relationships

Musings of a Muslimah | Divorce

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Recently I attended a short course where I bumped into an ex-student of mine from many years ago.

Her three younger sisters had also been students of mine.

I saw her arrive and as I always do with all my ex-students, looked forward to catching up with her once the course ended.

I approached her and joked if she still remembered me. After asking about how she was I moved onto asking about her sisters. I had remembered that one had married abroad a few years ago and enquired about her.

She looked a little embarrassed to answer, her cheeks blushing, her tone of voice changing and quietly said, “shes ok…she got divorced and came back”. I almost had to lip read it was that quiet…

Honestly, I didn’t flinch, in all my years of teaching and volunteering I don’t really think theres anything that fazes me anymore, but to be honest, why should it? It is not my business and it should not be anyone else’s.

I just responded with further questions about children and was so happy to hear her sister had two, mashaAllah.

I said my salaams and left to speak with others. Later on, I was musing about our conversation and remembering how embarrassed she was.

In reflection, I wish I had said something more to her about it, I wish I had spoken up and said, “don’t feel embarrassed, sometimes there just is no other way and its for the best”.

But “would’ve, should’ve or could’ve said” is pointless if its not said in the right moment.

My point is when we hear of others in such situations, we need to do less to make them feel like outcasts and more to make them feel empowered.

No one chooses divorce easily and though its not an ideal for most families, Islamically its usually a last resort and necessary for all parties involved.

So why is it that families are embarrassed if a member gets divorced? Or that communities make it ok to treat a divorcee as an outcast especially when it comes to remarrying?

If we believe we are all descendants of Prophet Adam A.S and Hawa A.S, this makes us brothers and sisters in humanity and that makes US responsible for each OTHER, so why do we make some individuals lives miserable simply due to their marital status, sometimes not even stopping at the individual but also labelling their families.

This leads me to share another incident that occurred a few days later, and that was of a friend sharing with me how she had received a promising marriage proposal only to have turned it down after her beloved mother was “interrogated” by the grooms mother as to why she was divorced!

SubhanAllah! I mean really!? What has her mothers marital status got to do with her own prospective marriage? I really thought that times have changed and that the stigma attached to divorce was disappearing.

Unfortunately no.

I was devastated to see the effect it had on my friend and her beloved mother, and though her mother said she expected it from people, I don’t see how those questions were acceptable.

Islam allows for divorce when marriages are no longer working as marriages and there are clear guidelines provided which are meant to give justice with kindness between the parties involved in a fair and civil manner.

However, communities just love rubbing it in, don’t they? Its like a stain that in their eyes can never be washed away but that is the peoples way of looking at it and not from our beautiful teachings in our religion of Islam at all.

Alhamdulillah for Islam, and alhamdulillah for the Holy Quran and the clear prophetic guidance that has been granted to us.

May Allah swt make us of those He swt is pleased with, enable us to treat others in the way that pleases Him swt the most, that is with love, open minds, understanding and kindness. Aameen.

Musings of a daughter.

~ modernmuslimahmusings ~ 1 Comment

بِسْمِاللَّهِالرَّحْمَنِالرَّحِيم “… Rabbi irhamhuma kama rabbayanee sagheeran”

“My Lord! Bestow on them Your Mercy as they did bring me up when I was small.” [Quran; Surah Al-Isra, Verse 24]

The Baobab Tree, also known as the “Tree of Life”. Photo taken by myself in Fuengirola zoo , Malaga, Spain 2017

Just over two years ago my dear father suffered a major heart attack, it was one of the scariest days of our lives. Alhamdulillah, praise is to Allah swt that blessed my father with a full recovery.

My beloved mother suffered a fall last year in which she fractured her hip and had to have a hip replacement operation, alhamdulillah, praise be to Allah swt, her recovery has been steady and slow but she has managed to remain independent.

Yesterday, we had another scare and my dear father was taken to hospital. Alhamdulillah it wasn’t as serious as we thought it might be and he was sent home today.

My blessed parents are in their 70’s and every day I am grateful that they are with us. May Allah swt bless them with true imaan, good health, wealth and much happiness. May Allah swt protect them from all evil and hardship. Aameen.

For many, parents are the glue that hold a family together. Like the roots of a strong tree that bares beautiful fruits and flowers. The “blessing” that parents are, make any special occasion or family event incomplete without them.

But sometimes in our own day to day life we become so busy that we forget to tend to that “blessing” and we unknowingly start to neglect the roots of the tree from which our own life has grown from. Even when we don’t mean to.

Its important to remind ourselves that time will not stop for anyone.

Our life is limited on this Earth and sometimes it feels like the days are dizzily disappearing into weeks that are fizzling fast out into months. Its no excuse but with a stressful job that requires a lot more energy and time that it really doesn’t pay enough for, and a young family that has never-ending needs. Time is something I feel I just don’t have, MOST of the time.

But, observing my dear mother this morning, slowly and purposefully making chicken soup with her arthritic riddled, rickety hands for my dear father to have on his return from the hospital. I realised I have to make the time.

We all do. To collect as many blessings as we can, we have to “unbusy” ourselves to save our souls from future regret. We have to tend to the roots of the tree, water it and look after it.

As children we have the best of intentions, and we do try our best and we can only do our best. So lets make sure we are doing just that inshaAllah. If that means other things have to take a back seat then so be it.

Time is limited, just pick and prioritise. Call your parents more often, visit them regularly, buy them gifts especially flowers and always pray for them. Look after that tree!

“Rabbana ighfir lee waliwalidayya walilmumineena yawma yaqoomu alhisabu”
“Our L
forgive me and my parents, and (all) the believers on the Day when the reckoning will be established.” [Quran: Surah Ibrahim, Verse 41]

May Alla
ect our parents from all harm and evil, bless them with the best of everything in this world and the Hereafter and reward them for all they did for us. Aameen ❤️

Family holiday to Spain : Day 1

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So we all woke up bright and early, left on time, checked in and went to board the flight and were told we had missed our flight! 

I couldn’t believe the words I was hearing…I actually thought I had not woken up and was having some sort of nightmare, I had to check that I was awake and that this was happening. 

To top it all, just looking at my children’s deeply disappointed faces was the tipping point for me and I shed a few tears. 

SubhanAllah, you hear about these things happening to other people but when it happens to you it just seems so surreal.

Believe me when I tell you that planning, preparing and packing for a family with three young children is no easy task. My instant thought was this cant be happening. My second thought was how did this happen? And my third was how much money are we going to lose? (Yes, you guessed it, quite a bit). ‎

اِنّا لِله وَاِنّا اِلَيْهِ رَاجِعُوْن

Then we waited over 3 hours at the customer services desk while my husband and I took turns to look after the children, mainly the youngest who was very quickly starting to lose his patience. 

It. Was. Not. Easy.

We were tired, the queue was neverending, we were surrounded by really annoyed people, the children were really upset , our youngest kept having a meltdown every 10 minutes that lasted for about 20 minutes…

It was a real test of patience.

Alhamdulillah, all glory is to Allah swt, we made it to the front of the counter and managed to rebook for tickets to fly out inshaAllah in two days time, and as we were going to go for two weeks, inshaAllah it would still be ok. 

We made our way home after about 5 hours at the airport accompanied by a toddler tantrum that lasted three quarters of the way. 

Thumping headache – understatement of the year…

However, as I write this, it makes me think about all the positives…subhanAllah you probably think there aren’t any after that! But alhamdulillah I would like to share them inshaAllah and I hope these words might resonate the next time you are going through a hardship. More importantly I hope they become engrained in my own memory as a reminder.

1. When we were initially told we had missed our flight, neither of us blamed each other. You might think well “why would you?”, but usually in challenging situations the “blame game” always gets played. Alhamdulillah this time it didnt and I think this set the foundation of utmost patience during this testing time.

2. When we had to queue up at the customer services, we took turns and worked as a team to see to the needs of the children. In this way not only did we manage to sort out our tickets but also managed to get all our luggage back quite quickly (others who had been with us had still not found their luggage hours later). Again you might think “isn’t that what anyone else would do?”. Well yes, probably but in some cases some couples might argue and out of vengeance make each others lives a little more difficult. 

3. I think out of all of this the financial hit on us has been the worse part but as I explained to the husband (I surprised myself by saying this quite soon after we were told), that this is all from Allah swt. At the end of the day, as muslims if we believe in Qadr/destiny then we have to accept that this is all part of Allah swt’s plans for us, and even though we don’t understand it, we have to believe that there is goodness in this situation, short term and long term. This reminder helped him but deep down I think I was saying it to myself, and I feel that it was this that kept me calm and patient throughout this ordeal.

4. Coincidentally, we made an agreement yesterday, and it was basically that  no matter what happens we will not get into an argument of any sort this holiday. Now again, you might think “why does that even need to be said in a marriage, its natural right?”. When we made the agreement, we were applying it to actually being on holiday, getting there was assumed. However, perhaps having said those words and made that agreement actually helped to remind and reinstate something that is always taken for granted especially in marriage. But lets face it, we can all do with reminders, and thats not just reminding our spouses but actually ourselves! 

5. As muslims, we believe that sometimes hardships and trials are averted through the giving of charity, or someones dua/prayer for you and ultimately Allah swt’s mercy. I really do believe that something much worse and perhaps unthinkable was averted and instead we were put through this test, a test more bearable. As I mentioned this to my husband, I also said that, the day you find out what danger was averted, you’ll wish that you hadn’t complained at all and you will feel grateful for it.

6. Lastly, if anything, I would like to hope that this experience has strengthened our marriage more inshaAllah. And more importantly I would like to hope that this trial and challenging experience has strengthened our imaan and relationship with Almighty Allah swt. 

And if that is the case inshaAllah, then it was worth every single tear shed, tantrum thrown, extra expenses and moments of difficulty.

Alhamdulillah!

اللَّهُمَّ لَا سَهْلَ إِلَّا مَا جَعَلْتَهُ سَهْلًا ، وَأَنْتَ تَجْعَلُ الْحَزْنَ إِذَا شِئْتَ سَهْلًا

Transliteration : allaahumma laa sahla illaa maa ja‛altahu sahlan, wa anta taj‛al-ul-ḥazna idhaa shi’ta sahlan

Translation : O Allah, there is no ease except in that which You have made easy, and You make the difficulty, if You wish, easy.

Aameen

Sources: Ibn Hibban in his Sahih #327 and Ibn As-Sunni #351.

I look forward to sharing our holiday  experiences with you soon inshaAllah.