You know, I wonder sometimes if there is something wrong with me or even the way that I live my life. Then I have to stop and think. I am me and I am all I can be. However, it gets me down when my parents…namely my mother…continuously ride my back trying to make me into someone I am not. Don’t get me wrong here. I love my mother and she can be an amazing person when she wants to be. Im just tired of being treated like a tumor instead of the amaing person I truly am.
When your child achieves something great, something that they have worked hard for and finally attained, you should not say the following “Oh, I guess this gives you a reason to lose weight now doesn’t it.” For me to have my mother say this to me, after I called to tell her I was just elected by my peers to the highest statewide position mind you, makes me want to crawl up and cry. Everytime I think about how after every award or every honor I have recieved my mother always has something derogatory to say. Or better yet, compare me to my brothers and sisters. Now, my siblings are 18. I am 23. For her to degrade me to that level is uncanny to most people. However, what hurts the most is that in some of the most exciting times of my life she has something negative to say about me or my decisions. What I do is never enough or never good enough. If she wouldn’t compare me to herself, her friends kids, or even my siblings she would understand that what she says and how she acts is extremely out of line.
Lets take the current situation for exampe. I have accepted a job in as a Field Organizer in a battle state for a presidential campaign. Im getting paid, some cool new gadgets, gas and housing paid for, health insurance, as well as the most AMAZING experience of my life. Out of all the people in the US who they could have aquired to work for them, they picked me. While most parents would be jumping up and down at the thought of their child doing something they love with an offer like mine, my mother yelled. Not only did she yell but she screamed and threatened me. Mainly because I have chosen to have an opportunity that most people I know would kill for. She thinks that my taking a semester off of school will be the end of the world and that I will become a bum living in a box on Georgia Ave. Im not. It is a semester. Not 20 years. My major is political science and the best experience I can get is working on this campaign, this year. I will be miserable sitting in a classroom knowing that I had this opportunity and passed it up all because my mother wanted to dictate my life yet again.
This time its different. This time I am going to make my own decision and do what makes me happy. I have for too long tried to make her happy and quite frankly I give up. Nothing is good enough for her. Im not happy and Im not going to make myself into someone Im not just so my mother will stop complaining that I am a failure and “caused her so much pain.”
Really mother. What is this pain I have caused you. Because quite frankly, everyone else is proud of me and wishes nothing but the best for me. I may not have a diploma but I have achieved so much in the past 5 years that if you would just open your eyes to my hopes and dreams, you would see that. If you would just look around you and see the real truth and not your hidden disappointments, this wouldn’t be an issue. Even the BFF’s parents think everything I do is amazing and want the best for me, even when you don’t. They are always so awed and amazed that I am able to do so much and have so much at a young age. Sometimes I think some of my friends’ parents want me to succeed more than you do.
It makes me cry when I see mothers and daughters acting like normal mothers and daughters. Buying clothes, laughing, being friendly. My mother degrades me, makes fun of me, and even has the galls to call me fat and a failure in front of her, as well as my own, friends. Does she not realize that everytime that happens I die inside? I want to crawl in the biggest hole and wait for someone to cover me up. When you make someone that vulnerable its hard to open up to anything. I am not taking it anymore. I have to draw a line somewhere. Its not condusive to my life at all. EK’s parents have always been like a second set of parents to me and all of her friends. They pray for us and wish us the best in everything and are always so proud when one of us does something remarkable with our lives. I just wish mine were the same.
I am not my sister. I do not look like her, I do not act like her, I am not your “caring child” like her. I never will be.
I am not my brothers. I am not a computer whiz or the best runner. I am not your favorite or your baby. I never will be.
I am the best that I can be.I am going to do great things and visit great places. I am going to treat life with a sense of awe because everyday something happens that makes me stop and think just how fabulous it really is. I am going to run for office and change the world. I am going to love my life and the people in it. I am an amazing person. I am not you. I never will be.
“Shadow”I was six years old
When my parents went away
I was stuck inside a broken life
I couldn’t wish away
She was beautiful
She had everything and more
And my escape was hiding out and running for the doorSomebody listen please
It used to be so hard being me
Living in the shadow
Of someone else’s dream
Trying to find a hand to hold but every touch felt cold to me
Living in a nightmare
A never-ending sleep
But now that I am wide awake
My chains are finally free
Don’t feel sorry for me
All the days collided
One less perfect than the next
I was stuck inside someone else’s life and always second best
Oh, I love you now ’cause now I realize
That it’s safe outside to come alive in my identity
So if you’re listening
There’s so much more to me you haven’t seen
Living in the shadow
Of someone else’s dream
Trying to find a hand to hold but every touch felt cold to me
Living in a nightmare
A never-ending sleep
But now that I am wide awake
Then I can finally see
Don’t feel sorry for me-
Mother, sister, father, sister, mother
Everything’s cool now
Mother, sister, father, sister, mother
Everything’s cool now
Oh, my life is good
I’ve got more than anyone should
Oh, my life is good
And the past is in the past
I was living in the shadow
Of someone else’s dream
Trying to find a hand to hold but every touch felt cold to me
I’m living in a new day
I’m living it for me
And now that I am wide awake
Then I can finally see
So don’t feel sorry for me
Don’t feel sorry, don’t feel sorry for me
Don’t feel sorry, don’t feel sorry for me
Living in, living in, living in the shadow
Living in, living in, living in a new day
