Mourning Womanhood

by Matty B. Duran

Is it wrong to mourn one's own womanhood? I imagined that I would be married, and that I would have at least 2 children. The husband that I didn't have would have taken his role of husband and father seriously. He wouldn't have abandoned us, he would have stayed. But that is not the man who fathered my daughter. I didn't expect him to marry me, though I would have married him had he asked me to. I did expect him to take responsibility for our child seriously, to have at least been there for her these many years.

Twenty-three years later, he casually sauntered back into our lives as if he only went out for a pack of cigarettes. That was 3 months ago, and he casually calls every couple of weeks, to check on Emma, I suppose. Why traipse back like a drunkard at all? I have accepted the situation, when a couple of years passed by with no word that he would be absent from our lives. Even after all of my fervent prayers, I had accepted that it was not to be, that he would never accept his role of fatherhood.

I mourn that today along with the loss of my womanhood. I had mourned it before, but bits of it still linger as cinders from a fire that burned once. My daughter's father, contacting us after so many years stirred the sorrow of scars. I realize he contacted me to contact Emma. But that wound was extremely deep. I surmise it wouldn't have been as lingering had I actually married, had Emma had a stepfather who would have assumed the role of fatherhood in the absence of her own irresponsible one. But I couldn't even do that for her. Now the chance has passed as she is now grown, and I have passed into the age of an older woman. There are no traces of youth on my face, there are only lines that deepen with each day that passes. I don't mind the age that presses down on my face, it is that I never passed through the milestone of marriage.

This hasn't bothered me for years. In reality I was very content and satisfied with God. His love was enough. Lately, the old wound howls. The familiar stitches ripped in succession, the stitches I thought had already dissolved only to reveal the traces of blood. The immediate thought is to pray, if I prayed fervently this injury would cease to harm me anymore. Instead, I look at families together, the same families that haven't bothered me for a long time. I look at them and think why didn't that happen for us?

Since my period ended a few years ago, I have forever lost the possibility to have a second child. There was a man a few years ago I thought I could have married, I mean the feelings were there for me but not for him. It was a far-fetched possibility anyway as he was literally from another country. Despite this we spoke on the phone often, almost every other day. Once again, I was misled.

This wound has opened not only itself but many questions along with it, "What was wrong with me?" My therapist Mary, as well as many others have said it was not me, but the men I chose. This has caused me to revisit a lot of old relationships, despite the obvious hurt feelings I hadn't thought about in many years.

As I look back, I didn't choose to get involved with these men, I didn't have the experience to know that they were only playing with my feelings, as if I were a woman of the same age and experience. It was my lack of experience that caused me to let myself get involved with these older men. It was because I let myself go with my heart. The Bible says, "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:9)

If I had only listened to my mother: if I had obeyed my God when He wrote, "Do not commit adultery." Do not commit fornication." But I thought my heart knew best, somehow, I thought it would all work itself out like a romantic movie.

Jesus warned about the wiles of the devil, being seduced by the flesh. A lasting relationship does not come from indulging your flesh, but by continually feeding your spirit through God's Holy Spirit. So many young woman are involved with men that don't love them and never will. I know I was one of those young women. My time as passed, but I would like to write, don't let yourself get used and discarded, don't tell yourself there is still time, I used to tell myself the same thing, that there was plenty of time. I lived under the illusion that I would be young forever, or at least, a very long time.

When the truth is, life is but a vapor. We don't know if we will even be alive tomorrow. Every day is an immense gift of Grace. Live like there is not a tomorrow, not in reckless abandon but in humility and obedience. Live life in the Truth of God's Holy Word. He has your best interest, He has plans for you, plans to prosper you.

The devil does not come except to steal, kill and destroy, but God has come that you may have life and have it more abundantly.

(John 10:10)

 If anything good came out of the loss of my womanhood is that I can warn other women that you do not have to be used and discarded by men that don't want you in a godly way. Any man that does not offer you marriage is not a godly man. If a man does not offer marriage, at least you didn't give your body to him. Men and women date to marry, not as frivolity as is the assumption. Marriage is a sobering decision. The intimate act of sex is not even on the table before a marriage, sex is the consummation of the marriage covenant. I mourn something that was holy, something that I cheated myself out of.