To Mum and Dad…

If I was brave enough I would say….

I wish I could share that I wanted to end it all last year, I wish I could explain why, but the truth is I have no idea. I know I have always been the one in the family who’s been driven, who knew where she was going and nothing was going to stop her, who ticked all the boxes and got where she wanted in life – I had the dream job, the house, the master’s degree, the husband…. Everything I could have wanted by 30… but I wasn’t happy.

I know I haven’t really been able to articulate why I wanted to leave my husband to you, truth is I don’t even know how to put it in words, or how I knew I should have done it on so many occasions before I did it, how I felt ashamed when I finally had the courage to stand up for myself and follow my heart not listen to my head that just kept telling me to carry on and ignore the feelings I had deep inside. The unhappiness from being ignored, from not feeling like I mattered to someone, from being way way down the priorities of someone I would have died for, I would have done anything for, but they wouldn’t have done it for me. You think he fought for me, you think he tried to win be back,  but over ten years of sadness and misery, emotional abuse and being made to feel bad for my successes wasn’t really want I wanted anymore. I couldn’t sit next to someone ignoring me while they continued to play on their play station or watch sport or went out with friends time and time again leaving me behind, suggesting things to do with him – and him then booking them with friends, leaving me alone. Making me feel like I wasn’t important, that we weren’t a team, slowly making me feel less and less of the person I had been, making me feel like I didn’t matter and guilt for my successes.

I know you won’t understand, its impossible unless you are me, its impossible to even begin to understand myself sometimes. But I try, I try to do my best all the time. I was depressed before I even left, I didn’t realise it at the time, I didn’t even recognise the symptoms from when I had dealt with it before, but here I was alone for the first time in 13 years. Everything had changed and I had no idea what I was doing, but I knew it was the right decision. Because even sat alone In my rented room with my possessions around me, I didn’t feel as alone as I was sat on that sofa with someone who passive and disinterested in hearing about my day.

It’s not been easy at all since I left, I have had various health issues – mostly linked to my endometriosis of which have caused my weight to gain and me to look a fragment of myself, I know this, I recognise this, and I battle with the demons in my head al the time, the thing is these demons don’t just criticise my weight, they criticise every decision I have made or that I am yet to make. Id spent years putting so much pressure on myself to be the best at everything I didn’t know how to be the best at being me. I struggled, with weight, with expectation, with being single at 32 and not having a clue what I was doing anymore. Feeling like I was just becoming a disappointment to friends and family, unable to explain what was going on, because I didn’t have the right tools inside to even begin to actually know what it was that I was thinking or how to translate the jumbled mess of my mind into something coherent that I could share with people, let alone those most close to me. The ones I felt I had disappointed the most, my wonderful parents.

Its been hard because I still can’t communicate with you, I know I have shut off and shut down and struggle to even have a normal conversation sometimes… because in my head I have myself telling me I am a disappointment, a failure that I am not good at anything and that I should just give up…. And that’s the thing… last year I almost did give up.. and that’s what scared me most, it’s what I really really can’t tell you, its what I don’t want to admit to you of all the people in my life, because its you I would have hurt the most by doing it, its you that would have had to live with the consequences of my action and make sense of everything that I am still struggling to do.

But I didn’t do it, I sought help, I went to the doctors I asked for help, I got the medication I am having the counselling,  but it’s still so brutally hard sometimes to even remotely discuss because I can’t articulate how I am feeling or what I am feeling because I am still processing myself. Counselling is such a journey for me I have ups and downs,. It works some days and doesn’t the next. I am still terrified on a daily basis.

I saw you this weekend and for the first time in ages I had a day when I could control my inner voices, I could control the negative thoughts and emotions, I felt like me. I danced the night away – aware I am two stone plus overweight, I talked to people I wouldn’t have had the courage to before, I felt like a weight had lifted from me and I was me for once.  Not overwhelmed is thoughts and worries, but free. It was a feeling I hadn’t felt in so long, and it was amazing… I loved being that confident person. I know I had responsibilities and I need to find a job and I need to find my drive again but for once all that didn’t matter because I felt human again, I didn’t feel a disappointment, I felt I might have made you proud, for recognising a fragment of what I was before, way back when I was a little girl and able to just live free from judgement and self-criticism. I am far from the person I was but I found a glimmer of her again and knew I can and will be her again…

I don’t want to die, I don’t want to give up, I have been fighting tirelessly for three years alone and a few years before that. I know you think I don’t have passion for anything anymore, but I do – I have passion for myself and becoming an even stronger more veritable force than I have been before. Making the impossible feel possible, making the hurt into a positive, and making myself believe in my abilities.

I know you want the best for me, I know you want toes me succeed and to be who I was, but the truths I don’t want to be her anymore, I want to be stronger.

I am not giving up, I won’t let anything stop me if I felt like that I would have let myself go last year, to feel the peace I desired not keep fighting through the quick sand determined to end this constant battle against myself.

No-one knows more than me how far I am from my former self and no-one puts more pressure on me than I do and have done, just please love me and support me. Help me and listen to me. I will always want to do my best for you, I alway want to make you proud. I love you, you are my parents you have done so much to help me achieve what I have achieved so far, I just need you to know I am ok, and I will get there but I just need to find my own path and sort these battles. I am not giving up, I am not losing my passion, it’s just being redirected at the moment to help me.

I love you xxx