning between both father and son was that continued education for me, a woman, was unnecessary.  I was to be a homemaker.  A college education would be self-serving and pointless.  My father-in-law always told me that if anything ever happened to his son, he would support the children and me, so that I could continue to raise his grandchildren properly.  This fed every maternal instinct I had, and it left me feeling as though the children and I were safe, and loved.

When I left his son after discovering him in an affair with another woman, his approval evaporated as quickly as my delusion that we were a happy family.

His wife, my dear Mary Mom, was not allowed to help care for the children while I worked outside the home trying to support them.  She did a few times, but he put his foot down, as he used to say.  He wouldn't allow her to help me in any way.  She used to call me at night after he had gone to bed, talking in whispers so that he wouldn't hear her on the phone.  Otherwise, she wasn't even allowed to call me.

Looking back from who I am now, I'm disappointed and disturbed that I allowed myself to be immersed into such an unhealthy system.  That I laid my children and myself at the feet of something this weak, and this twisted.  Because we weren't safe, and we weren't loved.  We were controlled.

I should have never quit college.  I should have never bowed to a system that dissuaded me from my natural development as an individual, but instead, placed me into the rule of 2 controlling men--my husband, and my father-in-law.  But, at the time, I was so sucked into their line of reasoning, that I actually allowed myself to feel loved and protected by them both, and I never for a second doubted their honor.  I believed them, and I believed in them.  I believed that their position and reasoning was in the best interest of our family.

So, I was on the outside of their favor, my eyes were finally wide open, and I was bitter.  Very angry with myself for believing the lies.  Angry that I allowed my children and myself to be left so vulnerable, and as a result, had to leave my teenage children to raise my younger ones while I worked 2-3 low-paying jobs, just to stay afloat.

Lee was just over 2 when I had to start working.  He would frantically fight, trying to get me to stay home when I'd leave for work.  He would cry at the door, running outside to get me before I drove off.

I would crawl into bed next to his sleeping little body when I'd come home late at night, kiss his little cheek, and whisper in his ear that Mommy was home, and loved him so much.  Then, if it was the weekend, I'd crawl out of bed in the early morning hours before he'd even wake up, so that I could be at work by 5:45.  At least we could both be spared the torture of me having to leave home with him crying again.

Maybe it's because of this little history Lee and I share that I now enjoy every moment I have with him.  I appreciate every sound he makes, every thought he shares, and every direction his little imagination takes him.  Maybe this is what I always did with my other kids, and it isn't all that different.  But, I am different.  Maybe that is what seems to set this experience apart from anything I had before.  I'm looking at it all through new eyes.

But, on a deeper and even darker level, I wonder sometimes whether I soak him all in, enjoying the moment and all that we have, in an effort to quiet the bitterness that continues to pop up when I think about the time I missed with him.

I take full responsibility for placing myself under the rule of my ex-father-in-law, and ex-husband.  For believing in what I wanted to believe in, rather than allow myself to see, and believe how things really were.  I was a consenting adult.

I need to forgive him for not being what I wanted him to be, and I need to forgive him for being who he was.  Because I can't change any of it.  Because he didn't lie after all.  He really was looking at me with narrow scrutiny.  Not with kindness, or love.  That's what I wanted to see, but it wasn't what was really there.  The bristles and growls were true indications of an angry, broken man who would say and do anything to feed the egocentric whole of his being.  He said, and promised whatever he had to say or promise to keep me in line, and submissive, and under his rule of control.  Because in truth, the man had no control over himself, and was running amok in selfishness, and hatred in a world that let him down somehow, somewhere.

That is a life to pity, not be bitter against.  And the kids and I have done well, in spite of his shortcomings, and we are persevering, in spite of our past.  So, really, there is no logic in my holding onto bitterness.  All that does is serve my inner need to cast blame onto someone else, and not accept responsibility in my own actions.

There.  Right?  Forgiveness has won over bitterness, just that easily.  Hardly.  It's a process, and it is going to take time.  But, if I say it out loud enough times, I believe my heart will catch up with my mouth.  Eventually.

And while my mouth is moving, I might benefit from throwing in some heartfelt prayers, asking God for some help with this one.  Because He knows a thing or two about forgiveness, doesn't He?