52 Verbs--Permit, Admit and Renewal

I have had three major relationships in my life.  The first was with my my high school sweetheart.   I was young, dumb and had just graduated from high school.  I thought that I knew everything that there was to know about life.  I married him the month that I should have started to college.  I went from a warm cocoon of a family to a survival of the fittest kind of a situation.  I was there when his affair began.  She was a senior in high school and was married.  They lived behind my sister and brother in law's house and all three couples did things together.  It was at square dancing lessons

I am going to give you a minute to compose yourself.  

Really....stop laughing.

that I realized that they were always pairing up.  Then I saw them kiss.  She even told me that she loved him.  I would not leave.  I had no point of reference for leaving.  My parents and all of my relatives had always been married to the same person.  So leaving was not an option to me.  Instead, I permitted him to treat me badly. 

So...he left me at my parents home.  ~laffin~  I guess he thought that I could not find my way home.

We got a divorce.  He got a new wife and baby.  I got bitter.  

I was not a happy person and it showed.  I had a dead end job in a tiny little town. Raising my beautiful daughter with no sign of love in sight.

Then he came back.  All sugar and sweet.  Paid off my car.  Loved his daughter like he should.  Told me what a horrible mistake he had made and he worked at regaining my trust.  Oh how he worked at it.  For years he worked at it.  I permitted him back in. 

Loaded up the U-Haul and the daughter that did not WANT to be loaded up and off we went!  The happy family back together.  Eventually along came a son.  That exploded into knowing about the another girlfriend and her pregnancy.  I must admit he really learned how to do that better.  I did not begin to suspect until the end.  So now I have a newborn baby, a 10 year old daughter, town without family and not enough job skills to get a good enough job to even pay my rent.  I told him I would take him back.  I again permitted the behavior.  He did not come back.  Thank God for unanswered prayers.

I went back *home* and waited for him to jump on his white horse and save me.  That poor little girl was so clueless.  Eventually the scales began to fall from my eyes and I saw the whole thing for what it was.  I begin to realize my value thanks to some wonderful women who drug me along when I could not seem to put one foot in front of the other.

I admitted to myself he was not coming back.  I admitted to myself that something in ME had to change.  I raised my babies....went back to college...got a career.  I moved forward.  I let go of the bitterness.   If that divorce did nothing else but help me to get release that bitterness, it was totally worth it.  I became happy.

Flash forward 20 years.  I entered in to a relationship that I never ever dreamed that I would get into.  I was in love.  I would say even deeper than the first two times.  I slipped back into some old patterns and chose to believe the words over the actions.  Want to woo me?  Give me beautiful words. Make me prpromises I want to hear.  Tap into my insecurities of being alone and assure me that you will always be there.   I permitted them even thougt there began to be no follow through with the words.  I eventually woke up and took my life back.  Words woo me....but damn....actions will keep me or lose me.

Boundaries that you set yourself can be such good and healthy but can hurt.    You know it is for the best but it is like carving words into your arms and watching yourself bleed.  

Then you decide that you that the blood is not so bad if it will eventually lead to the healing.

Then my friends intervened and held on to me.  My life coach pushed me out of the nest.

 I flew.  

Renew- to make like new : restore to freshness, vigor, or perfection.  

That is what I am doing.  That is what others are helping me to do. I am working on my bucket list. I am creating, remodeling and planning to travel.  I am taking risks and living my own life.

I have gone from a scared little girl watching her husband kiss a married woman from across a dance floor to a woman who is truly happy with her life.  

I would not have changed a thing.  All of the relationships taught me something.  Especially my last one.  I will forever be grateful.  

I can honestly tell you that I am happier right now than any other time in my life.  I am hungry for what is coming.  I am excited.  I feel sparkly on the inside. 

I am one of the lucky ones.



 ....~singing~  I'm leaving on a jet plane, don't know when I'll be back again.