The Beginning….Not the End…

I did In the Beginning, In the Middle, More about the Middle, so there should be an In the End, right? But it isn’t the end so it didn’t seem appropriate. I am just beginning. I am still beginning my career I am still beginning my dreams. It is just the start of my life and it’s getting better and better. So let’s say its the beginning 🙂

Okay so I left the home and everything with no car, no money (I might have had roughly 1k in my savings) , no phone, just a few bags full of clothes and hair products. Whooppee. Oh and my stuffed bear, Puffy. I couldnt leave him in a time like this! I felt lost, alone, and very frightened. Sure, I was free from them but if this was the feelings of freedom…it was not what I was expecting.

I continued to go to school and continued to work. My boyfriend had to drive me everywhere. It was incredibly embarrassing. I felt useless. I had to figure out how I was going to pay over $1,500 of my school so I could graduate. I wound up graduating with no Diploma. My diploma was not given to me until I paid in full which wasnt until I received my taxes the following year. After that I finally started applying to colleges until I realized I could not afford it. I could not get approved for FAFSA because you need parental information, to be married or to be 24. My dream of being a dentist completely crashed before me. I was finally 18, graduated, working now full time for a grocery store, and living with an elderly woman who was renting out a spare bedroom. I felt like a failure. I thought at this time I would be living in my condo, working and going to college. This was not how I pictured my life.

For the first couple of months my parents would contact me. I had gotten a prepaid phone from Walmart. My mom never spoke, just my dad. On graduation day they were not there. No one was except my friends and boyfriend. After the graduation party and everything I noticed a voicemail on my phone. My dad had called to say happy graduation and then he continued with some story about how he found out the cops had been called to remove me from the lady’s home who I had been living with. Correction: The woman who I lived with, Brenda, adored me. She was super sweet and treated me more like a daughter than a tenant. The neighborhood we live in (I actually live just down the street from her today) is upper middle class and has bike lanes which are posted “no parking”. One afternoon Brenda’s friend had came over to go to the grocery store together, I had just gotten home from school and was laying down for a nap. Police officers were going door to door to ask residents to remove their cars from parking on the street in the bike lanes. So to my psycho father: sure there were police officers at our home. No they were not removing me they were trying to get the cars moved. Idiot.

In all honesty I was a very good kid. I didnt smoke, my parents let me drink every now and again (like 1 wine cooler), I wasnt crazy or sneaking out. The craziest thing I have ever done was yes, after I was kicked out I had a phase where I stole from retail stores. It lasted a couple of months and I quickly grew up and acknowledged it was wrong and I was better than that. See my parents think I am this terrible person. My goal in life is to show them I am everything they are not. I want them to see I am smart, I am successful, I am a good person, I love God and most of all that I was never a bad daughter and they are in the wrong. Still, I forgive them. Although they do not see that they are the ones in need of forgiveness.

Moving on. So yes the first couple of months they had contact with me. Now mind you, after I was kicked out my dad said to people that it was not because I had a black boyfriend that it was because I was lying and manipulative. Mmk. So if that is the case…why did he say he gets a say in whom I date because he doesnt want mixed grandbabies?? Say what?? People actually say that? Like for real bull like that comes from peoples mouths??? Wow. But yet…You arent racist…right? Hmm. Whatev.

About a year after I was removed I spoke to them 1 more time. I told them my boyfriend had proposed and we were getting married. They did not want to come and asked if his family knew what I was like. Yup. They did. He did. No one seemed to have the same opinions of me as my dad did. Shocking. (sarcasm of course). After he asked me that ridiculous question I FINALLY snapped. I just lost it. For all the years of not standing up for myself against him I finally did. He was utterly speechless and finally managed to tell me to never ever contact either of them again. Okay, sir yes sir.

I did get married. I did get divorced. No I did not have “mixed grandbabies”, I realized after all of this I do not want kids. They would have no grandparents and I do not know the relationship between parents and children that other make look so amazing and unbreakable. The desire for my female instincts was crushed when my bestfriend and my hero decided to throw away 18 years of calling herself my mother. All because of the male species she was married to. Where did her independence and fire go when she didnt stand up to him and tell him to leave instead of me?

After getting divorced I got my very first and very own apartment. Yes I struggled, yes for awhile I was on food stamps and Medicaid but I was working. I went from grocery store to cellular sales and become a pharmacy tech. I would write to my mother but never heard back until my dad sent a certified letter for me to stop contacting them or he would seek legal action.

I heard from him a couple of months ago. Now I am in a very good position with good money working in a high end office for a custom packaging and logistics company. I am in school full time for business. My dreams of becoming a dentist won’t ever happen at this point. But I am in the process of trying very hard to pursue schooling to become a dental hygienist. I dont know how to make that happen since I really cant afford to work part time but we will see. I am praying very hard.

I live with a wonderful man of 2 years. We plan to get married and buy a house there is just so much going on at once. When I heard from my dad a couple months ago it was to tell me my childhood dog had passed away. She had been sick but he called only once she had passed. It makes me want to hate him. I loved that dog. I plan to try to contact my mother again once I become a little more successful. I think she changed her number though. I want a relationship with her but never with him.

I miss a lot. The things a mother and daughter share, conversations and advice from her. It still breaks my heart. There is never a day that goes by where I do not think of her or miss her. I love her and I forgive her I just want her in my life.

As for my sister, we dont really communicate much. We do through social media. She moved to Pennsylvania and is studying to become a Psychologist (or Psychiatrist I always forget). Frankly no idea how she does it. I dont know how she has the time or the money to study in a seated class. I think she has had a harder time getting over what happened and it changed her. She isnt a bad person her way of thinking is just..not normal I dont think. But hey when youre a teen thrown into a mental institution and your sister cant be there and your parents show you no support what do you expect? It damaged her. I still love her, I do. We just arent bonded and probably never will be. Thats heartbreaking.