My brokenness – Part One

This being my first blog about my journey of divorce and creating a new sense of family, I feel my ‘starting point’ is somewhat blurred. Why? Because I want to share my current and powerful message of an extremely joyful life, where my family is healthy, vibrant and thriving. However, in order to let you know how we got to ‘here’, I feel I need to be transparent and share the painful and difficult start of this journey that over time gifted us with transformation and transcendence. So, I start with my brokenness of youth because this is the foundation from which we all start. If this part of my story grabs you in any way … hold on and read on … I promise you that there is hope, redemption and a new sense of love to live in what is my and possibly your endless story.

Have you ever felt so broken that you thought your problems were insurmountable, that you said to yourself, “my very being is the painful source and unfixable”? This fearful feeling of ‘being’ was one of my dark secrets that lived deep in the recess of my soul for many years. I didn’t talk about it to anyone, didn’t even mention it much to myself. My young adult life was one of pretense of which I was a convincing actress. I told myself that I was living in a broken world and accepted my dysfunctional relationships as normal and my dreams as unattainable.

I didn’t always feel this way. As a young child, I was a self-assured assertive (bordering on aggressive) girl that believed I could do anything. My core was one of joy, curiosity and boundless energy. And if things didn’t come easily, I naturally would try to force the issue thinking nothing of it. Out of four girls (me being number three in the order), my parents told me that I was the most ‘exhausting’ for them to raise. My parents were good people who loved their children but didn’t know how to love us the way we needed to be loved (ever feel that way?). I figured that out when I was older and able to see my parents as broken individuals who did the best they could with the upbringing they had.

My parents also said other things to and about me, of which I believed over time. Things like I was selfish, spoiled, stupid and self-indulgent. I needed to change who I was in order to be loved by them ~ or at least that was what I thought when I was little. So, I grew into a young woman  who had low self-esteem with feelings of being unworthy, unintelligent, unimaginative and certainly not loveable.

But, like I said, I was a good actress and appeared ‘healthy’ on the outside. I went to college and joined a sorority. The sorority was a significant changing point in my life because for the first time, I was exposed to women who came from healthy and loving families. These sisters knew how to love! It felt strange and awkward to be around them at first … all that hugging and laughter (certainly not a mainstay in my family). However, I became more than comfortable with it and it became one of my healthiest addictions in life.

My relationships with men were a different story. Out of the three long-term romances I had, two of them became alcoholics later in life, and one of them was very controlling, leaving me feeling I just wasn’t good enough. My feelings of inadequacy as a loveable woman continued.

Fast forward a few years and to make a long story shorter, I met my future husband, Doug (and father of my daughter, Madison), while working at a high-tech firm in Los Angeles. The stars must have been aligned and a few angels watching over me, because Doug was a genuinely good, kind, funny, intelligent and loving person. He was the first man to make me feel that I was intelligent and had something to offer the world. Most importantly, he made me feel loveable. He quickly became my best friend and I knew that he would make someone a wonderful husband and loving father.

So, we married and were happy for the first five years. What I failed to realize was that as long as I continued to secretly ‘loathe’ myself, no amount of Doug’s love was going to create ultimate happiness for us. That was a wave of brokenness that awaited me and unfortunately captured my family in its wake.