In Seventeen Years.......

...a lot can happen. During that span of time your marriage can end and you can face the pain of explaining why it seems two little boys got divorced too. You can survive financial problems which includes garnishment of wages, being evicted, and losing your job. You can completely raise two very young boys to grown men. You can survive teenage rebellion and all that goes with that which might include the dangers of drugs and alcohol. You can lose your pride and slowly gain it back, you can face embarrassment and ridicule from the people that you thought cared about you. You can work three jobs and miss sports events where someone else's parents are cheering your kids on.

You can also experience the joy of having two boys who without doubt love you and survived it all side by side with you. You can stand proud beside those two little boys as men and know without doubt it was all worth it. You can experience the joy of becoming a grandparent and feel the warmth of that child's love and devotion. You take what you've been through and become a different person and you look back at all you learned and realized that it was all ok.

So....why does the person who walked away from our family seventeen years ago need my forgiveness now? And am I a big enough person to tell him I forgave him a long time ago for the pain he caused my children? Is forgiveness really forgiveness if you don't tell the person you forgive him, if you just know it in your heart? And what would he think if I told him his children forgave him a long time ago too and now they really just feel nothing for him? NOTHING is so much worse than anything I can imagine and I don't want to have to tell him that because he should already know that. But I'm sure he doesn't.

We've moved on, the three of us, my sons and myself are not the same people he knew then but he is the same. And that is the sad part. Mostly for him, not us.

Seventeen years is a long time in the span of a lifetime, especially in the life of a child. And you can't just say "I'm sorry" and it be alright. Those years are lost. I wish I could just tell him the best gift he could give to his sons is to leave them alone now. Just like he's done for the past seventeen years. It's a good gift. And it's one he chose to give so don't take it back now.