I was listening to the preacher this morning, and a theme was waiting was present. There is an importance to being able to wait. Moving too soon could mean making the wrong move. It also means that you may be moving too fast to realize whatever you need to.

Parents who have gone through domestic violence and are sharing custody know that waiting can be its own form of torture. The waiting to move, the waiting to get legal help, the waiting to address issues. Those things are hard enough. There are so many what ifs and fears that come up. There is a different kind of waiting though…

It is the waiting for the phone call. When we get one a day, or one is scheduled, and it is late for some reason. If something has occurred that has made the partner angry and now you’re waiting for the call. The hope is always there that everything will be fine, and nothing will go wrong. Statistically that will be the case, but at the same time, there are enough cases where it aren’t…. there are enough cases where things go wrong that you can’t get them out of your head. You are just praying everything is ok, and that nothing out of the ordinary will happen. All you can do is document everything and pray everything will be fine. That waiting. That waiting is the kind that builds character, and changes us as parents. I hope it is the right kind of changes. I hope it will make me the way got wants me to be.