Those Who Mourn

by Marie Brousseau

Divorce is one of society’s ills that erodes family ties and creates grief in the heart of the ones being abandoned. While the forsaken spouse must often deal with feelings of betrayal and loneliness, the children may grow up with a sense of insecurity and unworthiness. This is when love and faith become the most important factors amid all the turmoil. 

I am a child of divorce. Being an only child, I became very close to my mother who wholeheartedly accepted to bring me up on her own. That bond was made stronger with each passing year as my father became more distant from me. My mom did everything in her power to fill the void. She was terrified that I would be traumatized in some way. A dear friend of hers, a cloistered nun, had advised my mother to surround me with unwavering love and affection so that I would grow up confidently believing that I was indeed worthy of being loved, even though my father had effectively abandoned us. 

My father left when I was a toddler. My parents were separated for many years before divorce proceedings were undertaken. My mom had always hoped he would come back, but when he decided to officially file for divorce, she finally understood that it was truly over. I therefore did not grow up with brothers and sisters. Coming from a large family herself, and loving all her siblings, my mother was looking forward to having lots of babies when she got married. She deeply loved her husband and wanted to bear him many children. She never foresaw that she would have only one child. After my dad left, I became her entire world; imagine her state of mind when she nearly lost me to pneumonia when I was only fourteen! I sometimes wonder if she would have survived my death. Sad to say, before the divorce, my father had advised my mom to send me to a convent and start a new life without the encumbrance of a child. She declined this suggestion and brought me up on her own. It was inconceivable for my mother to abandon her child. Deep down, I think that my father must have known this; divorce was bad enough for my mom without adding the misery of losing her child as well. 

Mother and Child, Armando Spadini

Indeed, losing one’s spouse to divorce is a traumatic experience, yet, for my mother, the trauma didn’t end there. As it turns out, my father died eight years after the divorce. Despite everything, she was devastated at his rather early death, out of the blue, from a brain hemorrhage; he died in his sleep, never to wake up again. My mom prayed for his soul and had Masses said on his behalf. I too had Masses said for my father, out of charity and of wanting to adhere to the spiritual work of mercy of praying for the dead. While my mother cried a lot over the death of the man she had loved so much, my feelings were rather ambiguous. I had already learned all my life to live without a father by my side. She wondered about my lack of deep sorrow. I tried to explain as best I could how love and affection had never been fostered by this man during my formative years. How can one mourn someone they never really felt close to? 

I think my mother understood my point of view. I grew up without a full-time father. He was a once-a-week father, for a few hours, treating me to supper at a restaurant or a movie now and then. As I grew older, the visits became monthly, then every other month, at his behest. He would sometimes forget to come see me, meaning three months could go by without any news (this was decades ago, long before cell phones and emails). I learned to live with it. I was always very polite with him. My mom had always stressed that respect for my father was essential. She would not countenance any show of disrespect towards him: he was my father after all. 

I remember giving him gifts for his birthday, and on Father’s Day, when I was a child. My mom wanted to encourage a semblance of normalcy and filial love and duty on my part. Strangely, my dad always seemed ill at ease with these gestures. For example, I would come home and tell her how he never wore the gloves I had given him. Eventually, she understood that our efforts were actually making him feel uncomfortable given that he had chosen to no longer be part of the family unit. We finally decided to stop these niceties as a sign of respect for his feelings; my mother did not want to make him feel guilty or ill at ease. By the time I was sixteen, he told me that I was on my own and to never expect anything from him. As far as I was concerned, that was already the case from the time I was a toddler. But to hear one’s father verbally express it so bluntly kind of diminishes any spontaneous sentiment of filial love. This is what divorce does: it breaks the loving bonds which should be the basics for familial unity. 

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In any event, the separation and divorce of my parents were the catalyst for the strong bond that developed between me and my mom. Outside of her deep faith in God, I became my mother’s only consolation. In turn, she became my rock: the one who stood by me through thick and thin, to the very end. 

I have known many people who have survived the trauma of their marriages breaking down, going through divorce, and fighting for custody of their children. At least my mom and I were spared from the ordeal of a custody battle: as my father had specified himself, he truly believed that I was in better hands with my mom. Friends and colleagues of mine have often recounted how their divorce was a loss they will never forget: the betrayal, the acrimony and the sense of unworthiness were rather devastating. The custody battles were horrible. One former colleague told me that she had nearly keeled over with shock when her husband had informed her that he wanted to marry another woman and was seeking custody of the children. Unfortunately, divorce often tends to put children in the middle of conflict.

In closing, there is a final note I wish to add about my father; he lived long enough to see me grow into a confident young woman starting university even though he had discouraged me from pursuing higher education, warning me that he would never help me in that regard. It is thanks to my mother’s support and encouragement that I forged ahead in postsecondary education. Be that as it may, I do have one beautiful memory of my father that helps to ease the past: I providentially saw him a month before he died so unexpectedly. That evening, when we were saying goodbye, he did something that he had never done before: he hugged me close and told me that he loved me. I was rather surprised at such an unusual display of affection, for my father was not a demonstrative person. What had prompted this action? Years later, I wondered if he had perhaps known about the aneurysm in his brain and that we would never see each other again. I will never know the truth of the matter, but I do cherish those three words he told me. I can actually shed tears for my father when I remember this. I hope that with God’s grace and with my mother’s prayers, my father has finally found true peace and the true joy that can only come from God. 

May God help all those who are affected by divorce and may they find consolation in the loving embrace of the one true God. Amen.

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