In My Sisters Shoes

The other night I was thinking about my brothers, all 5 of them and wondering why we just aren't close and never have been. There is no doubt we love each other but none of us really connect. I have always thought it was because I was the girl, but it's more than that, we are all very different.

Then I started to think about my 3 daughters and how different they are too, but they adore each other and quite honestly when they were growing up, as a mother I worked really hard to help them respect and love each other as sisters, even if there were times they didn't particularly like each other. 

As they have got older and two of them have a family the differences between them are even greater. Sometimes they don't get along as well as I would like them too, life is busy and my daughter that isn't married often feels very left out.

When we are in pain we often wish others could understand what we are feeling and going through, but each person is in their own world doing their own thing, the best they can.

There have been times in my life when the pain was so bad and I wasn't getting the comfort from family that I needed, it would make me really angry, I'd feel sorry for myself and decide I didn't even care if I never saw them again. Pain does that, it can separate us from people we care deeply about.

It's different today, in the process of understanding the Bible, which says we are to forgive 70 x 70, not in a life time,  but in a day if we have to. Many times when trying to fall asleep at night I would imagine myself literally in the shoes of who ever it was that I needed love and acceptance from, imagining what their life was like and how they had to cope with their own struggles. My attitude would often change instantly.
There us so much we don't know about what goes on in other people's lives and how they feel, day to day.

My prayer for my daughters would be that they understand, having the same parents doesn't mean their experiences growing up in an abusive home was exactly the same.  Each one of them experienced me as a mother, their father, 3 marriages and 3 divorces differently, and I pray they will try to wear their sisters shoes and imagine what life was like and is like now. 

Divorce affects children so badly, some kids bond better with the absent parent, therefore it's tougher on them.  Our children desperately need to be heard and understood, not just by parents but each other. It's the unspoken and not heard, that separates families forever sometimes.