Menewsha Avatar Community - Childhood Dreams

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I think every little girl's dream is to be just like her Mommy. Mine encouraged me to be more and I tried to fulfill all of her drams for me: Good grades, Good girl, College graduate, respected others and loved above all.

I rushed away all the days and all the years. Some remarked that I had an old soul; I suspect this may be true. All I can remember wanting was what I considered the perfect family life in the same town I grew up in. I never lost this focus from way too young of an age. For my sixteenth birthday, I wanted a hope chest from my grand parents. It was beautiful and I adored it. I adored looking at it and polishing it and filling it with memoirs and items I already started to collect for my future home. I had already been dating the same and only boyfriend for two years and already dreaming of the perfect wedding and the perfect life we would have. I would be the best wife and Mom ever.

I would have forfeited going to college if it weren't for my parents and grand parents. I'm glad that they instilled me with the importance of education, even though none of them had gone to college. For me, being just like them would have been enough. Looking back, I don't know how I could have missed the unhappiness, in my Mom's eyes especially, but also in my Dad's. I knew one thing I wanted to be different though. I did not want my husband to be a drinker. If I only knew that I could have and should have had so many more qualities that would make us compatible and true partners for life.

I went off to college in 1991 with a diamond engagement ring on my finger; crying my eyes out because I didn't want to leave home. I did well academically at college and kept myself pretty socially isolated from the rest of the campus by choice. I never felt like I fit in. I traveled home every weekend to see him or he would come up and see me. Meanwhile, I fantasized about marrying my high school sweet heart in the big, perfect church wedding and moving into a small apartment that I would make into a dollhouse with all of the treasures I'd collected in my hope chest. I pictured us working hard by day and loving and being one with another by night and ever day off we had. I would cook dinners, pack lunches, keep the house tidy and entertain friends and family. Yes, I agree I watched too much Brady Bunch as a kid!

What was I thinking? What was I looking for? Safety, Love, Loyalty...but mostly just to be loved, cherished and adored by one person for the rest of our lives.

I read my Bible and prayed to God that through marriage I would find happiness and the other half to make me feel whole. To finally feel that I fit in and was where I was supposed to be...

I never learned to be comfortable and love myself for being me. I counted on a husband and later kids to make me feel complete. Instead of making myself happy and finding passion; I made others happy and settled for stability in place of passion.

I'm not sure exactly when I realized that I had gotten almost exactly what I wanted and yet was unhappier than ever. I made mistakes along the way, but with good intentions... searching for this unconditional and undying love within the destiny I had already chosen.

Almost exactly a year after we were wed, I became a Mom and even as happy and as in love with my baby that I was: I was again depressed and lonelier than ever. I spent way too much time taking care of our baby alone while my husband was always busy doing something else that in his eyes was important. It was this year that I first underwent treatment and medication for depression. I was hoping for a miracle pill and for a while it seemed to work. The crying lessoned; I started exercising and taking pride in my appearance again. This would be the first of many increasingly worse cycles of depression while trying to mask my problems and numb myself to the pain with medication/ drugs. You see, it wasn't my first time being depressed. It was my first time seeing a doctor about depression.

I had been depressed many times before ever knowing what the term really was. At first the adults in my life called it separation anxiety and then nervous stomach (when I'd spend almost every day of elementary school in the nurse's office). Later, it was a Stage and then I was just Moody and eventually I began to just think of myself as a bitch. Yes, I was called this...but who wasn't? It was me who internalized all these statements and made them true. I was used to being misunderstood. My shyness, anxiety, moodiness, longing to be alone, not wanting to hang with friends...all were equal to me being a bitch in somebody's eyes. These eyes aren't important though and I place NO BLAME, because only my eyes and seeing myself this way can cause this kind of pain.

My daughter turns ten and our eleventh anniversary is in less than two months. When I look around at where I am and where I've been, I realize that the more things change...the more things really stay the same.

I'm still lonely and depressed and still looking to others to make me happy. I'm lost in the past and stuck in a cycle of worthlessness.

I don't want my daughter (or my son) to grow up and be like me...like Mommy. In another eleven years, will this shell of a person still be crying the same sad story or will I somehow muster up the courage, wisdom and belief in myself to make a change?