A Girl Like Me 2.0

 

A girl like me overthinks.

A girl like me needs to realize that she doesn't need to have someone tell her that she's beautiful because she is.

A girl like me needs to not allow her insecurities to lie to her.

A girl like me should know her worth and not allow the unspoken words manifest in her mind.

A girl like me should not be afraid to have difficult conversations.

A girl like me needs to communicate her feelings to a guy like him.

A girl like me needs to understand that a guy like him is not like the other guys that hurt her.

A girl like me needs to realize that a guy like him will not know how a girl like me thinks and feels unless I share it.

A girl like me cannot assume that a guy like him will know what is wrong unless we have a conversation.

A girl like me needs to stop overthinking and just breathe.

A Girl Like Me

 

A girl like me never gets flowers.

A girl like me is always called sexy or hot.

A girl like me is never told she is beautiful.

A girl like me gets sent dick pics and not kind words.

A girl like me never gets asked out to dinner.

Guys only want to fuck a girl like me.  A girl like me never gets to have a relationship.  

Guys don't love a girl like me.

A girl like me starts to doubt our self worth.

A girl like me doesn't feel like they are loveable.

A girl like me feels used and tossed away like a used tissue.

A girl like me cries themselves to sleep because they wish they had someone to hold them.

A girl like me deserves better.  A girl like me deserves 100%.

A girl like me wishes that I wasn't a girl like me.

Losing Kate

 

Katherine Marlene was born at 16:16 pm on June 9, 2002.  She was a petite 7 pounds, 5 ounces and had a full head of hair.  She had big, beautiful eyes and long fingers.  She had a tiny little birthmark on her earlobe.  We knew she was a girl long before she made her appearance.  

As she grew, her personality really started to shine.  She was smart and funny.  She was also quite trying on the patience at times.

Her teen years started with her always wanting to succeed in school, bringing home straight "A"s without me even having to push.  She was always harder on herself.

Teenage Kate had her hard moments.  We struggled with her eating disorder and low self esteem.  We sought help on numerous occasions.  She attempted suicide once and was hospitalized.  Once we found the right treatment, she started to soar.

At the beginning of this September it all came to a halt.

Her move in day at the start of her sophomore year of college turned into a nightmare.  

She was raped by another student in his dorm room.  

She internalized the trauma for about ten days before she told me.  Ashamed and embarrassed, she didn't want to be judged.  As a rape victim, one tends to blame themselves and is often afraid to speak out.  A victim feels afraid of retaliation and also fear that they won't be believed.  A victim is in shock and is unable to fully process what has happened to them.

I finally talked her into reporting it and she went to the hospital to get examined.  During the exam, she vocalized wanting to die and they had to commit her to behavioral health for 72 hours.

After her release, she was exhibiting signs of delusions and hallucinations.  Her dad was concerned and brought her back to the hospital.  She has been diagnosed with psychosis.  She has been creating an alternate reality to hide from the trauma of the attack.

As a parent, I cannot explain how horrible it feels to have lost your child on top of knowing what she has been through to bring her to this point.  

She doesn't deserve this.... any of it.

I cannot visit her due to covid restrictions.  I cannot hold her and tell her that she will be alright.  I cannot take away any of her pain.  I couldn't protect her from the monster who did this to her.  I cannot wipe her tears.

When I talk to her, I don't know this Katie.  

I pray that I have not lost her.  I pray so hard.

I listen for any little hint that she's still in there somewhere.

I don't want to be losing Kate.

Dear Phil

I visited you today.  I brushed the leaves from your headstone.  Tears stung my eyes.  I has been so many years, my friend, but it seems like yesterday that I last heard you laugh.

I remember your smile and your kind eyes.  You tried to hide your hurt but I could see it.  I remember our talks.  I remember how you got me to laugh.  We were friends who shared a common battle.

You chose to end your battle with your demons and insecurities. I still struggle with mine.

I often wish that I as a better friend and wonder if I had only stopped living my life enough to hear your call for help.  If I only took that moment to be there for you.

It is one of my biggest regrets.

I stood at your grave to be with you for a moment, praying that you are at peace. 

Some day I will see you on the other side.

Help is available

Suicide Hotline

800-273-8255 

Hard to Hide My Crazy

 

Lately I find myself apologizing for my emotions and feelings.  In theory I shouldn't have to do that.

I am who I am and I do come with an amount of crazy.  I am not perfect.  I have tender feelings and am easily hurt.

There is large amounts of baggage that I am trying to work through but it is so hard.

There is so many layers of hurt feelings, mental abuse, trauma, and various other crappy things that lurk under my surface.  

I hate allowing anyone to get close because it has a tendency to surface and then I feel the need to apologize for it.

My insecurities come out and I question everything.  

I hate it.

Sometimes I think I need to come with a warning label,  

At the same time, I should be allowed to be me.  

I think we all come with certain levels of crazy.  We all have gone through shit we don't talk about.  

I do find myself wishing that I didn't feel the need to hide it.  It gets hard sometimes when I'm really tired or I have emotional overload.

My crazy comes out with jazz hands and a kazoo.

It's hard to hide it.

Unlovable

 

I feel so unlovable at times.  It's hard to explain but the feeling is real.

Some say I'm funny, smart, pretty and have a good heart.  I don't see that some times.  I see an unlovable person.

Men have left me, cheated on me, abused me and used me.

I have been left in the wake of the chaos wondering why.  I've been told that I deserve so much more than I've gotten but it never happens.

It becomes so hard to trust that the next one won't be like the others.  I am taken advantage of and tossed aside like a used tissue.

Wounds cut deep and they take long to heal.

Why would someone want to love a mess like me?

Who would be brave enough?

What would even attract them to my soul?

I know it is hard to believe that I think this way.  Feeling unlovable is an incredibly painful experience.  

We all deserve love and to love but it doesn't always happen like the fairy tales and that's kind of sad.

Therapy helps with dealing with my thought process at times but when my guard is down, I let myself feel a little self pity. 

When a person if feeling unloved, they usually believe that other people are the cause or source of the feeling.  IN reality, feeling unloved is ultimately the result of an unresolved conflict within ourselves.

No one is capable of fixing me, I have to figure out what unresolved conflict is in me and resolve it.

.

Little Girl Lost

 

I am often asked why I am still single.  I'm told that I am smart, funny, beautiful, fun, etc.  It is hard to explain to someone who asks why.  I know why.

I hesitate to write this as it may seem that I hate my family or others but it isn't true.  I love everyone.  (Well, not that crazy bitch...some of you know who I mean.)

In all seriousness, no one is really at fault for how I feel.  We cannot change the past but we can have an understanding of how things were and how we now deal with feelings and situations.

And with that being said....

I've been in therapy for awhile before I had a full understanding of why I choose men who abandoned me.  My therapist was very good at asking the right questions and interpreting my answers in order to help me stop the cycle.

After my last break up I was deeply hurt.  I thought everything was good and never thought that he would do what he did to me.  But he did.

I sought out help.

What I learned is why I am still single.

My choices in relationships all stemmed from my relationship with my parents.  I had learned that my mother was extremely narcissistic and controlling.  I was conditioned to understand that receiving her love was more like a transaction.  If I didn't conform to her wishes, her love was taken from me.  I saw her do it repeatedly to others and my biggest fear was losing her love for me.  

It was such a fucked up way to grow up.  I thought that if I was a certain way, I would be loved, not just by my mom, but by everyone.

I had met my aunt and uncle for lunch once and my aunt told my kids that I was such a loving child.  Every time that they would come to visit, I would run to them for hugs and kisses.  Tears stung my eyes.  Thinking back to those times I realized that I was such a love starved child, I just wanted to be hugged and feel unconditional love from someone.

I never was hugged by my mother.  Her hugs were always cheek to cheek.  I never heard praise.  It was usually a comment that "you could have done better" or she would make it a point to tell me that she always did it better.  

At the time I never thought it was a wrong way to be loved.  For me, it was normal.

When I became the age for dating and boyfriends, it became a nightmare.

I was in the mindset that love came with conditions and expectations and if those weren't met, then it wasn't love.  Being in relationships was always incredibly stressful for me.

My father was pretty stand-offish.  I do think my mom had some contribution to the relationship I have with my father.  She demanded that she came first and if I didn't chose her, there was always mental hell to pay.

I wish that my father was more caring.  It seems that he wanted perfect kids, correcting our English, no laughing at the table, no asking how our day was. (At least that is what I remember.)  He never hugged us or tucked us in at night.

My father always seemed to love everyone else.  He was always good to others, willing to help them and even hug them.  I held in so much anger because these people got the attention from my father that I had wished he had given me.

My parents fought verbally and sometimes physically.  

Not only did I have a fucked up view of love, my view of relationships was even more fucked up.

Again, at the time, it was my normal.  I figured that the Brady family was abnormal and no one really lived like that.

I cannot go back and redo my choices in relationships.  I am sad that I gave two men two very beautiful children and those men were incapable to see me needing their love.

I am thankful that my children didn't grow up not getting hugs and goodnight kisses.  I did make it a point to never let my kids grow up like I did.

I am also sad that I didn't get help sooner.

The difficult thing now is learning to accept love from others.  I cannot even explain how hard it is to allow people to love me without thinking that there is a condition attached to it.

I had been getting better.  I tell friends that I love them and I feel them love me.  I am even learning to love myself for the shit show I think that I am.

There was a huge set back recently that sent me into a tailspin.

My father was visiting.  I have always looked forward to seeing him as I thought we were working on the relationship that we have.  We have had talks about the past but I don't think he really understands the toxic environment that we were all in.

He had a little too many spirits and told some of my new friends that I was not a good person and that I was a "jerk".  That was so hurtful as I didn't want them thinking that I was just putting a fake side forward.

Someone walked in the club and he wrapped his arms around her and said how good it was to see her.  I held back tears.

He told people that I hadn't seen in 30 years that I didn't deserve the car that my son bought me.

I probably will never understand why he feels the way he does or why he doesn't see the hurt he caused me.  I also don't understand why he never took what we talked about to heart.

I love my dad but at the same time I don't want to let him hurt me anymore.

It's hard.

For most of my life I have feel like a very unlovable little girl just desperate for someone to love me.

As the same time, I have walls up so high because I don't want to keep being hurt.

I've been keeping to myself and licking my wounds as I have been doing for many years.

Someday I hope that someone will see me though a little hole in my wall and just love me unconditionally.  Because if they can do that, they would have all the love that I've been holding back.