Freedom Rings

Dear Simone,

I need to look at each feeling and ask, “How will I accept you?” Process, store, grieve… repeat. It’s like I’m learning feelings for the first time. Like, I’m 3 again, except I’m 31. I hate when some people say, “You choose to be who you are.”

I didn’t get to choose. My whole personality is molded from trauma. The funny thing is though, since I was 3… I’ve been fighting my mom on right and wrong. On being free or being different or doing things as they should be done. Somehow, I always had that sense. So, I have been advocating for myself for a long time. But I was a child. And I spent my 20s in a continued survival mode. Fighting my “support system” every step of the way. As much as anyone said they wanted to help me, they hurt me twice as bad. Kicked me out, left me stranded, starve…. no one said, “Hey, let’s get you some help,” or “Maybe she just needs some nurture.” No, I continued to get the “tough love I needed.” And that was from everyone. I was already fighting my parents to be a person, I was fighting myself to stay alive, then I was fighting my job from taking advantage of me and my toxic exes, fighting Jeh Nay to learn and listen and having a relationship with her was hard, fighting life and all the obstacles it threw at me. I honestly don’t know how I made it. I just needed a friend. That’s what helped me make it through. The friends I had. They didn’t last long, and the little care they provided carried me a long way.

I think at some point everyone expected me to unalive my parents and were surprised I didn’t. I know everyone remembers what my dad used to say. And how my mom didn’t help me. I know everyone looks at me as the better person but still not good enough. I see it, I feel it, I live it. I just keep my distance now.