 22 Jul 2004 @ 07:38, by Susan Murray
"God moves in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform" - many wonders have been performed in my life and this is just one of them.
I did not have a very happy upbringing. My parents did not demonstrate a loving relationship with eachother at all. Our house was more often than not the scene of conflict and arguments.
I loved both my parents. It was my mum that I was closer to, though, and all I understood when they had these conflicts was how my dad seemed to be hurting my mum and making her cry. He became the villain of the peace in my mind and by the time I was coming up to my teens I felt I had no real relationship with him. When he wasn't talking to my mum he didn't take any notice of me either; it was akin to living with a stranger.
When I married at the age of 17, my mum took the opportunity to leave dad after 30 years of marriage to at last find a peaceful life. My three elder sisters and myself were all very pleased about this as we all believed she should have made the decision a long time before. She moved in with her sister and filed for divorce.
Because of the estranged relationship my sisters and I had had with dad, we none of us ever went to visit him or see how he was. We attacked him in our thoughts and our words and just basically forgot he existed.
Two years later we heard that he had married again and had moved away from the family home.
I was divorced by then and living in a flat with my mum, who was at last happy and wasn't interested in remarrying. In 1983, at the age of 24, I moved in with a new partner and a year after we moved to our new house I began to have a recurring dream. In my dream I had met up with my dad and we were hugging, kissing, laughing and crying together. It was very vivid but the first time I had it I dismissed it. But I had it again the next night, and the next and the next - every night for 2 weeks I had that same dream - with the same vividness. I knew I had to find my dad!!! I knew I was being given a message!!!
I found out where he was living and wrote to him, with apprehension as I didn't know what to expect in return. Then I received a lovely letter from him that had me in floods of tears. He was obviously so very pleased that I had wrote to him!! We made arrangements to meet at his house a few days later. It was a very emotional meeting. I was introduced to his new wife, who was such a lovely person!!
Over the course of a few months we had built up a relationship with eachother. By then I could look back on my childhood and all that went on between my mum and dad, and I could see that it was six of one and half a dozen of the other and my mum had hurt my dad just as much as my dad had hurt my mum. I became filled with unconditional love for both of them. I got to know my dad for the first time and realised just what a lovely person he was. He would do anything for me, and so would his lovely wife, Doris.
My elder sisters were not really impressed and couldn't understand why I would want to have anything to do with our dad. But in time, the youngest sister, Pat decided that she would like to meet dad and so it was arranged. She also found a good relationship with him. Then my next sister, Jean said she would like to meet him, and so it was arranged and she developed a relationship with him. However, Jackie, my eldest sister, was quite disgusted with us all, saying how we were being disloyal to mum and that she would NEVER want anything to do with dad.
However, when my niece was married we were all invited to the wedding and at the reception Jackie and my dad began to talk to eachother and, well, to come up to the present day, she has the best relationship with him than any of us!!!
Our mum went into transition 17 years ago. She did not know that we all had a relationship with dad.
Doris went into transition 3 years ago.
So many lives have been enriched through these dreams that I had. My sisters and I have developed a loving, unconditional relationship with my dad and had the honour of having a most beautiful, gentle soul as a step-mother. Doris could not have any children of her own but ended up with 4 daughters, 10 grandchildren and 7 great-grandchildren, who she absolutely delighted in, and our children have known the wisdom of grandparents.
There is no mystery to this at all. It is crystal clear to me that I was given a message, through my dreams, that has brought love, light and peace to so many and my soul is filled with joy and gratitude.
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