His family all tried to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted. “I will go to my grave mourning for my son,” he would say, and then he would weep.
-Genesis 37:35, NLT
Even years after a divorce, grief can still surprise.
That is how grief works. It ambushes. The heart has a way of reminding us of past injuries like a broken bone throbbing in the change of weather years after healing.
Grief is funny like that.
This week is my divorce anniversary. So, I am not completely surprised by the minor longing over what was lost that this week has occasioned.
Anniversaries like a change in the weather can predictably set off this introspective melancholy. It just mean that I cared about what was lost.
The minor nature of the ache is also an encouraging sign about all of this:
I look back on my first marriage and its ending as if it was another person and life I lived. The pain is no longer acute, thankfully.
So, I encourage you if you feel the grief years later to be kind to yourself. That just means you cared about what was taken from you. You loved wholeheartedly. That is the opposite of a flaw.
