Trying to find balance

Tonight, I’m just hurting.  But I’ve been secretly hurting for a while now.  There are no words that can explain why I am feeling hurt and I can only hope it will come out as I type.

I just want to cry, just have an all-out ugly cry.  I want to go away for a few days into the woods and just be still in complete silence.  My heart aches and my mind is elsewhere.  In the mist of the realities I am dealing with on my own, no one has a single clue how difficult it has been.  Yet, I smile and say it’s all good just to avoid further questionings.  I’m not one to ask for much because it always seems like I’m in someone’s debt and I’m buried underneath debt of my own. 

Every day I am trying my best and every day I know I’m missing something or several things.  I try to backtrack and figure out where did I fall off and why.  Some days I just feel like I must be someone I don’t feel like I am and every day I’m fighting to just be myself but at the same time I struggle to be.  Conflicted? BIG TIME.  I’m in an unfamiliar place and having a hard time trying to determine am I safe or not?

Things have been going “well” for me but at the same time I honestly feel like I’m failing as a parent.  I am still struggling with the things that have happened and even though it has been a few years, it just bothers me to the core.  While I understand there’s nothing that can ever change what happened, but I’m just having a hard time coming to terms with it.  I honestly felt betrayed all around and still do.  I feel like every time I take a leap of faith, something bad happened.  I feel like, no matter what I do it’s never good enough.  In the end, I’m to blame for everything and yet I’m the one for why things went the way they went.  It’ll always be like that no matter what.  It’s also the reason why I’m pulling away and staying to myself more these days.  It’s either you in my corner or you’re not.  I know the choices I’ve made and knew what I would be faced with and knew just how hard it would be.  They question I would ask is are you to help or make it difficult?  If it’s both, then no, I have no patience for it.  Either be understanding or not.  If not, yeah it’ll be easy to walk away.  But don’t rub into my face or compare me how your life is better and how it would have been.  All I know, is just lies – yet I can see right through it all.  Guess, I’m not worthy enough to know the truth and that hurts.

Now, I’m finally surrounded by the right group of people and I don’t know why I still feel like I don’t deserve any of it.  Yet, I’m told I do deserve it and I guess I do but I think after years of dealing with a lot of negativity and lord knows fighting it back with all my might, I’m just having a hard time believing in myself again. 

I’ve been snappy and in an “I don’t care” mode because my son who is ADHD doesn’t always follow directions well and I get a lot of shit for it but I take it and say, “You know what, you’re not me and you have ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA what I have to deal with daily.”  I don’t get that break to be an adult as often, I don’t get that break to be alone often, I don’t get that break to “have fun” – I just don’t even know what fun is anymore.  I’m always paying bills, watching my account dwindle down to under $100 before the end of the month. I can’t do much but fight every day to keep going and figure out a way to save.

Yes, I am stressed out.  No, I’m not going to smile and pretend the day is great.  I did that for so long and now I’m like I just can’t do it anymore.  It’s easier to hide the pain with a smile than to show it and have a million and one questions being asked if you’re okay.  Sometimes, it’s just hard to truly express how deeply I have been hurting for because for reasons unbeknownst to me, I may still be hurting from something then get hit with something right after and I haven’t even fully come to healing from what previously happened. Then it’s like one tidal wave after another, you’re fighting against an angry sea trying to survive each tidal and your emotions – they’re pushed to the side because you’re in survival mode. When the tidal waves start to slow down and come to a sudden stop and you’re no longer in survival mode, all those emotions come rushing back in and your poor heart just doesn’t know how to deal, how to cope, how to process and how to conquer each hurt that had time to build up while in survival mode.  Your mind is there but not there. You’re present but not fully. Just in a state of shock.  It hurts to breathe some days and others it just hurts to feel. Hence, you may find “Numb” by Linkin Park on my playlist, “Just Like a Pill” by Pink, “Bring Me to Life” and “My Immortal” by Evanescence, “Breakaway” by Kelly Clarkson, “Fix You’ by Coldplay and a few more.

Depressing? Well, living life with it can be a challenge and staying positive is an uphill battle on some days. Other days, I’m good and my playlist is different.  I think as soon as I start to settle into something that is “good” that is when everything catches up to me.

The last two years, I’ve been back to back with court, cps, counseling, training and starting a new job almost a year ago.  I didn’t even have time to process how I even manage to get through it all.  My feelings are still raw and feel ignored. “Come on Gloria, I need you to focus here…. it’s behind you, move forward!” I wish it was that simple.  I do, really.  I just process things differently.  I always try to find the good in the bad and try to make sense of it all.  But at the same time, finding myself in once again unfamiliar territory.  I always need to know where I am or else I’m not going to feel like I belong or truly fit in or even comfortable.  When I don’t know where I am or where I stand, it will be obvious that I’m uncomfortable and/or uneasy.  Sometimes, it’s just me trying to find myself.  It’s like searching in the dark but having to learn how to trust your own gut and feelings again, more importantly how to have faith in yourself.  My faith in God remains strong, it’s just that when you go through so much in life its only human to feel like your life has so little meaning when you’re a diamond in the rough.  It’s hard to believe that better days are ahead but in the moment, you just can’t quite see it or sense it.

I may have survived a lot in my life and not many know exactly how much I’ve been through.  I’ve been that girl who OD on pills and no one knew. I’ve been that girl who was sexually assaulted not once not twice not even three times. I’ve been that girl who had to beat the crap out of the abusive boyfriends my mother had.  I’ve been that girl who been stalked by drug dealers.  I’ve been that girl who’ve been used in the most degrading way. I’ve been that girl who have loved only to be told she’s not worthy of any relationship in not so many words. I’ve been that girl who was put into a position to go up against my personal beliefs to make someone feel better but it was my faith that got me out. I’ve been that girl who will not ask for help because when I did, it never came or some believed I didn’t need it yet when I didn’t need it people did what I wanted to do on my own.  I’ve been that girl who fought physically, mentally and emotionally for years.  I’ve been that girl who had to bury three baby sisters. I’ve been that girl who had to bury her mother and grandmother. I’ve been that girl who watched her father walk out and never turning around to say “bye”.  A lot of heartaches, so when I say I get it, I truly get it.  As a woman, today I can honestly say I’ve been to hell and back more times I would like to say and it’s tiring.

Now, as a mother, my son has his uphill battles and I’m watching it eat him up because he refuses to deal or cope or face it. And I know it’s not easy for him.  I know he’s trying.  But there are days where it’s a shouting match and we both end up in tears. It’s because the pain is so great that it hurts the both of us.  Yesterday, was one of those days and where I just lost it. My son refuses to tell me what’s bothering him and instead choose to act out… shaking my head… instead I just got straight to the point and yeah it was painful to talk about but I can’t deal with my own kid saying he wants to kill himself on more than one occasions.  The first time he said that I ended up in a nervous breakdown because he was only 6 and ½ and what child would say that… what I didn’t know was he was holding back things that had been happening to him and things that had happened when I wasn’t around until it came out in counseling sessions with him.  More heartbreaks for me.  For him, it’s been hard.  I cannot tell you how awful of a parent I felt and no matter how many said I was a good mom, I couldn’t help but feel some sense of responsibility for it.  I couldn’t help but feel I didn’t do enough to protect him.  I couldn’t help but feel betrayed and lied to.  I couldn’t help but feel like I should’ve followed my gut because I knew something wasn’t right.  No matter how much praises I’ve gotten to say I was a good mom, it didn’t do anything to take away those thoughts and emotions.  It’s like I just knew it was a bad decision, but I took a leap of faith and my kid, my own son comes back 360 in a negative mindset towards everything including himself.

He’s a sweetheart, he’s smart and handsome. He’s caring and polite. But like any kid he’ll have his bad and good days.  With his ADHD, he’s a handful and I had him on a behavioral plan and I guess I’m still pissed off that it wasn’t respected and followed through when he wasn’t with me.  My life was a bit more manageable and on a schedule which I knew he needed to strive and focus.  These last two years, I’ve been fighting to get him back onto a schedule and I can’t even accomplish that because I was thrown off my own schedule.  I know I need to find a balance somewhere and find a way to get on a schedule that is doable for both of us.

Being a working single mom isn’t easy.  I’m blessed to have the flexibility with my job as no other job would not offer the level of flexibility I have now.  I met another single mom and even she said she only works jobs that provide flexibilities because she herself has a son with a disability.  But like her, we both shared the same story lines.  It’s sad because there are some single moms out there willing to work with their child’s father to have them included without any drama, but for some they choose to make the moms look crazy or in a bad manner when all they are doing is leaving a door open for them to have access to their own child.  But I guess, that’s not viewed like that. I try to make sense of it all and I tried, I did but I’m so done, so done.  I made all the efforts and arrangements and as a payment I got blamed and put down in so many ways while pretending to care about me... ha! Never again. Never again.

I don’t like secrets and I don’t like liars.  If I call you out, I call you out but when I truly care about you and I must call you out, man it hurt’s like hell to do so and I find no pleasure in that. None.

This is the first time I’ve wrote something in so long and it’s been weighting me down to not write. My mind has been trying to get things done, but I haven’t had time to sit down and just write. Being strong is one thing but it comes with a cost. I don’t give up easily but when I really wanted to there was always a voice that said, “Keep going. You’re not alone”.  Even when I have been beyond exhausted and I just want to rest and cry at the same time, same thing. So, no matter what, I know I got angels watching over me and whether they are in spirit or in human form, it’s a lifeline for me.  Sometimes, when I least expect things, I’m naturally shocked and speechless because good things don’t always happen but when they do, I’m humbled and thankful.

I try my best to make the most of life, but I have forgotten what it is like to enjoy life because I’ve been so busy trying to build myself up as well as my son up.  It has not been an easy task but nothing is.  I like to have things be simple and straight forward. I like to have my house back to being organized and clean – which is why I’ve been trying to get the laundry and clothes all cleaned and ready to be put away into the closets and dressers.  Then I can have my bedroom floor back.  Plus, I need to get all my papers organized as I had to pull documentations constantly to be mailed out or hand delivered.

I am in the middle of getting in my driving lessons and trying to gain more freedom to be mobile.  You need to have a car if you live in WNY.  I will need to figure out how to budget for a car and all, but I am hoping with additional practice I can be alright.  I think next Saturday I’ll do my five-hour course. This way I will have it out of the way and just go for the road test when I am done with the lessons.  Life can get a bit overwhelming, but I hate to say when I am overwhelmed. I really do. Well it’s late and I got to be up early.  Peace.