holding myself back--my messy beautiful

i was always told i was too much, too intense, too talkative. my nickname was 'bug' because i wanted to talk to my parents instead of let them read their newspaper. i was reading and discussing the newspaper at age 3, asking questions about the Holocaust; reading chapter books at age 4. i was independent, feisty. i would wake up at the crack of dawn and then wake them up soon after coloring a picture to relay my ENTIRE dream from the night before, IN DETAIL. i was good at everything i tried, but never felt like i was. i got good grades and got into every college i applied to. it felt like my parents wanted super humongous things for me; lawyer, doctor or somehow doing big things to help the world, and i just wanted to write and learn about the world. sometimes i feel like i've totally let everyone down because now i'm "just" a stay at home mom. there is no way to tell my whole story about what makes it messy beautiful in one blog post. probably not even ten. i would probably be able to write a book about it and i'd still be cutting parts out. 

my little family

i have started writing this post a hundred times. what story would be the best one to write to represent why my life is messy beautiful? how can i make whatever story i choose the right length without leaving out too much? how do i isolate one part of my story without telling the rest? my life has been filled with beauty. it's been filled with sorrow and ugly. i've listened to myself and i've ignored myself. i've loved and i've lost. i've tried to be the person i think others want me to be. one thing remains true: all of it is okay, except being anyone but myself. 

i learned too late that when we deny what we know to be true, our lives becomes confusing. i spent years trying to be the person i thought i was expected to be. i spent years trying to figure out why the person i felt i was didn't match with what others saw me as. i closed myself up and felt completely lost in my life. i stumbled through my days. while my life felt like it was literally crumbling around me, people on the outside had no idea. when my husband and i split up for the first time or the fifth time, people were puzzled because i was able to put on such a good act about us being so happy. this is not something that you learn over night. this is something perfected over time. when the thing that we know we are doesn't match with what others see us as, we get confused and feel like we are wandering the desert unsure of which direction to walk in. it became easier to just go along with it and i had became a shell of myself. 

i am all of the experiences i have had in my life. there is no way to be one without the other. some stories may weigh more heavily than others in defining who i am. many years ago, i decided i was going to go to therapy. in my first session we went through a bunch of background questions and she took PAGES of notes. my next session she asked me, as she flipped through the PAGES of notes, "so, okay. where do YOU think we need to start?" and i said to her, "isn't that your job? that's why i'm here. but, if i had to answer, i'd say the beginning. because one led to the other." she looked at me blankly and let's just say i never went back. 

(i love this james baldwin)

my story is beautiful because of who i've become because of it. my children are a huge part of my life, but they are not where i have struggle. it's been messy because i have let others define for me who i am and therefore i have gotten in my own way. none of what has happened or i have done makes me any less unlovable. it can feel so lonely to feel like you're not lovable. the truth is i am and if someone is truly uncomfortable with my story and they don't know how to handle it all, they aren't worth my love. and to be loved unconditionally is the only thing i've ever really wanted. i've been searching externally and i've finally turned inward. 

i am a sister and a daughter. i am a mother, aunt and friend. 

i was a victim of rape. my messy beautiful is becoming a mom at age 18. 

my messy beautiful is marriage, divorce. two more babies, post-partem depression and another marriage. now another divorce. it is parenting four children, one with autism. it is fighting for what is right for your kids. it is confusion. it is learning that by removing what confuses, it opens up to clarity. it is finding my strength when all seems lost. it is knowing and loving and adoring each and every one of my four unique kids. it is making the choice to accept responsibility, even when i want to blame. it is coming out of darkness in search of light. it is pure devastation and crawling under my covers. it is coming out of those covers because of hope and possibility and light. it is speaking my truth, as uncomfortable and painful as it may be for me and others. it is friends and family who are there at all moments, beautiful and ugly. it is losing everything yet coming out with far more valuable things with no monetary value. it is being left and not feeling good enough most of my life, yet learning i am lovable and wanted and beautiful, even though. EVEN THOUGH i have not lived a perfect life as it aligns with society. (i am still working on this one!) it is admitting i am taking on too much. it is not needing to be perfect anymore.  it is learning to trust myself. it is saying i am worth it and believing it. it is finding my own worth when everything else is gone and i am stripped down to my naked real me. it is loving myself (and even my curly hair, which i hated for years). 

when i told my grandparents that i was pregnant at 18, it took me FOUR HOURS on a hot July day. my grandma was scared because she'd heard the kkk was making a comeback and my child was going to be half black. my grandpa cal looked around the room and he said, "She's going to be fine. THEY are going to be fine." since then, i've had a number of dreams where i'm climbing a ladder or a bridge. i can't see where it is going and when i look back behind me, there's my grandpa cal. and every time he tells me, "keep going. you can do it. you're going to be fine." 

:my messy beautiful is ME:

 http://momastery.com/carry-on-warrior

This essay and I are part of the Messy, Beautiful Warrior Project — To learn more and join us, CLICK HERE! 
And to learn about the New York Times Bestselling Memoir
Carry On Warrior: The Power of Embracing Your Messy, Beautiful Life, just released in paperback, CLICK HERE

 

falling apart or falling into place?

i can't even pretend anymore that i'm not having a hard time. it seems the kids are falling apart at the seams. if i didn't hear another whine in my life i would be forever grateful. that goes for fighting too. i try really hard to have patience with them, yet lately it is all i can do to keep from shutting myself in my room until tomorrow.

the imminent divorce that i hoped would never happen is happening. tuesday we go to (hopefully) finalize the whole thing and then i can really start to move forward and heal more and just be semi-normal with everything else. there's just so much on my mind right now that has yet to be dealt with that i'm trying really hard to not have anxiety over the whole thing. this is just about the hardest thing i have ever had to do. after months and months of trying and praying and hoping, i finally had to file for divorce in october. even then, there was some 'maybe this can still work out' times. as much as i know he doesn't want the divorce, i couldn't see a way that we could make it work. i feel like we are too broken, like a vase that is smashed into millions of shards of glass. it could happen, but would take years and years and YEARS of tedious work. i just couldn't anymore. my heart broke; i know i have to just look ahead to what is coming. i'm due for something great, really. it's only logical that after so many hard years and so much hardship, that greatness comes next.

but these kids. what do i even DO about them? it has been a tremendously long winter here in minnesota and it feels like we have been on top of each other all winter long. as i write, we are getting even more snow. really though i think it's the stress and the hardship this divorce has caused all of us. it makes me feel so bad, realizing the divorce that i filed for, could be causing so much pain in my sweet babies. i have to be honest with myself and not forget the pain i endured within my marriage and remember that they suffered from that, too. i keep telling myself that these kids just need to know they are safe, they are loved, they have what they need: warm house, good food, each other, their mom and other family and they still have their dad. they don't have to pick. sometimes they say, "i'm on mommy's side" and then the other will say, "i'm on daddy's side." and i just tell them, "you don't have to pick a side. you can love us both, we will always be your mommy and your daddy. and we both love you guys." SO HARD. they just don't need to feel so insecure about life. they are too little and precious. i don't know where they pick this stuff up from, but i sure know it's not me. the other day, my five year old told me he wanted to go into Johnny Test and go back to the future and make a new mommy who will buy them as many toys as they wanted and then replace me with his new mommy. (okay this was pretty funny actually).

it doesn't feel good though, to be so stressed that you can't even decide what shirt to put on. or to not realize what day it is five times in the same day that two minutes before you knew it was saturday. i don't want to feel like i've given up on things. it hurts like crazy to not have a whole family like it's been...the funny thing is we weren't even really complete. we were always apart. someone always seemed to be missing for one reason or another. and no family should function only when one person is not there. although i miss the whole family being together thing, i missed that before since it was never all of us all together. i only have four years until my oldest is off to college. i need to make the most of his last four years at home. i need to figure out what i'm going to do to sustain us. looking for a job in the midst of a divorce after being a stay at home mom for 5 years is a lot harder than i thought it would be. somehow my degree and experience just doesn't account for much after that long.

what i'm looking forward to is peace. calm. order. togetherness. planting my garden and watching it grow and harvesting it. at the same time, figuring out how to help my kids have peace and love during this whole thing. i want to paint and write and just be. while my patience is running short and i feel stretched beyond all possibility, i know i can do this. i know i will be okay and they will be, too. now if only to figure out how to start waking up before everyone else to have my coffee and sit in silence for a few moments each morning. . .