Love Has Found Me

The other half of my forever. 

It has come quickly and fiercely, yet looking back, I see God’s gentle prodding and preparing of my heart for this timing.

Five months ago I sat across from a widower in a local restaurant on our first face-to-face meeting. We instantly connected on several levels. When he spoke of his late wife, his eyes and voice changed ever so slightly. Maybe it wouldn’t have been noticeable to many; but to someone who also had a beautiful marriage...it was obvious...this was a man who loved well and was loved well.

What a gift!

If I could visit the afterlife and have a few minutes with his late wife, I would hug her tightly and say...

Thank you, Julie.
Thank you for loving him well. Thank you for raising such sweet and respectful children with him.  Thank you for the beautiful relationship you had with both extended families.

Words actually fail me when I try to describe the gift he is to me, and I fully acknowledge that YOU were instrumental in molding him into the man who stands before me. I appreciate your love affair and your forever place in his heart. I am humbled to be stepping into the lives of your children and family. You will always be honored by me. Your family will always be respected by me.

Mark and I never could have imagined that you and my late husband would only be half of our forever's; but here we are.

We know we are fortunate to have found each other; to be experiencing two "love of our life's" in a single lifetime.  I am head over heels in love with him.

I promise to love him completely. I vow to love and treat your children as though they are my own.

I prayed, oh friends how I prayed!

I was content to remain single. We were a happy family of three. I had no desire to ever date again.

I prayed daily for an entire year that if God had someone special for me in my future, he would change the desire of my heart.

He did.

It scared me.

So I prayed.

I prayed daily for an entire year for God to prepare me for my future mate and to prepare him for me.

It was another year and a half before I met him.

A man who was loved well and loves me well. A man who knows the plight of solo parenting through grief and has excelled at it.  A man who is respected in his profession and adored by his family and friends.

I admire him. I cherish him. I enjoy being his. He is the answer to three and a half years of constant prayer.

So now, I pray.

I pray God blesses and protects our relationship.

I pray God continues to mold me into the woman this man needs as his encourager and partner.

I pray I can be a safe haven for him and his children in the years to come and that he can be a positive, loving mentor in the lives of my children.

This life is full of twists and turns; crushing turmoil and unexpected blessings. We cannot escape pain and loss; but we can embrace love. God is so faithful to expand our hearts to include new love without it standing in competition or comparison with the past. I marvel at how the great loves of my life can so peacefully co-exist independently within me.

Beauty from ashes...God is good.

A Podcast Interview: Memories and Missing

Yesterday morning, I sat with a friend and visited about widowhood.

She asked real questions and I gave raw answers.  We barely even noticed the microphone in front of us.

Today, her podcast interview was released.

My first thought while listening is, "Goodness gracious, I do laugh a lot in this life!" and I am not one bit sad about that fact!

Tim would be tickled that I am still laughing my way through this messy life.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/elizabethkaydyers-podcast/id1417204110?i=1000436964800&fbclid=IwAR19zGOQI3gvZ36Feettpa367VXZkp0vYETXWacmtTdgLfatJ-7qSkCHTcA

A Work in Progress - Uncovering Deeper Grief

It’s been quite the week here.

After a long hiatus from time in my kitchen (and complaints from the kids over my lack of cooking)…I returned to a place in my home that has always been about Tim.

He made one comment early in our marriage that stuck with me for the nearly two decades we had together. 

“I travel so much for work and eat out every meal, it would be nice when I’m in town to come home from work to a home cooked meal.”

That was all it took. One simple comment and I began spending hours in the kitchen to make sure he had a fulfilling and delicious meal at the end of his long workdays. He ALWAYS thanked me, and there were only a handful of times in the following 19 years that he didn’t wash the dishes and clean the kitchen afterwards for me.

Cooking was a way I showed appreciation and love to the man that gave his all in providing for us. It was an act of respect and obedience to his request as the head of our household. One simple comment from him and I willingly shifted my desire to be taken out to eat when he was in town. 

Within a year of that comment, we packed up and moved to Salt Lake City and I was able to prepare meals for him daily, as travel was no longer a part of his work.  It brought me joy to serve him in this simple way.

When he lost his ability to swallow during the cancer battle, I ceased cooking. I thought it too cruel to have food aroma wafting through our home for hours each day to torment him.  I was feeding him formula through his feeding tube every few hours and people were preparing meals for the kids and me several times a week for me to easily serve each evening.  This went on for over a year.

He died.

I returned to my beloved kitchen and began making meals from scratch again for the kids and myself. It wasn’t the same. Grief had somehow invaded this part of my life and besides, the kids’ schedules were so hectic that often, I wouldn’t get home to begin preparing food until close to 9:00 pm.   So I tapered off from cooking until finally in the past few years I pretty much have been non-existent in the kitchen.

Over the past few months, I have been open to the idea of dating.  Recently I decided I would just say, “I don’t cook” to would-be suitors so that I could avoid the pain of ever having to return to a chore that I no longer enjoy.  Saying it out loud, coupled with the recent teasing from our kids made me realize the reason behind my dislike of cooking.

It isn’t fun doing something that was so intricately tied to my marriage without Tim being here. That’s just my reality.  Now that I’ve been able to identify the root of my problem, I am able to properly address it and heal from it.

Communication is critical in every relationship. Unmet expectations can destroy happiness if we are unable to communicate our needs to one another.  Sometimes, self-communication is equally as important for self expectations to be met.

I’m still a work in progress…every single blasted day of this journey!  Last week, I completed three homemade meals for our family (and by Wednesday to boot...I was kind of a big deal over here).  Baby steps...but I'm learning more about myself and moving forward in new areas again.