She Took a One Way Road Out of My Life...

"I have a gaping, painful hole in my soul... Where good, loving parents, and a normal, safe childhood should have been"

- Lilly Hope Lucario

As many of you know, I am adopted. And I recently came into contact with my biological mother and sister. It was kind of insane, because It's not normally something that happens in real life. So, my sister and I have been talking a lot, and it's been really cool getting to know her, and having someone to talk to about the things that happened when we were little that other people don't really understand. And I mean the funny memories, as well as the traumatic stuff.

But things with my mother are different. I only ever wanted to talk to her because I had so many questions that I never knew the answers to and she was the only one who could answer them. However, I made it very clear to her that I in no way wanted a relationship with her, and I didn't want her to be a part of my life.

Which I think is pretty fair considering the things that she did to me and my sister when we were younger, and the stuff we had to go through, which I still have to deal with.

Then today, she texted me, and started asking how I've been and what I'm doing, and it honestly got me really upset. Here was this person whose existence had haunted me for years, and she was just going to act like we were best friends? She had never cared about me before, so what exactly gives her the right to try to have a relationship with me now, and start pretending to care when she never did before.?

I feel like a bad person for thinking like this, but at this point, after everything she put me through, I just can't stand to let her back into my life after she tore it apart. I'm just starting to feel normal. My whole life, I felt like there was something wrong with me, and that no one would ever love me, or want me. And finally, after 15 years, I'm starting to see that it's not true. I AM normal. I just had a different childhood than most people. But that doesn't make me less of a person. It doesn't mean that no one is ever going to love me just because she didn't. I'm finally starting to become who I want to be. And I would rather die than let her ruin me again. She doesn't deserve to be a part of my life now, when she made her choice before that I wasn't worth more than drugs to her.

For anyone dealing with something traumatic, or handling something that has happened to you, or is happening to you, I want to just say this: You are not responsible for what happened, or is happening to you. You are not weird, or not normal. But most of all, you are not what happened to you.

You are not your abuse

You are not what they did to you

You are not your trauma

You are the cleverness that survived

You are the courage that escaped

You are the power that hid and protected a tiny spark of your light

You will fan that spark into a bonfire of rage and love

and with it, you will burn all their lies to ash

You are who you choose to become after. Don't let anyone tell you differently. Not even yourself.

Just remember that it takes time to heal. Don't try to force yourself to be happy, or pretend that you aren't hurting. Because hiding your hurt and feelings just makes it worse on you, and harder to deal with.

So just be kind to yourself, and don't forget to remind yourself of who you really are.

LostGirl1152