Life soon started to spin out of control. Issues from finances, to relationships, to family conflicts, to grades soon deflected me once again from one of the things I loved most. And then it happened…
The day after Christmas I left my hometown going back to school in order to pick up my last paycheck from Victoria’s Secret. As I stepped out of the store, meeting back up with my boyfriend, I saw and felt a mood shift in him. He grabbed my hand and told me to call my mom’s phone. I kept asking him “why” and he just kept saying that something happened. I asked “liked what” but emotions started to take over him so I just called, still hoping that his reaction was an overreaction to whatever situation it was. I called the phone and my Auntie picked up. As I got in the car I heard “She’s gone” but I didn’t understand.
“What do you mean, like traveling or what?” As dumb as that question may sound now, it was truly my first thought. Never did I think that on December 26, 2006, months before her 50th birthday and months after my graduation from college that I would be hearing that my mother, my best friend, my supporter, my disciplinarian, my rock was taken from me suddenly. I was devastated. The pain that I felt could never be described. The confusion that I felt cause me many periods of breakdowns and blackouts. The seconds, minutes, hours, days and weeks that follow are pretty lost to me now. I can remember family and friends calling and coming to comfort me but no one could understand what I was going through. I was lost. Even with everyone around me, I felt alone and scared.
As months passed I feel into a deep depression. I gained weight, felt negative about everything and everyone around me. I’m not proud to say this but I tried to take my life several times. On my last attempt my boyfriend, and now husband, rescued me and spoke words into me that has stayed with me ever since — “We need you!”
Never once had I every thought about that. I needed my mother and she was now gone so I felt I had no other reason to live. But I did. I had many reasons to live; beautiful children that I was helping to raise, family and framily that I needed to be there for as much as they were there for me, and a passion that I had yet to really attack.
My best friend sent me a package for my birthday. It was a basket of spa items along with a notebook and pen. I opened that card to read “Write it down. Write everything that your feeling down. Get it out and it will make you feel so much better.”
And she was right. A year passed and even though I was still mourning my mother, I was now getting back to my basics – writing and creating.
My life went through several more lows but even more highs and through it all I kept writing. And so here I am today ready to share my literary journey with the world.
I’m only a few months away from releasing my first book and I want to share with you my writing process and maybe it will inspire you or maybe you can join the conversation and inspire others. Let the journey begin!
