Runner-up Wife - Christianity Today

Churches that want to begin divorce and remarriage ministries are wise to learn how complex the dynamics of a new marriage can be. Marriage Partnership editor Ginger Kolbaba, in Surprised by Remarriage: A Guide to Happily Even After , writes about one unexpected emotion she experienced. An edited excerpt from her book:

I remember how surprised I was when I discovered I was mourning my loss in my marriage. I thought, How can this be? I’m not the one divorced; my husband is. But I realized I grieve for several things.

First, of course, I grieve for my husband and his loss. I love him and don’t like to see him in pain. I see when he’s feeling sad. I see the distress he carries because his daughter has lost a dream and the innocence and security of an intact family. I try not to feel insecure, because I know he loves me, yet I realize our marriage wasn’t his ideal. It has become that now. But it was not his first plan.

Second, I grieve for me.

In high school, I was crowned Miss Akron TEEN and went on to become a semifinalist in the Ohio state pageant. But I didn’t actually win the Miss Akron TEEN pageant. I won first runner-up.

Then, a month or so later, the dream came true. I received a phone call from a pageant representative who said the winner had relinquished her title and I was now the “it” girl. I became Miss Akron TEEN.

I received the crown and all the privileges that came with it. Parades, photo ops, and a chance to go to the state pageant. Free modeling lessons. A college scholarship.

There was only one small problem: I never got to hear anybody announce my name as the winner. I never heard the applause. I never had the opportunity to walk down the runway, bearing the falling crown over my bouffant hair-sprayed coif, wearing the sliding Miss Akron TEEN banner, holding the roses.

People knew me as the beauty pageant winner. And that’s what counts in the end. But I knew the truth. I was runner-up.

That pageant is the story of my marriage. I’m a runner-up wife. I’m not a first in my husband’s life. I’m a second. And, technically, I’ll always be a second.

Yes, I get the crown and all the privileges: the parades, the photo ops, a great trophy husband. But I never got to experience the applause for being announced as the first.

His ex-wife experienced the firsts with him: first walk down the aisle, first love, first sexual experience, first house, first child, first promotion, first car, first gray hair. He has an entire history that doesn’t include me. He has friends who know him in relation to his first wife.

There are moments when I mourn that, when I mourn the loss of my dream to be the first. While those times occur less and less frequently now, every once in a while that reality reemerges and reminds me of my loss.

Other Resources for Churches and Leaders:

Blended Families , by Maxine Marsolini (Moody Publishers, 2000)
The Stepfamily Survival Guide , by Natalie Nichols Gillespie (Revell, 2004)
Grace and Divorce: God’s Healing Gift to Those Whose Marriages Fall Short , by Les Carter (Jossey-Bass, 2004)
When Your Marriage Dies: Answers to Questions About Separation and Divorce , by Laura Petherbridge (David C. Cook, 2005)
Divorce and Remarriage: A Redemptive Theology , by Rubel Shelly (Leafwood Publishers, 2007)
Happily Remarried , by David and Lisa Frisbie (Harvest House, 2005)
“Remarriage and Blended Families,” available for download at ChristianBibleStudies.com .
Building Your Ministry Pack, by Ron L. Deal, http://www.successfulstepfamilies.com/.

Related Elsewhere:

“Redeeming the Remarried” accompanied this article.

Ginger Kolbaba is an editor at Marriage Partnership .

Today’s Christian and other CT sister publications have articles on remarriage.

Christianity Today‘s articles on divorce and remarriage include:

What God Has Joined | What does the Bible really teach about divorce? (October 5, 2007)

Remarriage: Two Views | Two New Testament professors debate whether remarriage is acceptable for Christians. (August 31, 2000)

Divorce and Remarriage from Augustine to Zwingli | How Christian understanding about marriage has changed—and stayed the same—through history. (August 31, 2000)

Directions: You’re Divorced—Can You Remarry? | The New Testament seems to support divorce for a narrow range of reasons, but does it support remarriage? (October 4, 1999)

Also see our section on marriage in America.