Fuck. Here we go again. Get it together girl. Put on that smile and do what you do best, I thought to myself as I let out a deep sigh. One might look at me and say, “Wow! She seems like she has it all together. She is smart, has a good job, and makes great money. She drives a nice car and is beautiful and ambitious. Her kids are incredible, athletic, creative, and super smart. Their family is beautiful. They’re such a power couple.”

Let me stop you right there. I have been told several times that I could win an Oscar with my ability to put on a smile and call my best representative forward. Her name is Ms. Illusion, and she is a bad ass. And that is exactly what everyone saw—an illusion. Most would never have guessed that behind that smile and closed doors there lived a woman so full of hurt. A woman lacking self-worth, feeling broken from things she had no control over as a child and all the imposed self-destructions that resulted from that. All she wanted was to be set free. What she didn’t understand yet was the freedom her soul cried out for lay in a journey that only she could walk.

I didn’t understand or have the awareness to see how the traumas from my childhood had seeped out into every area of my life. My self-worth was a zero at times. My lack of trust in all relationships held me back. It was even a struggle when it came to bonding with my children. I was missing that deep-rooted connection that a mother has with her children. Every area of significance in my life was a struggle. Except when it came to work.

How did it all seem so good from the outside looking in when internally there was a battle that raged inside of me? I had buried the pain and memories so deep inside of myself. I had disassociated to survive as a child. I didn’t recognize the effect of the traumas that had been carried over through my adolescence into adulthood. What had once helped me to survive as a child was now hurting me as an adult, and I couldn’t even see it.

Within the span of three days, I felt that bubble of an illusion burst. It was like I was turned upside down, smacked around, and then just dropped. On Friday, I lost my job of almost five years through no fault of my own. On Monday, we called off a wedding that was supposed to take place in the next two weeks to a man I had been with for nineteen years. Covid was spreading like wildfire all around me, and I now found myself applying for food stamps.

What the fuck just happened? I didn’t know that it was going to take a world pandemic, me losing my job and a relationship to get me to stop and be still. I went from the bad ass—or at least seeming like a bad ass—to feeling so small and insignificant.

Let me backtrack for just a moment to set the stage.

Two years prior, I had been sitting in church. Now, I will be the first one to tell you that I am not super religious, and I have always been skeptical of people saying, “God said.” There I was, sitting in church, all the way up in the top section; you know, like the nosebleed section. So high that you are pretty much out of sight, but you can still say “Hey, at least I went.” I couldn’t tell you today what the actual message was on if my life depended on it.

Nevertheless, I was there, and inside of me this quiet voice said, “Why are you so afraid of who I created you to be?” I sat there in the chair with a lump in my throat, doing my best to hold back the tears. I thought about it for a minute as I slowly exhaled, and the tears began to stream down my face. Even though I can’t remember what the pastor’s message was on that day, I do know I was delivered my own message.

I would like to say just like that, I magically got it all together, healed all the wounds, and started living my best life. Not even close. I battled that little voice that asked me that question. Is God even real? How do you know if you hear God? Did I really hear that? Me! Afraid? I’m not afraid! I must be trippin’. Back and forth inside myself I went, month after month, battling that question.

Today, I understand that that was a very pivotal moment in my life. If I had taken a moment to get honest with myself, I would have known the answer. Most of us know the answer. Whether we are honest enough to admit it is another story. It meant that I would have to go back and deal with some of the most painful things in my life. I would have to face emotions and tell truths that I had suppressed for over twenty years. It meant that I would have to do the work it would take to start to heal.

I had never been ready to do the work that it would take to heal myself. My mouth did a lot of talking, but my actions didn’t match my words. My story was like so many others filled with so much anger, pain, resentment, and unanswered questions. It was always easier to just push it as far away as I could.

Two years later, I found myself sitting in a dark, silent room in the middle of the night. I felt like I had lost it all. I was staring at the walls, feeling so small and insignificant. I knew that feeling that had wrapped itself around me like a boa constrictor squeezing the life out of me. I heard that voice called deception in my head as doubt filled my mind like the musical notes dancing around on a page. I had no job, and my relationship was unraveling faster than the last bit of toilet paper on the roll. I felt like shit.

I had just been stripped of two of the most important things to me. Life was having a funny way of humbling me. It was clearer than ever that now was the time for me to start the journey that I had pushed away so many times. I knew in my heart that I had to truly stop and take care of myself for the first time in my life.

I had spent so much time chasing titles. I felt like the titles would give me a sense of worth and they would help define me. I was climbing the corporate ladder and chasing the next promotion that would give me a better title and more money.

I believed that the title of wife would somehow make everything all better, as if it would validate my worth. I had my superwoman mom cape on, running after four kids while also helping to run a business on the side. Most women love the title of mom. They dream about it as little girls. My title of “mom” came wrapped up as my greatest fear; that I would be like my mom.

I would spin so many plates all at the same time. People would look on in admiration and ask, “How do you do it all?” I have now discovered that my secret, which I didn’t even know was my secret until I started to face myself, was really a detriment to me. I kept myself so busy as a defense mechanism. It gave me the excuses to not have time to deal with myself. The sad thing is that I didn’t even realize I was doing it.

If I could get four hours of sleep a day, I could function. I would get up at 4 a.m., leave by 4:30 a.m. to commute an hour and a half to work, start working by 6 a.m. so I could be off by 3 p.m., and commute home again for an hour and a half.

I had to be at the first school by 4:30 p.m. to pick up my daughter, then go to two other schools to grab the rest of the kids. Not to mention the kids’ sports and practice during the week. We were juggling football, volleyball, and basketball practice. Drop one off, pick one up. When we were out, I would count heads to make sure I had them all. One, two, three, where’s your brother? There he is, four.

Oh yes, then there was the homework, and then the kids would be hungry, of course. I would have to cook dinner, wash the dishes, and do laundry because my five-year-old ran out of clean underwear again—even though I just washed clothes a couple days ago. Oh shit, I couldn’t forget to pick up the supplies I told the teacher I would send to school the next day, and I’d have to pack the lunches. Then I’d hear my phone and that infamous ding. Are you kidding me? Another work email—can’t this please wait?

“Mom, Mom, Momma! One of them would inevitably call out to me when I was in the bathroom trying to pee, the dog lying on the rug next to my feet because he needed to follow me from room to room too.

“Yes,” I’d call back.

“We are having a potluck at school tomorrow, and I need to bring something.”

You have got to be kidding me, I’d think to myself.

“Why are you just now telling me this?”

“Because I forgot.”

Okay, I’d have to run to the store again.

If only I could do the simple things like shower in peace, wash my hair, shave my legs, and just breathe. But I was always in a hurry, with time only to wash the hot spots. Utterly exhausted, I’d say prayers and put the kids to bed. I’d go to bed dreading the next day because I knew it would be the same thing all over again.

Lying in bed as I recalled the list of things in my mind that I forgot to do or that I had to do the next day, there he’d be, running his hands over me with a little grin. Okay, I’ll attempt to help fulfill your needs too. The only problem was, going through the motions didn’t really cut it. I just wanted to sleep.

Sound familiar?

How could I not see it? Just reading that list back tires me out. Year after year I would continue to spin so many plates. The plates may have changed, but they continued to spin, nevertheless. Just going, going, going, all the damn time. I could hide behind all the spinning plates.

It wasn’t until those three days in October when everything got taken away—my job, relationship, sports, school because of Covid—that the plates I had been spinning in a well-choreographed dance stopped spinning as they hit the floor and shattered. Reality was about to set in. I had a choice to make. More of the same, or change?

Most of us dread change. We like consistency and are creatures of habit, even when our habits are chaotic or dysfunctional. It’s all that we know, and there is a certain comfort in familiarity. We have learned to survive. To change means to grow, and to grow you must get uncomfortable.

I had to stop, hold up a mirror, and ask myself, “Who is Christina? Who is the woman staring back at me?” I didn’t like the answer because the truth was, I didn’t have a fucking clue. I wasn’t just the kids’ mom, his companion, or the CEO’s right hand. Who was I at my core? Those “titles” were a part of me, they were the roles I played, but they didn’t define me. You see, I had it confused. I allowed my roles to become my identity instead of understanding the difference.

I needed to figure out who I really was so that those areas of mom, companion, and friend could prosper so much more. I had spent so much of my time chasing meaningless titles, looking to prove myself and please others. When the titles were stripped away and I was jobless, struggling as a mother, my relationship in turmoil, I felt so insignificant.

That is because I didn’t have a clear sense of my identity and defined myself by my roles. I had to get honest with myself. I had looked for my worth in those titles. They gave off this false sense of success. For me to understand who I was, I needed to start back at the beginning and work through all the rubble. I had to be willing to excavate to go find myself.

 SHOWER WALLS

It’s me and the shower walls

Where my true reflection bounces back

Through the gray shaded swirls

On the white marble panels

The thoughts, ideas, the chatter in my mind

Freely released.

It’s almost the perfect BFF

No judgment, no backtalk

Just a stream of water bearing down

As the air fills with a humid mist

Water bouncing off the floor

As I stand there in the purity of my emotions.

The quiet moments all to self

Literally bare and naked in my truths

Flashbacks occurring at a rapid rate

My mind becomes a time traveler

Life’s journey all options to visit.

Do I truly understand that my past doesn’t define me?

The present a gift full of possibilities, hope, and greatness

If I will just remove fear and embrace who I was created to be

As the warmth of the water pulses against my skin

A one on one, with oneself

Worth more than any therapy session.

This is transparency at its finest

Truths that are unfiltered

Mixed in with raw emotions

Nowhere to run and hide

Unless by self-sabotage

I choose to run down the tunnel of lies

That only I can tell myself.

Knowing true freedom comes when we free ourselves

From the imprisonment of our own false thoughts

The countless conversations in my mind

Sometimes even by candlelight.

I have shed enough tears over the years to fill up the tub

You have caught them, one by one

And washed the dirt of the day away

My tears have cleansed my soul.

Bubble bath, full immersion

Finally, submission

You bore witness to giddy days

Excitement, elation, and even self-pleasure

Full of climatic endeavors.

Baptized by the water,

Renewed to face another day

My truths, my secrets, my joys

My fears, and yes, my desires

Dance around my mind to find my sanity.

Bouncing ideas from wall to wall

Forced to face truths that only I know

Each passing experience adds an element of growth

Like the morning glory on the grow

Sophisticated, and subtle all at the same time.

Come on girl, wash yourself off

Pick yourself up

And get your ass moving…