Originally posted 2014-03-20 13:54:08.
The traitor. That’s the label set upon me because I chose to date out of my race. In the eyes of those that oppose of my relationships I am worse than those who I choose to date. Didn’t deserve the breath God gave me. I am ok with that. I realize I can’t please everyone with my actions. My courage is not one for the history books but it belongs in my history books.
I was the black sheep of the family. My bio-fathers side of the family chose to disown me. Hell I can remember calling his house the day my daughter was born to tell him Happy Birthday, after all she was born on his birthday. A female answered the phone. I asked for my father, she was confused and told me he didn’t have a daughter only a son. Ha ha, Should I have looked down my pants to make sure what I was born with was actually what it seemed to be all these years? Did I just push a baby out of something that really wasn’t there? I think not. I told her, he had a son but also had a daughter. She was still denying the words she was hearing. I felt like maybe I should pull out my birth certificate and show her. But I didn’t. I just continued to laugh inside while I told her why I called. I just wanted her to tell him happy birthday and his gift was a granddaughter. He didn’t call and congratulate me or send flowers or even come see me. He has never done that anyway so that wasn’t a shocker.
A few months before that I was at home, still with the kids bio-father. Living in our own place on the other side of town. I was in severe pain one afternoon. He wasn’t there. Where he was I didn’t know. Either working, cheating on me with a girl in the same neighborhood, or Lord knows what else. No matter where he was I always felt alone. Like no one else knew what I was going through.
I decided early on that because I didn’t have my father growing up I wanted my children to grow up with their father. I always looked at families that had the mother and the father still together. I longed for that type of family. What I didn’t realize was it was doing more harm than good. My mother and my step father (who became the father I was yearning for) told me that I for the sake of me and the kids I didn’t need to stay in the relationship. The bio-father had brain washed me into believing that he was the all-knowing all I would ever get or deserve man. He wasn’t all bad at times it was just those times were extremely few and far between. It took me years to realize what they were saying. I finally left him, for good in 1997. But boy the journey just to overcome something like that …is hard to imagine. From an outsider looking in people say to women in these relationships…just leave. Way easier said than done. People truly don’t understand. The abuser, is smarter than a lot give them credit for. They transform your way of thinking without you even knowing. They make themselves look like the next GQ cover, Cosmopolitan article and runner-up to sexiest man alive. You fear them but seem like they are the air you breathe. You lose your own individuality. You aren’t your own person, you are known as his woman, his bitch.
On a side note, in my marriage (to note it is not the same man) early on he was in the Marine Corps, he called home one day and I heard someone in the back ground talking. No one was saying anything to me and wouldn’t answer me. So I hung up. They called back. I then heard my husband say “she doesn’t like people playing with her on the phone staff sergeant”. I was a bit ticked off at that point. The 3 others involved were some of my husbands so-called leaders. They were trying to make him call me and tell me, no make me make dinner for the 3 of them. Ha …fucking ha. That did not go over on me very well at all. Being a leader does not mean you get to do these things. Then some time later, after I obviously didn’t make any food for them, we were at what is called a ”going away”. In the Marine Corps it what it sounds like…someone is going away….moving, relocating, change of duty station, etc…Well my husband, my self and my children were in attendance. First for him to bring me since the phone call. He asked …pleaded for me to ”behave” ”be nice”…don’t get him in trouble. Ok…well here walks in one of the 3 so-called leaders walking up behind us while we sat in booths in the restaurant. He turns to me to introduce himself to me and extended his hand for me to shake, well….I couldn’t do it. I mumbled “uhh” and turned my head back in the direction of my husband. I admit it wasn’t a mature thing to do. I know, I know. I didn’t feel he deserved to shake my hand. Maybe only for his service to our country but his actions spoke differently. Would you believe that next week he sure as hell tried to get my husband kicked out of the Marine Corps. Sorry you were but hurt by MY actions but that was me not my husband. He did what he was told to do. Because I dissed you in front of many of your junior marines your best reaction is to try to get my husband kicked out. Well needless to say, it didn’t work. This is me …today. After all I have gone through I can stand up for myself. I married a man that lets me be ME. Doesn’t try to change me, loves me for me no matter my faults. Even when I have flashbacks from being raped and its in the midst of us having “alone time”. He doesn’t take it personally. Is he perfect, no. But he is perfect for me. It is taken many years just to get me to this point in my life. I am still a work in progress. You will never really get over going through an abusive relationship, being raped…but you will learn how to just live.
Character is how you treat those who can do nothing for you.
