Life After Divorce | The New Me Mom

I can’t tell you how much I prayed for things that I didn’t think were possible or I didn’t think I deserved. In 2019 we had just moved back to the Nashville area and the church I previously went to had quite a bit of changes happening. I was shopping around for a new church when a long time friend of mine reached out to me out of the blue! I hadn’t heard from her since my daughter was born and that was 5 years prior. She asked where we were going to church and I said “well I’m still looking for a new one and one that has a great kids program”. She invited me to her church. Reluctantly I went. I say reluctantly because it wasn’t conveniently close to where we lived and I had never heard of it. I really wanted to find a place for my daughter to grow and build a connection and this place had an entire playground in the middle of the kids classrooms so already it was a “GO” for her. I sat with my group of friends that I hadn’t seen in years and I felt connected quickly just having someone there I knew. It was enough to make me go back week after week. By this time it was November of 2019 and I was pregnant with my son. It was me and my daughter every week to church. We bought a house in Thompsons Station that ended up being closer to the church as well. Our neighborhood had quite a few people that regularly attended this church too so it was becoming more than just a “church community”. In March my son was born, Covid happened and quite a few things changed. My friend stopped going to church and started watching it from home. I continued to go because it was something my daughter and I loved to do together and we looked forward to it. And as my marriage continued to crumble, my faith was also being tested. My first blog post “faith?” I spoke about a woman I met on the prayer team and ironically she introduced me to my attorney who was her attorney for her divorce who attended church there. My sons teacher, during Sunday mornings, became my attorney’s paralegal. Our “court appointed” realtor attended church there. The Women’s pastor, that stood next to my daughter as she was baptized, was from Nebraska which is where I’m from. My daughter had a friend from school that lived in our neighborhood and she played with attended church there with her family and to my surprise her dad played football for Nebraska in college. It was just like all the people and all the connections I had been making all were finally making sense and why God had lined it all up that way. Not only these things already mentioned, but just before we were to put our house on the market, 3 weeks before we were to be in court for our divorce, we got an all cash offer on our house with “free occupancy” for one month post home sale. This was in the fall of 2022 when all the homes were going stale being on the market because interest rates were now going up and that crazy housing market craze finally came to a halt. It was the biggest miracle our house sold. Now rushing to find a place, I put a post on our neighborhood Facebook page asking if anyone had any temporary housing they could provide? A lot of surrounding neighbors would rent out their garage apartments or Air BnB their spaces. These spaces weren’t long term as they were mostly studio type apartments. Only one person got back to me. She lived down the street and her and her husband had just moved in to their house. They had a full kitchen in the unit as well which wasn’t common. When I went to go take a look I noticed their home backed up to one of the Pastors from church as well as my daughters friends’ family who I talked about above. This couple that was renting their space said they attend a Bible study with both of who I just mentioned too. I mean my heart sank! God was working. And when I kept waiting for him to “show up”…he was working all along. He had everything lined up for when court didn’t go the way I envisioned and made sure I would still be taken care of. But even after all this and having just spent thousands of dollars on court and knowing I just lost my case, I still had no money to my name so of course I’m freaking out on the inside trying not to show my daughter my stress. That same week I received a gift card from the church to pay for my groceries. They have given me a part time job working on Thursdays when I don’t have my son. They have shown up in so many many ways and I can’t even imagine how my life would be without the support of them.

So let this be a testament you can hold tight to when you feel like God isn’t working or nothing is going your way. If you are in the trenches like I was, feeling defeated before you’ve even started, not seeing the end in sight, not seeing the light they say will come on the other side. Don’t give up. God has a plan. It might not be the plan you envisioned but he’s working for you. He will show up when you need him the most. You may lose 15 pounds and half of your hair by the time you feel he’s shown up but hold tight to him. He’s going to test your faith until the end.