I did ask permission before posting the above chat with my friend... She was reading my blog (so kind of you, by the way, Cari) and she referenced my post from yesterday. I responded quickly, without thought, and after a few drinks very late in the evening. I dislike my response greatly. I apologize, Cari... I answered like a twit, like Katherine Heigl would have answered in the voiceover at the end of a romcom, and no one should have to read Katherine Heigl's voiceover to themselves from a chat sent to them at 12:46 am. No one.
First of all, the quote in question:
"But the simple joy of waking up every day and living my life is so overwhelming, it has it's own face now."
Let me tell you a story.
June 16, 2016... This is a day that I'll never forget. This is a story I can only tell here, in this safe spot, where no one knows I write things except the people I choose to tell.
This is the day I broke. I am not always good with my finances, anyone that knows me well knows this about me. It's never an intentional issue, I just get ADHD'd out and forget things sometimes until I go to flip the switch and the light doesn't come on but the light in my head does and I realize oh shit, if I don't pay the lights they don't work, isn't that what adulting is all about?? Paying the lights???
I can completely understand a partner being upset when something big like lights or, say, rent (as was the case on June 16, 2016) is forgotten. I can understand being frustrated. I can understand not patting someone on the head and saying "There, there, little Lindsay... We didn't need a place to live anyway." It was not that severe, it just required a phone call and a payment to the owner of the house and a sincere apology to remedy, but still. I can definitely understand someone's frustration.
What I can't understand is how anyone that loves someone can scream so loudly that the phone can be placed on the dash while the receiver of the screaming is driving and still be heard clearly. What I can't understand is how words can so easily fall out of a mouth... words like cunt, and bitch, and waste, and burden, and phrases intermingled with those words like you ruin everything, you're failing your family, you're the worst thing, you, you, you youyouyou... What I can't understand, and what broke me that day, was the realization that these words, this tone, this exact situation-whether brought on by money or by unwashed clothes or dishes or unswept floors or being late coming home or any discrepancy at all had the same reaction. What broke me was the realization that I didn't have to believe it to be true. What broke me further was the realization that I had always believed it to be true.
I'm all about taking responsibility, and not being perfect, and working together as a team to remedy those imperfections so that we can grow and change for the better as people.
That day I decided I was done being a one man team. I was finished with the knot in my stomach as I drove home every single day, to a house with three people living inside, two that ran up to greet me with kisses and hugs every day and one that didn't move from his spot in front of the TV, then began a completely redundant list daily of things I did wrong or didn't do at all.
I was done believing that no one could ever want me because I'm overweight, because I'm too tall for a woman to be attractive, because I sometimes forget to pay a bill, because I have imperfections. Because I'll never be good enough.
June 16, 2016 was the day that I figured out once and for all that I'm fucking good enough.
So a better response, Cari, is this (and I know it's the very best of all of the responses because I'm typing it with tears streaming, and I've tapped into that part of myself that I am still working on, and that I occasionally find bits of floating around that need putting back together, and thank you for your late night message because now one of those pieces is rightfully back in it's little place.)
While having someone in my life now that also genuinely believes that I'm good enough, better, even, than I could ever give myself credit for, is very nice and peaceful and wonderful, he wouldn't be here without this realization...
I am fucking enough.
I am smart, and beautiful, and overweight, and tall, and beautiful, and smart, and capable, and brilliant, and one in seven billion and counting, and there is no one else that is me and that is fucking enough.
That belief, that knowledge, allows my eyes to close peacefully at night and open like a Disney princess in the morning and Beyonce should be jealous some days because my entire life changed with the one simple yet complicated realization that words are not always true and people we trust with our hearts are not always kind and trustworthy and we don't need them to give us worth in the first place so why, oh why, Cari, do we keep insisting on placing our self worth and value in the hands of someone else?? No one in the world is good enough to hold our self worth in the palm of their hands.
That, sweet Cari, is why I am overwhelmed with the simplicity of existing now. I hope I never lose sight of the sheer gift of waking up every day to peace, and joy, and quiet happiness with exactly who I am and exactly what I have and everything else just seems to fall into place.
Finding a love that appreciates that has value and worth on it's own, away from that, but that kind of love can never exist without self love first.
You'll get there... you're fucking enough, too.
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