Holiness By Val & Bruce

I never knew

A phrase that came to us in a dream, before there was anything to describe.

The phrase came first. The life we have now came years later.

In the darkest months of Bruce’s divorce, his extended family — his siblings, his mother — was very worried about him. He was, to be honest, a little worried about himself. He had a wonderful family, and they were doing everything they could to help. There were calls every day from different family members. One of those calls is where this post begins.

Bruce

In the months before the call, I had been praying every day that God would let me die. My family was not sure I was going to be ok. And to be honest, I was not sure either. But then my sister called me one morning. She told me how concerned she had been about me but then told me she had had a dream the night before.

In the dream, she said, she saw me. I was with someone — she thought the woman had dark hair — and she could tell I was so very happy. She said I walked over to her in the dream and simply said, “I never knew it could be like this.” Then she told me: “I woke up. And I knew you were going to be ok.”

I was not sure I was going to be ok. But I believed in my sister. I trusted what we both believed was an inspired dream. And because she believed it, I believed it. Things did not immediately get better. There were still dark days. But I held onto her dream, and onto her belief that I was going to be ok.

Years later, the dream came true. We met. She even had dark hair.

The phrase the sister had heard in her dream — I never knew — became a phrase we actually started saying. This post is what we mean when we say it.

What home feels like

Val: My Saturdays in my first marriage meant making breakfast for the kids while my husband slept in. Sometimes he joined us. Most of the time I left food out for him to eat later. Bruce’s Saturdays in those years carried their own weight.

Now breakfast starts with both of us in the kitchen. Bruce starts breakfast — gourmet, we’ll both tell you, with a small smile — and I join him. We cook together, flipping pancakes, setting the table, cleaning up. It is almost like a dance. Then we often go for a hike, which usually includes conversations about people we love, and how we can show them love even better.

Neither of us knew an ordinary day could feel like this. The texture of a Saturday — that small a thing — is one of the first answers when we say I never knew.

Real connection

Val: I knew something was missing in my first marriage. I saw it in other people’s marriages. There were things I thought and needed that I could not say. I had quietly given up on the kind of connection I watched other couples have.

Now we can say everything to each other. Nothing has to be held back to keep the peace, because the peace is not a fragile thing that has to be protected. The gap between what we feel and what we can name has closed.

Bruce: Even now, I sometimes feel a little anxious when I have to bring something difficult to Val. Old patterns leave their marks. Even knowing what her response will be, I brace a little. And every time, what meets me is calm. It is loving. It is cooperative. There is no looking for someone to blame. There is no big emotion. Just the two of us, working through something hard together. It sounds like a small thing. To me, it is everything.

Neither of us knew this kind of connection existed. Both of us are still surprised by it.

Our family just got a little bigger

A few years ago, on the drive home from a funeral for one of Val’s former in-laws, Bruce said something about how sad it was that both of our families had been broken — and how much had been lost. Val’s reply changed the way we both think about our family.

“I don’t see our families as having been broken,” she said. “I see our family as just having grown a bit.”

What she meant was: our family now includes all of our children, both of our former spouses, and anyone they bring into their lives. Love is not a fixed quantity that gets divided when families change shape. It is a capacity that grows with use.

This is true in practice as well as in theory. Val’s children went through their own adjustments to the divorce and the remarriage, each in their own way and on their own timeline. They still love their dad and have a relationship with him. We have always encouraged that, and we always will. Alongside it — added to it, not replacing it — they have come to know Bruce, and to recognize the love he carries for them. A couple of Val’s daughters now call him Dad. They phone him directly for spiritual or other advice. The grandkids absolutely adore him. Bruce never tried to replace their dad, and he never would. What he has is a chance to love them in addition to him, and to be loved in return.

Bruce’s children’s relationship with Val has its own shape. They like her, and at times they have sought her counsel. But the closeness has been more measured, and we believe we understand why: a closer bond with Val could feel to them like a kind of betrayal of their mother. We don’t want them to feel that. We are content to love them and to let the relationship grow on their timeframe, not ours.

None of this is finished. Our family is not perfect; neither are we. There are still hard moments, conversations we are still figuring out how to have, relationships we are still tending. But we love what we have, and we are building toward something more.

Things that disappeared

Some of what we never knew is not about what we have now. It is about what we used to carry that is gone.

Val: I no longer live with chronic pain. The muscle tension is gone. I no longer take antidepressants. I am genuinely happy. My understanding of God has shifted, too. I used to focus on obedience, judgment, callings. Now I understand God as primarily about love, and the worry that used to attach to those other things has loosened. I feel more free than I have ever felt.

Bruce: I no longer carry what I carried in those years. The weight of those years is hard to convey to someone who hasn’t been through it. But the difference of no longer carrying those burdens is even harder to fully describe.

And there is grief in arriving here. Both of us wish we had had the language sooner. Both of us know how many years it cost. The “I never knew” of joy and the “I never knew” of regret arrive together. We hold them both.

The dream became real

Bruce’s sister had her dream when there was no evidence that any of this would come. She did not know who the dark-haired woman was. The difficult days kept coming for a long time after the dream. But the dream was kept.

What she saw is what we live now. Two people in a kitchen on a Saturday morning. A trail in the mountains. A difficult conversation that doesn’t break us. Children and grandchildren who feel loved and who love us back. A family we are still tending and still being surprised by. A life neither of us could have imagined from where we each came from.

We never knew.

We are telling you this because we want you to know it is possible — even if from where you are right now, you cannot imagine it. You don’t have to imagine it. You only have to keep moving toward it. The dream came to one person before there was any evidence. The promise was kept. There is no reason it would not be kept again.

Val & Bruce

Our lives have not gone at all as we planned. We have been through things we would not wish on anyone. But now, we are happier than we believed possible, and blessed beyond what we can describe.

The dream came in the dark. The promise was kept in the light. If you are still in the dark, hold on. Someone is dreaming.

Has there been a moment you didn’t know was possible?

If something we wrote here resonates with something you have lived — or are still hoping to live — we would love to hear it. Comments are moderated with kindness.