“There are always two sides to every story, and it is generally wise, and safe, and charitable, to take the best; and yet there is probably no one way in which persons are so liable to be wrong, as in presuming the worst is true, and in forming and expressing their judgment of others, and of their actions, without waiting till all the truth is known.”
― Jonathan Edwards, Charity & Its Fruits
This is harder than the about me section of a dating profile. This leads me to some disclaimers. This blog is about me and my side of the story. You see I have had a rough go at this life business and I am not as fortunate as many of you to have a huge support system of people around me. So I have opted to disclose all of my life's challenges in public to the masses. Not because I am seeking anything... I am just looking for a way to fill my cup and help someone out assuming someone is reading.
Let's start in high school... I know, I know a lot of us don't want to go back there but that is where life really took a change for me. See I grew up in a less-than-desirable financial situation this means that for me and maybe a lot of you reading this, working through high school was imperative. This also means that all of my "friends" were adults with whom I worked all day well not all day but every day from 4 PM til 3 AM at the Chateau Elan I was with my work family. Looking retrospectively they were just my coworkers but as a teen with no social outlets, it was cool. The staff I worked with were great people and were from all over the world but none of them knew at the time I was working full-time I was 16. I remember my prom took place at the hotel, I didn't get to go well as a guest but I certainly worked it serving all of my classmates' none of whom recognized me in my ugly blue button-down tucked into my black pant with a floor-length black apron that really made that uniform ... *chefs kiss.
Due to this lifestyle dating in my teenage years was pretty hard, well not even hard we would say impossible. Then I met ...well we'll call him Carl... Carl was 23 almost 24. We met once at a concert he saw me on Facebook and we chatted ever since. He knew my age ... although at the time I was elated this is one of those moments where I wish I could tell the younger me to run! Run as fast as you can from the biggest mistake of your life. He was kind though and most importantly he paid attention to me I was never ignored. The first year was casual nothing happened but dates and drives he would make time to come see me at work and since my coworkers also didn't know my age no one blinked an eye. Then life changed. Senior year wasn't going as expected it became a lot to handle work and relationships and school. I was also just very pissed off that I didn't get to have normal. So I ran away from my responsibility I finished high school through the Community College which got me out of there faster but led me to a dark place.
With school out of the way, I had a ton of extra time and all I wanted to do was breathe for a moment go out and have fun. I spent more and more time with Carl and eventually became his girlfriend. We spent tons of time and I started spending more and more time with him at his house. I remember one conversation where I asked if he would take me home and he declined but only because " I made his house feel better". I took it as a compliment I mean I did clean and organize and tried to do things to make it nicer. It was how I grew up and he and his mom definitely took advantage.
I don't want to focus heavily on this relationship because it is not the point of the blog but it is important... I promise. To make a long story short Carl took advantage of me and he knew it. His mom got a free housekeeper who also worked in a department store with her. She was allowed to make fun of me at work to coworkers (she was HR) and he was allowed to financially and mentally manipulate me. We moved to Seattle completely on my dime with an apartment and furnishings. He let me go hungry because we couldn't afford groceries and we used my family when we were in severe binds. He cheated on me and hit me and yes I would be lying if I didn't say he was emotionally damaging to me. I remember when I left he beat my car... yeah you read that right my car. Smashing the windows and kicking the doors. Police found me crying in my car and he left and Seattle PD pressed charges. I don't know why I defended him, it was likely because he was all I knew and all I had once he was gone I would be alone again. I did though I didn't want to ruin his life, despite the fact that up to that point he took mine. He also made me feel like it was all my fault like so many of us, he took my innocence and youth and made me one of those women prematurely.
The day I moved out he got to keep everything I was renting a bedroom in a shared house so it's not like I could bring everything I put into the house. I was starting over for the first time and I was not going to be alone because I had roommates who became my best friends. I was free. I moved into this big shared house of what finally felt like normalcy I was taking classes at the University and I was finally back on track and I was so stinking excited.