It seems that in life a young widow so very often feels like an oddly shaped piece that doesn’t fit into the puzzle of life going on around them. Many families around you are established and complete. They have their routines and their long standing friendships and career status. They have their lives, their own family routines and traditions, their commitments, and of course, everyone is very very busy. Few families seem to have a place in their schedules or in their hearts to truly open their lives to love on a young widow and her children.
Sometimes I think if people would just stop all the hurry up and over-commitment in life, then they might finally have a minute to breath and catch a glimpse of a hurting soul across their path that they could really impact for good. The problem of course is a lot of people feel they don’t have the time to make room in their world for a young widow or another suffering soul feeling beat-up by life for whatever the reason. But if the roles were reversed and they were the broken ones, surely you can guarantee they would want someone to reach out to them. Truly the heavy load of a widow could be a little lighter if more people around them simply made room for them. Room in their lives, and room in their hearts.
I think of the potential for a tremendous impact that a male role model with integrity and honor can have on a child without a father figure. There is so much need for life changing investment, yet, few men take the time to see and reach out to mentor a fatherless youngster.
I think of how desperately I wanted the example of a beautiful marriage and a Christian family lived out before my children to be set by my precious husband and I. Now I can’t role model this example for them. I have to hope and pray that they will see a great example of this in some other family when I so wanted them to have the model of their own parents to aspire to and their own father to be the hero of their hearts to emulate one day.
I think of how nice it feels when another family truly wants to adopt you into their own and loves you with sincerity and not pity. Caring for you as a person and valuing you as a friend that they want and need, not just as someone who needs them and is “less fortunate” or “going through a hard time.”
And I think of how I will never be able to look at another suffering soul the same. Human suffering has a way of making the human heart extra tender toward the sorrows of others and enables you to be a truly compassionate friend to another…. if you let it. I have not experienced the same kind of emotional pain as all the hurting people, but I know pain, and that knowledge can become the driving force to make room for the fellow wounded in my own life.
In Hope & Prayers,
From This Widow Mama
About Dorothy Swanson
Dorothy lost her beloved husband Oct 2021 to a very unexpected bacterial pneumonia that quickly became septic shock. Her other half and best friend was born with a serious congenital heart defect. Because of that, she had always feared the possibility of being a widow, but she thought it would be more likely due to his heart, and more likely when her husband was in his 50s after the children were grown. Instead, he graduated to heaven just one week before turning 34. Dorothy was 36 with young sons ages 5 and 16 months who adored their Daddy. In less than 48 hours, the life Dorothy and her beloved husband so carefully built together shattered. They were blessed to share just over 8 wonderful, joyous and fun years of marriage. While her heart is so thankful to God for having had their journey together, she has struggled since his death with feeling hurt and let down by God. She has felt so devastated that their love story was short and ended so abruptly. Join her as she shares her unfolding journey of grasping to faith in Christ as she journeys through love, loss, single parenthood, honoring her husband's legacy and guiding her sons through their grief and life without Daddy.