Nathina

My [ex-husband] and I were together for almost nine years. People don’t talk about it, but when you come out of an abusive situation and you take those blinders off and the rose colored glasses are gone and you’re seeing everything from the outside, the amount of shame you feel because you’ve allowed yourself to go through that… Like, I’m smart, I’m strong, I’m independent, and I would never in a million years put up with that shit… but I DID. For nine fucking years. When you first get out of it you’re like, “Yay, I’m out, I made it, I finally broke away from that,” but all the shit that comes after that… it’s tough. Like, I’m embarrassed. But I started looking at it in a different way because someone pointed out that it made me stronger and he was right. 

That relationship really just fucking took its toll on me. I realized I wasn’t the same person from before the relationship. My friends saw it, they were like, “We just miss you, you’re not the same,” and after it ended they were like, “Oh my god, you’re back! You’re happy again” but it was really fuckin’ hard.  I’ve been single for four and a half years. I had to get a job because I was a stay at home mom who took care of everybody [else]. Being a single mom with a mortgage, I’ve gotta take care of the kids, but I also have that guilt of, “well fuck, I’m working 50 hours a week so that I can pay for the house and the babysitter. I decided that I’d rather have more time than money, so I cut a bunch of shit out that was unnecessary and I decided that I’d rather have my kids see me struggle alone than be miserable with someone [else]. I didn’t want them to think [that relationship] was what love looked like, because it’s not. I would be devastated if either one of them grew up and was in a relationship like that. 

In 2017 I had a baby in March. When she was three months old I asked their dad to leave. Three months after that, he got diagnosed with bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder. Then 2 months after that my grandpa that I took care of died. So when I was 35, shit was fuckin’ happening. I kind of lost a whole lot of who I was. I could either wallow in it or grow from it. I started doing that really fucking hard work of trying to fix me and I think that it was a lot of breaking down limiting beliefs.  I remember I was in the ER with my grandpa one day and one of the nurses asked me how I took care of myself and I just laughed at her. I was like, “what do you mean? I’ve got a 6-year-old, a 3-month-old, and a dying grandfather… like, what? No.” I kind of had to figure out, “Okay, what DO I enjoy? If I had free time, what would I want to do with that?” So I started rediscovering hobbies and things that made me happy. 

The universe is so great. I feel like there’s been a paradigm shift for me over the past 4.5 years. I’ve just really focused back on the gratitude and truly being grateful for even the bad shit because I’ve learned something from it. As long as you learn the lesson, you’ll progress to the next level. Until you learn that fuckin’ lesson, though, you’re going to keep doing dumb shit. With my old job, my boss questioned my character and I decided, “I don’t wanna do this – this is my resignation effective immediately, thank you for reminding me how strong I am and how I can stand up for my family and what’s best for us.” The universe opened up and now I get to be the finance director at the school my kids go to and I’m on their schedule and their tuition is covered.

Self love means accepting yourself – all of yourself from the quirky little personality things to the extra roll on your tummy, your fine lines and gray hairs. Allowing yourself grace and realizing htat your body may not be everyone’s idea of the perfect body, but that body has done some pretty fucking amazing things. That body has been with you through everything. Appreciate it, it’s done a hell of a job. It’s being comfortable with who you are and being unapologetically 100% yourself all the time.

I feel like I’m at peace with my body and my weight and everything. Would I like to be healthier? I would probably like to be healthier, but I feel like the healthy portion comes after you love yourself because if you don’t love yourself and respect your body, you’re not going to do what’s healthiest for it. You’re not going to get up and move it every day and you’re not going to nourish it with good foods. So I kind of feel like that’s where I’m at. I’m loving myself, so the next step is to be healthier. Just taking those steps for me because I want to be around for my kids. 

I have to remind myself daily of my worth, my strength, and that I am enough. It’s written on my mirror in my bathroom: You are enough, you are loved, you are worthy. I think that, for me, a lot of my limiting beliefs came from “I’m not enough. I’m not good enough, I’m not fast enough, I’m not pretty enough, and now it’s like, I am fucking enough, and I do deserve that abundant life and that happiness and all the things.” I think self-love is a constant journey. You always have to remind yourself, “I am fucking fabulous.”