From: Amethyst Area: Mundane To: Aladrisa 6 Nov 94 01:20:50 Subject: Re: Abortion stuff in Metaphysical UpdReq A> I changed mine this year, but not for the same reasons A> as you. You can never A> run from your past. You can only deal with your A> mistakes and feelings, learn A> to deal with the anger, and then let it go, and cleanse A> yourself. You probably A> will never forget, yet you will forgive yourself. I dropped the name to A> disassociate myself from the family I never really had. It was also this for me. What did "Colleen Graham" mean to me when all was said and done? Absolutely nothing. My first name was just another choice my mother made for me and my mother was always (and always will be, sadly) this selfish, self-centered person who always said she loved and wanted me,but made me feel like she hated me every chance she got to put me down or rip me apart. As for my last name, I never knew my father, but I found out later that he was drunk who always beat my mother until she got the guts when I was 4 months old to pack us up and walk out on him. He came around all of a sudden one day when I was 7, but that was only because he'd had a fight with his second wife and wanted to f*ck my mom...the jerk! He played "daddy" and took us out for a drive in his car (funny, all those years of him not paying support and we couldn't afford to have a car...and while I'm indignant about the differences, why is it that my mother got excommunicated by the catholic church while he re-married in it only months after the divorce was final?) and stayed for dinner and then he kissed me goodnight and I went to bed and never saw him again. I really expected him to be there when I woke up and my whole life to be different from then on...I thought he'd come back forever...I was so naive and innocent then. It would have been better somehow if he'd never come back even for that one day...as an adult I can realize that he knew where we were all those years and he never visited even once until he got sentimental about my mother that one day...what an @ssh*le! And the name "Graham" wasn't even his...he was illegitimate...literally as well as figuratively, a b@stard through and through! It's bad enough I have his genes...I don't want his name, too! A> The pain is still A> there BUT now I start out on my very own to make my own name in this A> world.Nope, I wont forget the dirt, or the so called "mother" figure but I A> have been lucky to learn the fire can transmute, so I have taken the anger, A> transmuted it into poetry and art and music, learned to deal with most of it A> and now I guess it is time for me to move along. Oh yeah there are a few A> shards, but they will develope into something else as time goes on. The naming A> gave me a whole new perspective on myself and others A> and I am quite pleased A> with who *I* am but just yet found out. I am myself no A> matter what my name may be. I still haven't found that "creative" outlet. I never learned how to play a musical instrument and I can't draw or paint. I can't even sing anything anyone would want to hear. I can write, but the hard part is convincing myself that anyone would be interested in reading what I write, and after nearly 31 years of holding it inside instead of venting it properly, there's a lot of hate and anger still there....it doesn't make for good reading. I have taken it out on my second-eldest too much, though. She'e the one who is most like me and I hear myself sound just like my mother when I am really,really angry with her. She really knows how to push my buttons sometimes. I'm working on it, but it isn't easy. A> Off. WHat did we have A> to loose Am? We were alone from day one. Would it A> matter if people tried to A> have control? No. Our lives would have still been the shits. Very true. It wouldn't have made a difference one way or the other. Sometimes it's really hard to face that truth...it really sucks. I was pulled in so many directions and I did what people wanted me to most of the time, and for what? I got thrown away like garbage by everyone I loved. And people wonder why I had such a hard time dealing with love and affection. I was always looking for it on my own terms and running from it when it was freely given. My mother never gave it to me when I needed it, and when she did give me "love," it was this empty "I feel guilty for calling you stupid and all those other names, so please forgive me" version of it. Every time she hugged me from the time I was 7, I wanted to run away. And when I got false, self-gratifying love from guys, I didn't know the difference...all I knew was that it wasn't from her, and that's what I wanted...love from anyone but her...her's couldn't be trusted. What still makes me angry as hell is that she got away with it. She lives in denial about it. She had the audacity when she was here last December to put *me* down as a parent! I'm raising 3, not one, and I'm doing a far better job than she did, and all she can see is the material things..."you never wore second-hand clothes!" "you always had a roof over your head and clothes on your back and food on the table, so you have nothing to complain about!" Well, my girls have always had all those things, too. So the clothes aren't always brand new, but they aren't complaining. I grew up in rented apartments...so my trailer is old and not in the best shape, but we own it and there's no mortage on it....that's more than she ever owned! *But* my girls have friends and self-esteem and a hundred other things I never had, like happiness. They still hug and kiss me goodnight...I pushed her away at 7. They know they are loved. It isn't perfect, but it's a hell of a lot closer to it than my childhood was. I think it really pisses her off that as hard as she has tried to deny the abuse and destroy me, I have survived and risen above it all, and she can't stand that! I think she would have been happier if I had taken my own life with a drug overdose as a teen...then everyone would have blamed me for having been crazy and dumped heaps of sympathy on her. Surviving was the best revenge...I stand today as living proof of her failures. I can attest to them and she hates me for that. She knows full well that everything I have done right I have done on my own...she can't take credit for any of my successes,and that burns her self-serving little butt! (cont'd) 201434369420143436942014343694201434369420143436942014343694718 From: Amethyst Area: Mundane To: Aladrisa 6 Nov 94 02:05:48 Subject: Re: Abortion stuff in Metaphysical UpdReq (cont'd from last message) A> If only we could have thought that way when we were kids :-) True. A> But have you ever wondered why? I mean, I have sat and A> wondered why for so A> many years.....questions like "What have I learned from A> this?" etc etc. There A> was a lesson to be learned from the whole thing....a hrad one, but even A> still... I still struggle with that one. I wonder about what I did in my past lives to deserve half of what I've been through. I sit here and I think "what have I accomplished with my life?" I have to settle for the small victories that no one can see on the outside and I can't put on a resume. Right now, they're all I have, but when I consider the statistics on young people like us, it's a lot. We shouldn't have seen our 18th birthdays...certainly not our 21st. Kids like us die in alleys pumped full of dope or get knifed because we stiffed our pimps or robbed some john. We don't grow up into mature, responsible adults and mothers. We weren't supposed to make it at all and here we are, still kicking and fighting (if that's what it takes sometimes) to get through every day, week, year. And sometimes we actually sail instead of always fighting the current. We beat the odds, Aladrisa, we proved them all wrong and that's something....that's REALLY something! BB -=Amethyst=- 201434369420143436942014343694201434369420143436942014343694718 From: Shadow Weaver Area: Mundane To: Amethyst 7 Nov 94 08:42:32 Subject: Re: Abortion stuff in Metaphysical UpdReq A> I still haven't found that "creative" outlet. I A> never learned how to play a musical instrument and I A> can't draw or paint. I can't even sing anything A> anyone would want to hear. I can write, but the A> hard part is convincing myself that anyone would be A> interested in reading what I write, and after nearly A> 31 years of holding it inside instead of venting it A> properly, there's a lot of hate and anger still A> there....it doesn't make for good reading. Amethyst, I think you're missing a point here. The creative outlet (or any outlet) is not for other people. I've written stuff that NO ONE will ever be allowed to read. I don't know if it's good, or not. But it served its purpose. I was able to dump some of my feelings onto paper. It probably didn't make for good reading either. Didn't matter. Over the course of several months, I wrote enought to fill three large notebooks. I do the same thing with music. When I was alone, I'd shut off the lights and just play in the dark... let the music become my reality. And no one ever heard it but the gods and me. Blessed be, Amethyst. And there are those of us that do care about others. Including you. 201434369420143436942014343694201434369420143436942014343694718 From: Aladrisa Area: Mundane To: Frendal Fundari 5 Nov 94 19:32:10 Subject: Re: Anouncement UpdReq FF> I can understand your view on this, and Paul's as well. But I have FF> another view point to this issue myself. FF> FF> How do you think it would feel to be the MAN in this situation? I have often wondered. But the last time, we went thru it together. FF> was not promiscuous.) Now, she wanted an abortion. I, personally, am for FF> the freedom of choice, but not just the woman's choice. I wanted my child FF> more than anything in the world, but I would not go back to her because she FF> was preg. with my child. FF> ok- BUT did you want that child so much that you would have been willing to carry it (if you could) to term? Did you want that child so much that you would have been willing to patch things up because SHE was the mother? It kinda struck me as an EGo trip, and I am not trying to insult you so dont get me wrong, but most men say "MY CHILD" with little regard to the other person involved....alos most men would want the woman to go thru with the pregnancy as a pay back. (Not saying that you did)... al 201434369420143436942014343694201434369420143436942014343694718 From: Amethyst Area: Mundane To: Frendal Fundari 6 Nov 94 02:23:00 Subject: Re: Anouncement UpdReq I quite agree with you...the father should have a choice, too. Unfortunately,what happened to you happens all too often because the baby is inside the mother and the law sees it as her body and the father who isn't attached to her in some way gets shafted every time. Even in the rare cases when a man has managed to get an injuction, the woman has always managed to sneak off to a clinic somewhere and do it anyway. Such women are very selfish in my opinion and care nothing for the feelings of the father...it makes me wonder how they could ever have loved in the first place if they could turn around and care so little for his feelings about his child. BB -=Amethyst=- 201434369420143436942014343694201434369420143436942014343694718