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!
The Chronicles of DNC 