The way you look at me isn’t the same, since the first time you called me that name.

The truth is, I’ve taught you how to treat me. The truth is you’ve learned how to mistreat me.

You said it in so many words but what I got was what I deserved, it was my fault that you were perturbed.

I’ve felt it when you’ve been annoyed, I’m often left with a deafening void.

The more hurt that continues, the more things change. The more you grow ruthless than leave me to blame.

So now through the years as the pattern’s set in, we’re now left with a fight we can’t possibly win.

The resentment and hurt, deeply ingrained, the love in our hearts will never be the same.

Written August 7th, 2008 (ripped from a small notebook, untitled)

When I stumbled upon this poem in a drawer, I was sent back to a scary place in time. It was a time when I was still torn between love and fear. I was paralyzed even though I knew what I needed to do, I still wasn’t ready.

I don’t mean just not ready but actually I wanted to be sure I’d exhausted every effort to save my marriage so that my girls would have every chance to come from a stable, single home family. Looking back, that time taught me what it meant to live with intention and purpose. Forced to ignore abusive remarks and actions in a effort to keep the peace, I was disintegrating.

I tried everything I could think of to keep things afloat amidst a financial crisis, real estate crash, being a mother of two small kids, owning a salon and trying to be a wife and a hairstylist all in a days work. Still I showed up for the task everyday that my back wasn’t out. All jokes aside, I had a high bar set for my performance on every front.

I was smart enough to know I wasn’t and couldn’t be, or have it ALL. My hard work and generosity paid off in the long standing relationships I built with my clients and staff over those years and they kept my feet on the ground and my head on straight.

Not going to lie, there were days I’d go on auto pilot, stealing moments of joy only with my girls and my favorite clients who’s lives I loved to live vicariously through. I kept my unhappiness to myself and suffered only in silence except to my older sister. I never wanted to burden anyone with my sadness. So instead I wrote poems, as this example above,I have a dozen more.

It was a beautiful client who came in late one night and she’d known me for years who really first mentioned, I didn’t seem to have the same light in my eyes. I’ll never forget her words because I felt as if the light had been taken out of me. Gave me shivers to think someone could see that or even care to notice. I wasn’t happy but I was pretending to be and I was exhausted. I was terrified what anyone would think if I were to complain or admit I was tired and that everyday was a struggle to keep my chin up. I was the one who had to keep all the plates spinning and keep everyone smiling. How could I let everyone down like that even for a week.

So, I didn’t let everyone down, but I did start to take more time for myself to rest. I started studying about boundaries and self care, remembering these were all practices that had transformed my earlier years. I’d simply lost touch with my daily practices and didn’t honor and respect them.

Boundaries are like muscles, if you don’t work them they atrophy. People slip back to bad habits and behaviors and they don’t work on building strong ones as life evolves and things and people change. Truth is when you change it makes the others around you have to change and some people don’t like that much, you know what I mean.

I got rest, I kept up my self care, I kept writing, exercising, looking for the joy and beauty around me every day. I found the work of Eckhart Tolle and A New Earth 🌏 and I got silent enough to see that I deserved to be at peace. To choose joy and health and vitality for me and my girls and when the courage came it came before my confidence, I can tell you it did…and I acted…still not sure how I did it, but that was when I could breathe again.

The journey was another chapter but looking back today after finding this poem in a drawer, I can only say, thank God for showing me the way. I write this today to say anyone who is suffering in a relationship and struggling with the truth inside of them, take my advice start with some rest. Know that you are worth it, know that you are not alone and that you deserve better and someday will have it. Keep your vision on what it is you want and what it is that you know you deserve. It all starts with love for yourself. #loveyourself #longlostpoem