From the moment I met Danijela I think I knew that every decision I made in my life from that moment forward would come second to her and then later to my children's needs. Then again, even as I say that it seems that I in turn contradict myself because when it came to the most important time in their lives for me to make that choice I failed them. For the five years I was married to Danijela, and the two years before that that we dated, the choices that we made were ones we were sure were going to better our lives, the lives of our children, and if we were lucky, we would have enough left over to take care of our extended families as well. How we looked at things was the way things had always been done. Nothing was more important than family, except perhaps your faith in God, it had been that way for our parents, and their parents before them, why would we think it would be any different for us?
I don't think either of us understood how hard it was going to be to find ourselves not just cut off from our families, but in the middle of a war-zone with no means to escape. I blame myself for putting us in the position we were in, I should have made Danijela take the children and leave when she had the chance, but she refused to break up our family, and I refused to walk away from my residency. I don't think either of us thought things would become as bad as they did, and by the time the realization was there it was too dangerous to leave. All we could do was stay where we were and pray for God to keep us safe.
He failed us, as I had failed them, and I lost them all. On that day I lost not just my belief in him, but my purpose in life as well and it took many many years for me to find my way back again. But, then I met Abby, and after some bumps along the way I've found my reason to live again. Everything I do now is for Abby and Joe and the life we're building together, and as hard as it seems at times, I'm determined not to make the same mistakes I made all those years ago.
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