Forgive

It finally happened.

8 years and 11 months later, my ex husband apologized to me.

Honestly, I never thought I would hear those words.  A few years ago, someone asked him if he was ever gonna tell me he was sorry and his response was something like "I haven't done anything to be sorry about." 

And I wasn't exactly waiting on an apology.  When friends and family would lament his lack of contrition, I always thought to myself. "What good could words possibly do?"  How could a collection of letters knit themself together and heal the wounds he had caused?  I found the whole idea simply ludicrous.  All that pain.  All that rejection.  So much worry.  So much sorrow.  Words could not even begin to heal me.

But as he said those words, I realized something.  "I'm sorry" can't eradicate pain.  It can't change history.  It cannot right wrongs.  But those words can validate a painful experience.  God had healed me a long time ago.  He used Kevin to show me that love was real and still more powerful than any other force in the universe.  And for that I am thankful.

But hearing an apology was like taking a band-aid off a horrible wound and finding only an impressive scar.