Growing Pains
My dad always told me, when I was in high school, that my “friends were not my friends, they were acquaintances”. At the tender age of 16, I thought I would have those friends for the rest of my life. To my surprise, my best friend of three years stole from me, several boyfriends lied to me, and one boyfriend physically beat me every day for about six months. On several occasions, I was nearly killed in various car accidents. By the time I was twenty-six years old, I had graduated from the School of Hard Knocks. Living independently in the world, away from my parents, taught me that people can and will be cruel.
The last straw was when my boyfriend, with whom I was living, strangled me because he was disillusioned by a …show more content…
There were so many unpleasant rifts that I could hardly remember when, if ever, I was genuinely gratified. I soon discovered the only time I was ever truly content was within the comforts of my parent’s house.
As we sat on the edge of my bed, Mom and I discussed the friends and boyfriends I had allowed to plow through my life. We reminisced about the princess movies I watched as a kid. Feeling helpless to mend my heartache, my mother wished she could wave a magic wand so that I could live in the blissfulness of happily ever after with a noble prince. It was at that exact moment when I finally realized there was no such occurrence as “happily ever after”. It was yet another heart-breaking revolution.
After praying for God to guide me, my mother and I conversed further. The topic evolved to the extent of deception in the world and how people mercilessly claw through others just to satisfy their own selfish desires. Growing up, my parents always instilled honesty in my sister and me. I questioned my mother about why she and Dad never warned us about the dreadfulness of the world. With a solemn expression of bewilderment and scarce hesitation as the words flowed from her petite lips, she asked, “How can you teach a child to be honest, but then turn around and say the world is not truthful?” While licking the lacerations of my soul like a wounded dog, I realized I, too, had become one of those ruthless people of which we were
My dad always told me, when I was in high school, that my “friends were not my friends, they were acquaintances”. At the tender age of 16, I thought I would have those friends for the rest of my life. To my surprise, my best friend of three years stole from me, several boyfriends lied to me, and one boyfriend physically beat me every day for about six months. On several occasions, I was nearly killed in various car accidents. By the time I was twenty-six years old, I had graduated from the School of Hard Knocks. Living independently in the world, away from my parents, taught me that people can and will be cruel.
The last straw was when my boyfriend, with whom I was living, strangled me because he was disillusioned by a …show more content…
There were so many unpleasant rifts that I could hardly remember when, if ever, I was genuinely gratified. I soon discovered the only time I was ever truly content was within the comforts of my parent’s house.
As we sat on the edge of my bed, Mom and I discussed the friends and boyfriends I had allowed to plow through my life. We reminisced about the princess movies I watched as a kid. Feeling helpless to mend my heartache, my mother wished she could wave a magic wand so that I could live in the blissfulness of happily ever after with a noble prince. It was at that exact moment when I finally realized there was no such occurrence as “happily ever after”. It was yet another heart-breaking revolution.
After praying for God to guide me, my mother and I conversed further. The topic evolved to the extent of deception in the world and how people mercilessly claw through others just to satisfy their own selfish desires. Growing up, my parents always instilled honesty in my sister and me. I questioned my mother about why she and Dad never warned us about the dreadfulness of the world. With a solemn expression of bewilderment and scarce hesitation as the words flowed from her petite lips, she asked, “How can you teach a child to be honest, but then turn around and say the world is not truthful?” While licking the lacerations of my soul like a wounded dog, I realized I, too, had become one of those ruthless people of which we were