This letter is not written with the intent that you will receive these words and feel anything. Although I’m certain you will eventually read these words and know I’m talking to you, this letter has very little to do with you. You see, the window of time for any difference to be made in this situation has closed and I’m not willing to waste anymore of my time focused on you. This letter is more written in an effort to reach anyone who may be questioning their self-worth, convinced they deserve how they are being treated. Hope is the only thing stronger than fear, so if somehow my words can give someone hope, then maybe they can overcome their fear and walk away. I want it to be known that there is ALWAYS hope. It is true that every single day the sun sets, filling the world with darkness-but it is also true that with a little patience, it always rises again bringing back light. I have finally been able to find a tiny bit of light in my world, just enough to know without hesitation which direction I should be going. It may not be the light I was looking for, or even the light I continually prayed to find-but I absolutely know without doubt that it is the one that was meant for me.
It’s oddly ironic that you are reading this now-yet you refused to read the letter I wrote to you after you banned me from your home and your lives. Are you interested enough in what I have to say now that you’re willing to read this letter? Or is it because it’s public and you have no way to “burn” it as you threatened to do with the one I wrote to you privately? It doesn’t really matter now anyways.
It is human nature to seek approval of others. Most healthy functional people strive to become a person who is worthy of respect and admiration from the people around them. We all want others to find us capable and impressive. This effort becomes even more crucial when trying to win over the family and friends of someone you love. It’s a lot of pressure to be accepted by another family, to be loved and valued by people that are there by default. We do have the freedom to choose who we share our lives with but we do not get to choose who and what comes with them. For 3 years, I made a conscious choice to accept everything that came with the person I loved. I choose to accept each of you and how you treated me and how badly you hurt me. I thought I was allowing this because I loved your son unconditionally when in reality-if I had loved myself as much as I loved him-I never would’ve accepted your behavior.
The truth is, in life we all are faced with individuals we will never be good enough for. We will always be faced with people who strive daily to make us feel unworthy, inadequate and insignificant. For 3 years, you were those people in my life. With the exception of your extended family; who welcomed me with open arms, who loved me, who supported me and my relationship with your son. They know who they are, and I am forever grateful for their kindness and acceptance. For choosing not to “follow” your lead and influence but instead take the time to form their own opinions. This letter does not apply to them, as they were the very best thing to come out of this experience. Maybe in some way as you read this letter, you will find satisfaction in knowing that you were successful in your efforts to bring me down. This is me, acknowledging to you and the world that I absolutely felt inferior to you and your family, your presence was intimidating, you single handedly caused me to question my own value, to feel that somehow I am inadequate and unworthy of being a part of your lives, you planted doubt in our relationship, you wreaked havoc on the plans we made for our future, and ultimately-our relationship ended abruptly due to your persuasive efforts and manipulation. The most heartbreaking part is that in your undying efforts to sabatosh our relationship, to eliminate me from your lives, you never stopped to consider how it affected your son-the other half to that relationship. Your selfish motives, whatever they may be and your desire to control was so powerful, that it took higher precedence than how this effected your son and his life.
I have found that despite the best of efforts, there will always be people that just aren’t meant to be “won over”. People just like you. The kind that are full of negativity and spend most of their time judging others. You made a conscious choice to never even try to get to know me or try to see me for who I am before my “fate” in your lives was decided. You spent the small amount of time we had together searching for weakness so you could prey on my insecurities. This would eventually give you the power to bring me down with calculated precision. You use your ability to manipulate everyone around you to see whatever you want them to see, feeding and fueling your obsessive desire for full control. It may have taken 3 years-but nonetheless I am now able to acknowledge and accept this situation for exactly what it is rather than what I so desperately hoped it would eventually become. I have accepted that believing and hoping for anything different from people like you is an unattainable goal. Most importantly, I understand now that how people treat others is a direct reflection of how they
feel about themselves. So this is me, telling you and the world that your behavior is a statement about you, not about
me.
I am disgusted at how much time, energy and effort I wasted hoping that just maybe tomorrow would be different. I am
ashamed at the amount of tears I have shed at the hand of someone in my life that views me as an insignificant outcast in
their lives. I am not proud of how hard I tried, how many chances I gave, and how many countless times I convinced myself
to wipe the slate clean and try again. It is disheartening on so many levels to know that with each and every hurdle I
managed to clear, every goal I achieved, every “win” big or small in my life-my initial thought was whether or not you would
finally be pleased. I somehow managed to convince myself that I needed your acknowledgement and approval before I
could even feel proud of myself. A deep, vulnerable part of me held out hope that each time I got a promotion at work, or my
plans to attend graduate school, or paying off excess debt-all by myself, being 100% self-sufficient, carefully and
thoughtfully planning gifts for holidays/birthdays/events months in advance in an effort to show you I care, analyzing the
perfect thing to wear every single time I knew I’d see you, coaching myself on how to be as proper as possible and to think
through every single word I say before I say it-that somehow it would finally be enough to prove you wrong. I held out hope
that at some point, something would finally be exactly what it took for me to earn your respect, to earn your acceptance and
prove to you and your family that I am not worthless trash. Please hear me when I say this-I know now what I wish I’d know
then. Your opinion, approval or acknowledgement should’ve been just as irrelevant to me then as it is to me now. I am not
only proud of what I’ve accomplished and who I am, but even more proud of myself that I never reduced myself to your
level-no matter how hard you tried.
To the boy who was at one time the love of my life, the one I endured this abuse for, the person who at one time was worth
every ounce of pain I felt and every sacrifice I made, the one that I sacrificed myself for-you have certainly earned your new
title. “Ex”, it perfectly represents your significance in my life now. Small, very very small- almost non-existent. Defined as
“free of, beyond, away from, former, or previous.” I think it’s important that I clarify-you were never the bully. You were
never the enemy. You were my very best friend. You did not treat me as your family did, most times you were just as
disgusted with their behavior as I was. I can only imagine how hard it must be watching the very people who instilled values
in you and helped shape you into the person that you have become, embody every single thing they taught you not to be.
To watch the people that you look up to for guidance mimic the behavior of the very people they put down over Sunday
dinner. I can only imagine how much it must hurt to have to acknowledge how little your happiness actually matters to the
people who are supposed to love you most in this life. I cannot imagine the questions that run through your mind when you
see how accepting they are of your brother’s wife, how much they respect her. Or worse, searching for the reasons that
your brother is worthy of respect and boundaries but you are not. I am genuinely sorry that you have been dictated and
manipulated for so long that you are more afraid of the conflict, the blackmail, becoming an outsider to your own family that
you’d rather just accept how you’re treated and live with it. It is my hope that one day you will learn to love yourself enough
to demand respect. Looking back, it’s not only me that suffered the unfair demoralizing treatment of your family; whether
you choose to see it or not, you’re essentially being treated the same way. Thankfully, I have found the strength to defend
myself and walk away. That’s where you and I are so much different. I refuse to be treated with disrespect, to be
blackmailed, to be controlled or manipulated, or to live my adult life to please someone else.
I almost did-but then you showed me exactly what that future looked like for me. Every single time you stood back and
watched as your family disrespected me, belittled me, humiliated me, and alienated me, when you came home in April 2017
and told me how little you cared about me and our relationship, and that I needed to find another place to live, when you
disregarded how any of your selfish wants and actions affected me and our future, when you took the opportunity to lie and
deceive me during the weakest, most vulnerable state of my life in an effort to get what you wanted, when you walked out
and left me alone the weekend after I lost my mom to go spend “quality time” with your family-knowing I am not welcome,
knowing I was terrified to be left alone, knowing that I had just lost the glue that held my family together, and knowing how
badly that reality hurt me, when you choose to spend the following Saturday visiting your friends at the beach while I stayed
home with our animals and desperately tried to help my dad piece our lives back together, when you told me you were
“ready to have fun again-you were tired of me being sad”, with every single promise you made that you never kept, with
every lie you told, each and every time you deceived me, you gave me the opportunity to truly experience what a future with
you would be like for me-a test drive if you will. It is through those experiences that I gained the absolute certainty that my
choice to walk away was the right one.
So I’d like to offer you and true and genuine thank you. If you hadn’t forced me to experience life without you-I don’t know
that I ever would’ve believed I could. You showed me that just because someone says they love you doesn’t mean they
actually do-actions always speak louder than words. It is through this experience that I learned how important it is to value
myself, to trust my gut. I learned that when people show me who they are, I should believe them. You taught me that loving
you unconditionally isn’t where I went wrong, you simply weren’t deserving of it. You taught me to raise the standards for
myself because the right person will be man enough to rise and meet them. Most of all, thank you for giving me the courage
to love myself enough to walk away from you and all the toxic negativity you brought into my life. You were not a mistake or
a waste of time but rather a lesson well learned. Instead of looking back at what I’ve lost, I’ve chosen to look at what I’ve
gained and how it helped shape me into a stronger version of myself. I can honestly say that it no longer pains me that you
or your family don’t think I am an adequate human being, because I know now more than ever before that am far more than
adequate.
In the last 2 years-I have been faced with some of life’s cruelest experiences. I have been broken beyond understanding, I
have been rejected and thrown away, I have been crippled with grief in the unexpected loss of my mom, I have been
tortured with regret, I have been haunted with the memories of her death, I have been paralyzed with fear of the unknownnot
having the ability to truly understand what is happening, I have replayed the “what ifs” and “should haves” trillions of
times, I have been overcome with sadness-deep unexplainable despair, I have been angry, and at times-just convincing
myself to get out of bed in the mornings has been an immeasurable task. Yet somehow, I have found the strength to face
tomorrow-day after day-week after week. I have chosen to stop being held prisoner to things that I absolutely cannot change
and I am proud of myself for that. I still have a long ways to go but with every passing day, I am growing into a young
woman I hope to never stop being proud of.
So for every person reading this and envisioning those who made them feel small, for every person who has felt like they
weren’t worth knowing, for those who wanted to be proud, but kept telling yourself to do better and better in order to finally
achieve acceptance from those that would never truly give it to you, anyway-you are NOT small, you are WORTHY of
knowing and loving, take PRIDE in ALL that you do, and know that there is absolutely NO room in your life for anyone who
makes you feel otherwise. Set goals and crush them, then share those experiences/achievements with people that choose
to love you and desperately want to be a part of your life, not the ones we have to tirelessly convince to do so.
So, to the family that choose not to accept me, and the boy I thought was a man:
I don’t need your approval. I don’t need your praise. I don’t need your acceptance. I am happy to report that I know longer
want these things either. In your choice not to accept me and through all your attempts to severely impact my life in a
negative way, your only success was conditioning me for trials yet to come. You gave me the opportunity to grow as a
person and to acquire a deep compassion for others who have walked this same empty dead end road. Through your
choice to exile me from your family for absolutely no reason-you deprived yourselves of the opportunity to know and love a
kind and genuine soul. In everything you’ve put me through, I have found peace in knowing that I am not the one who lost
anything; you are. You robbed yourselves of the joy I have to offer and the love I have to give. I know I will be able to
accomplish anything I set out to do in this life, and fulfill every unique purpose I have in this world. I am flawed, but I am
fiercely proud of who I am. I know in my heart that no matter what I do in this life, in your eyes I will be the exact same
insignificant outcast unworthy of your acknowledgment. I’m positive there will be others who will choose to see the same
thing that you do, but finally, I just truly don’t care. What you choose to see is irrelevant because I see me for the person I
am and the person I am becoming and for the first time in a really long time, I like what I see.
Sincerely,
