White
Picket Fence Syndrome
Finding
Myself Again After Heartbreak
TRIGGER WARNING: This blog post will share some very
personally intimate accounts of my life, and also could potentially trigger
someone who is struggling with addiction, mental health or has a past of rape
and sexual assault. Please proceed with caution.
I never thought I’d find myself in a position again,
where I was forced to be a single parent, AND attempt to let go of that dream,
while letting go of the person you once loved and gave your everything and all to.
You know, that dream where you are married, have a
house, settle down, have a big family. That dream didn’t include infertility
battles, raising kids as a single mom, let alone kids with special needs.
I think everyone has a perfect picture of what they want
in life, when they think about it growing up.
You know… white picket fence
syndrome. I wanted it all. I wanted to have the perfect life, the one that I
dreamed of having growing up.
I never thought I’d be able to have to let go of all
my hopes and dreams and must try to find myself and do it alone, without my
partner and best friend by my side.
My life growing up was anything but great. My mother and
father had split up when I was just a baby. My mother struggled with her mental
illness and drug addiction throughout most of my childhood. I remember very
small images of going to New York to see my father while he was incarcerated. I
remember visiting with him on the weekends, when I’d stay with my Aunty Tasha
and Uncle Scott. I remember that I was very young when my father stopped coming
around, and I remember being told that my father didn’t care about me.
My mom was in and out of jails until she would finally
hit her rock bottom with her addiction. Of course, this meant I was also in and
out of foster homes. I lived in the foster care system from age 7 until 17. On
and off, never having that stability I wanted. At one point, I even lived in a group
home.
The group home was nice, and at least it was a roof
over my head, but I never truly felt like I was loved and cared about. All of
this is probably why I have unstable relationships. Honestly, I tried to block away most of my
childhood, though the thing I probably remember most was that I was a sick
child (I had acute promyelocytic leukemia and went through chemo, radiation,
and ultimately an anonymous bone marrow transplant) and that I felt alone and
just wanted to be loved.
While my mother had her struggles with addiction, I
had struggles with just trying to feel loved, which meant I trusted way too
easily. I was raped and sexually assaulted by one of my mother’s boyfriends whose
literal job was to protect us. This went on for years, and me and my sister
didn’t talk about it. Not until years later when we ended up in a foster home.
They call it “white picket fence syndrome” for a
reason. My reason was simply wanting to be loved and wanting to have that “perfect”
lifestyle so badly, because of everything I experienced at such a young age.
WHITE-PICKET-FENCE-SYNDROME: A
state of mind where a person blindly holds on to the idea of their perfect
lifestyle, regardless of the inevitable life factors that make it impossible
for it to be true.
This is still a struggle that I struggle with today,
and after Matthew and I officially went our own ways because “he had moved on” I
can still hear that pain in my mind. Moved onto what? Another woman? I was so
easily given up on and discarded. WHY. Why would someone be with me for three
years just to easily discard me, especially when we had a son together.
I struggled with those harsh emotions again. I was angry.
Angry with God. Angry with the world. How dare I be blessed with a baby after
five years of infertility battles, just for that man to decide he didn’t want
me or a family anymore. I felt lost. So very lost. BUT, I knew that after the
years of emotional and sometimes physical abuse, that I was not ready to date
again for a while. I knew that I needed to heal and needed to find myself.
The journey to finding myself was tough. I won’t lie.
I had to learn to let go of a lot of things. I didn’t get answers to many things.
I had to learn that feeling angry was an okay feeling to be. I think that the
best thing was that I had already established counseling, so I was able to work
with my therapist on EMDR or trauma therapy, and it was a good time, because
like with death, when you end a relationship unexpectedly, it can be triggering
to past trauma, because there is a grief cycle to this too. I had to learn it
was okay to be selfish. I had to learn that it was okay to do things for myself
that made me feel happy. I had to learn that some things I cannot control.
I think that the most confusing part to all of this
was the court battles, but fortunately, our son was young enough to not
remember.
Matthew and I broke up in August 2017, but we were
still ‘seeing’ each other about once a month until May 2018 (and by seeing, I
mean occasionally having sex) which was when he met his now fiancée.
Apart of the healing process (which I am still on
because its only been about a month) was accepting that my son would be raised
by another woman too. I think that is something that bothered me the most,
because I was my sons’ mother, and I can never be replaced. I guess I just feel
bitter because I was the one who fought for him to be here healthy and safe after
everything I had gone through. I was the one who took SIX shots a day during
nine months of pregnancy. I was the one who had paid upwards of 25K in
treatments for infertility, recurrent pregnancy loss, genetic testing, and immunology.
I was the one who did it all because I wanted my son, so so badly. So, I felt a
bit bitter and so I had to accept that there would be another woman in my son’s
life, and that was a hard thing to cope with.
I think a month after this has all finally hit me, and
I can look at it from a different view point. The best thing that Matthew did
for me, was deciding to move on. Mostly, because I was the type of girl (and
still am) who holds on for dear life, refusing to give up on someone she loves,
because she knows how that feels. I guess that goes right back to the whole
white picket fence syndrome thing, because I know how bad it feels to be given
up on.
I love my son so very much. I adore him. And trying to
co-parent and ultimately do what is best for him, is very hard. Its super hard
because I am also trying to find myself in this whole thing and am trying to
see the light at the end of the tunnel. But, I don’t see it yet. And, I have to
wonder what God is truly doing here, because I am unsure if and when I’ll
understand his lessons.
I think I will close todays blog with this.
Don’t be like me. Don’t believe that there is this “white
picket fence” out there, where life is perfect. Everyone has their own perfect
life story, and each is individual, and I am learning that each is without
fights, disagreements and that sort of thing. I am learning through all of this
to be selfish, and to be who I am, and to find myself again. I am learning to
love myself. So, my advice to my readers is to love yourself. Because you will
need to know you are worth so much more than you think, especially on days like
today, where it is dreary outside, and I feel sad, lonely, and alone. Make your
life what you want it to be.
I hope this time next year; my life is in a much
better place.
Born: June 25th 2009
