Author: James Gorton

Dealing with Past Issues: Part II

My dad died in June 1990 and we had a good relationship when he died. There were some issues that we had to talk about during my high school years that caused disconnection for a few years. He was a perfectionist and communicated from a perfectionist expectation. I remember mowing the grass for the first time when I was 10 and was so excited and wanted him to see. He came out and said, “You missed a spot.”

I would go with him on jobs after he was done with the rural mail route to put in tile or fix plumbing. I was the one who cleaned the tools after the job was done. He didn’t see the tools I had cleaned, but saw the spots I missed.

I resolved these issues with him when I got into college, but what would have happened had he died before I was able to resolve my resentment toward an inability to ever meet up to his expectations. What happens when you have a severing of a relationship, or marriage, or parental tie and are never able to go back to them to deal with and resolve the issue?

This brings up the second scenario. What do you do with relationships of the past where you don’t have opportunity to go back to them and resolve the issue?

Some have said that you need to forgive them and move on. For those of you who have been able to forgive that person who hasn’t asked forgiveness that is fantastic? But there are those who have tried to go down this route and couldn’t put the past issue to rest. For those of you who are in this category, here is an alternative that could release you from this baggage so that you can move on in a healthy way to your present relationships.

I have a couple of questions that need to be asked. Does God forgive every sin even if we don’t ask Him? He says in I John 1:9 that if we ask for forgiveness he is faithful and righteous to forgive us of our sins, but He doesn’t forgive us until we ask. Does God expect us to forgive others who don’t admit fault when He doesn’t? In Ephesians 4:32 it says that we need to forgive others just as God in Christ forgives us. He forgives us “If” we ask for forgiveness. Here is the difference. Jesus is ALWAYS WILLING to forgive us, but the forgiveness is not actualized until we ask for it. His death on the cross-made forgiveness available to all , but we need to confess our sins or acknowledge our sin before He forgives us.

Some will say that if we don’t forgive others, we hold bitterness in our heart. I propose that in the same way that Jesus is always willing to forgive, we can do the same by being willing to forgive someone we will never come in contact with. If they were to sit in front of you and sincerely apologize for what they had done (even if they are no longer here) would you forgive them?

This perspective is based on the premise that when we are willing to forgive others of what they have done, the willingness to forgive released the bitterness we feel so that we can move on even if we never see the person again. For those who have applied this principle to past issues with family members who are no longer here or past marital partners who have wronged them, there has been a burden that has been cut away so that they can move on without bitterness or resentment.

Some who are reading this will have questions and I encourage you to dialogue with me on this. I realize that this has not been taught in the churches for the most part, so you may have questions and I would urge you to dialogue with me on this.

Other passages to look at

Luke 17:3-5

II Samuel 11-12 David and Bathsheba; Confession/Forgiveness

Principle

Willingness to forgive those we no longer have connection with can free us from past baggage and allow us to experience the greatest potential of present/future relationships.

 

Dealing With Past Issues: Part I

When I was growing up I loved to play on the horizontal monkey bars.  It wasn’t as complex as the monkey domes are today, but it was fun to see how fast you could get across.  I have asked many of my clients to describe the often daunting process of getting across the monkey bars in their lives and everyone has a different answer.  Some have said that you need to have a purpose in getting from one side to the other.  Other responses involves being strong.  A few of my clients have said that you need to have momentum and build up a swinging action to cross to the other side.  Still others have said that you need to go from one bar to the next, taking it one step at a time.  All of these answers are right and are needed to get from one side of a horizontal monkey bar to the other.  But I always tell them, “there is still one key ingredient that is essential to carry out this feat.”  They think and think, and finally give up trying to come up with the answer.  Did you figure it out?  Do you give up?  It’s letting go of the past.  All of the answers above are right and healthy, but if you don’t let go of the past you will never get to the other side.

It’s similar to relationships that we enter seeking to find a significant person to spend the rest of our lives with.  If we don’t let go of our past issues and seek to resolve those things that are considered baggage, we will never experience true happiness in or present relationships or the ones that we are hoping to cultivate.  The principle I am talking about is letting go of the past and the tool for doing that involves forgiveness.

There are three scenarios that I would like to propose in getting rid of the past.  The first involves situations where the person or persons who have wronged you have asked forgiveness. However, we have become so mad, angry, and even bitter that we have been unable to forgive that individual.  I was talking to a friend this morning and he reminded me of a couple in that exact place.  It was 30 years ago when they were young in their relationship and the wife was pregnant with their first baby.  Within a month of her having the baby his work necessitated that he go away for two days within a 6 week period for a task he needed to do.  Both of them talked about the best time to do that and agreed that he should go quickly so that he could be back for the birth.  Unfortunately, he was gone when she gave birth and she never forgave him.  EVERYONE she interacted with from then to this present day has heard the story of her now x-husband not being there for the birth of their first child.  Even with new people she comes in contact with, she will bring up this issue early in the  conversation.  Her husband apologized often for it because he did desperately wanted to be there, but she never forgave him.

In this scenario, it is important to let go of the past, or the past will eat you up.  A principle in Matthew 18 highlights this with the story of a rich man who had a servant who owed him a very large debt and couldn’t pay it back.  The servant was going to be put in prison, but begged for forgiveness and the rich man forgave him of his debt.  He walked away a free man.  This servant has a servant himself who owed him a day’s wages and couldn’t pay it.  His servant begged him to forgive him, but he wouldn’t and threw his servant into prison until he could pay off his debt.  The rich man found out about this atrocity and called in his servant whom he had forgiven.  He said to the man, “I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?”  Because of his lack of forgiveness, the master threw him into prison and made him pay off every penny of his debt.  Then it says, “If you don’t forgive others, God will not forgive you.”

It is a choice we have to say to the person who has wronged us and has asked forgiveness, “I forgive you.”  I assume that everyone reading this Jlog isn’t perfect and has blown it on various occasions.  When we blow it, we surely want others to forgive us.  Can’t we do the same for those who have wronged us and are seeking to be forgiven?

Principle

If we want to have the greatest potential for successful relationships in the future, we need to that we let go of the past and forgive those who have asked for forgiveness.

 

Talking About Past Marriages/Mates

On the first few dates that Nadine and I had, discussions of our past spouses came to the surface.  Nadine had been married for 24 years when her late husband developed cancer.  Over the process of a year she saw him become less and less involved in the business and finally experienced his death.  He had been gone for 9 years when we began to date.  Nadine relived the wonderful experiences of their marriage as well as times that were very difficult.  It was during those times that I learned to appreciate the characteristics internal to her life.  When she talked about the challenges of her past life, it helped me to become sensitized to the possible triggers that could cause disconnection between the two of us.

It was at breakfast during our first meeting that I revealed to Nadine the horrific ending to my late wife’s life, suicide.  Cynthia had major back pain for about a year with two surgeries that did nothing to stem the increasing pain she was experiencing.  During this time she was getting only about 1 1/2 hours of sleep a night, so she was sleep deprived and experiencing consistent, excruciating pain.  The back doctor told her that this would be her life from now on, chronic pain constantly vying for her attention.  She was in such intense pain that the doctor eventually prescribed her Lyrica, a nerve blocker with the side effect of suicide. With the thought of living the rest of her life in pain, she decided that the reality of her future was not worth what she would have to endure and on June 29, 2008 she took her life.

I do remember a pastor asking me this question the day after she died, “Jim, do you have any regrets?” I responded without hesitation, I had no regrets in terms of wishing I would have said something or done something differently with Cynthia.  There were no unresolved issues between us when she died, so my regrets weren’t from wishing I could or would have done things that I now didn’t have the chance to do.  My regret and grief was over losing the person I thought I would live the rest of my life with.

For Nadine, Stacey’s death brought a sense of relief from the long process of chemotherapy and other treatment programs sought to fight the cancer in his body.  She had no regret about her efforts to work on their marriage and make it the best it could be. However, there were unresolved issues that left scars in her life, just as there were in mine. So, it was healthy to talk about our pasts with one another and process some of our experiences together.  The death of Nadine’s late husband was much farther back in time than was Cynthia’s death; therefore, elements of my process were a bit different from Nadine’s. However, there were also many thing in common they we could share and discuss with one another, such as being solo parents for our children moving forward.

Both of us had dated since our spouses died, and this had influenced some of our perspectives on life.  I do think problems arise when people jump into new relationship while their past relationships are still so fresh and the hurts are still bleeding.  If you move on to a new relationship while you are still healing from the past you aren’t able to give your whole focus to this new person in front of you.

When you experience the death or divorce of a spouse, it’s healthy to give yourself a year or two to allow the wounds of the past to heal.  If you find that in a new relationship, the sole topic or the majority of your conversation is focused on your past relationship, it might be an indicator that you haven’t healed properly and you are not ready yet to move forward.

Principle

Talking about past partners is very healthy in a new relationship, as long as it doesn’t overwhelm the conversation.  The past can and often does give individuals insight into the soul of another person as well as the triggers they may need to become sensitized to.

Total Vulnerability

Our relationship started about 4 years ago.  As I indicated earlier, I had taken my car to Airpark Auto Service in early August 2010 to get it serviced.  Nadine came out and talked for over an hour.  I suggested that we go for a cup of coffee sometime and she replied, “That would be great, but let me get Tyler settled into his new High School, and I will give you a call.”

I waited and waited and waited for that call.  It never came.  No text.  No email.  No phone call.  I didn’t know what to think.  Had she blown me off and really didn’t want to go for coffee but was being nice?  Was her interest genuine?  I waited for 9 months and I thought I would give it one more shot, so about May 2011 of the following year, I wrote her an email and put the lack of response on me.  “I have been remiss in not getting back to you about coffee, and was wondering if you wanted to go out for coffee like we had suggested a few months earlier?”

To my surprise, I got an email back within 3 minutes of my email stating that she would love to get together, but that she was driving across country and was in Tennessee as she was writing the email.  She mentioned that she needed two or three weeks to get things settled and she would give me a call.  I had heard that before, but about a week later I called her and we set up a  Friday morning coffee time.

What happened over the next two hours of our conversation was truly remarkable.  I began to reveal things in my closet that I wasn’t proud of but that she needed to know about me and my journey through life.  I told her about the death of my wife (suicide) and it’s effect on me and on my children.  I revealed the journey I had taken in trying to be a single parent, a mother, a father, a provider, all at the same time.  I didn’t want Nadine to find out later down the road about things in my past that I had not revealed to her.  I wanted her to know everything about me and make a decision to move forward with all the truth.  I was totally vulnerable with her.

When she heard my story, she felt safe enough to begin to tell her story and became totally vulnerable with me.  We laid everything out on the table for the other to see.  There were no hidden agendas.  There were no skeletons in the closet.  What you see is what you get.  The foundation for our future relationship was set on solid ground.  We have never been surprised by things of our past, because we both know one another’s past right from the get-go.

Principle

It’s important for someone you are interested in to accept you just the way you are.  If a person has problems of your past, you want to know that right up front and not hear that concern as you move toward commitment with each other.  To have someone know your past and accept you is a wonderful feeling.  It happens when you are totally vulnerable up front.

 

When Two Become Eight

This is a new blog for me.  Over two and one-half years ago, Nadine and I embarked on a new journey of becoming blended.  I mean becoming because it has been a process of blending two families into one.  The story goes back over 20 years when I began taking my car to Airpark Auto Service to get an oil change.  I don’t know anything about cars and so it has been a very anxiety provoking experience of taking a car to a repair place and having no idea what they might find or whether they would tell the truth.

My first experience was with the service manager Aaron who was very friendly and told me that everything was fine, but I might need to be aware of a couple of things in the future.  This was different from other repair places as he wasn’t trying to sell me a job, but to be aware of possible problems down the line.  I was sold and have taken my car there for 21 years.  Stacy and Nadine were owners of Airpark Auto Service, so I got to know both of them over the years and was saddened when I learned 11 years ago that Stacy had died of cancer.

About 6+years ago my wife died and I had to grieve over her untimely death with 2 children in the home and one having been launched.  It was about 4 years ago when I took my car in to get it serviced and in the process Nadine and I talked for over an hour.  The rest is history as we were married December 17, 2011.

This blog comes out of our experiences of blending my three children (two young women and a 17 year old teenage boy entering his last year of high school) with her three children (one young woman and two young men, one of which just graduated from high school and is starting college this week).

This has been a new journey of blending two distinctly different families with eight different personalities with eight different journeys of their own and eight different expectations within the family.  Each of them have had different experiences with their late parent that adds to the complexity of this blended phenomena.

If you are in a blended family experience, welcome to the ride and hope you get some tools and structures to help your situation.