Girl, no man is worth lowering your standards…I’m speaking from experience (The final chapter)
(As I begin to write this one, I don’t know where it’s going. So let me say domestic violence and abuse may be discussed. I just don’t want to forget to add the trigger warning once I finish.)
For weeks, I couldn’t play with my kids due to the headaches my injury caused. I walked around with sunglasses over my regular eyeglasses because I was super sensitive to light. I had to see an ophthalmologist every other week for months to ensure my eyesight would be normal.
But the worst part was my babies constantly asking where daddy was and when he would come back.
They were too young for me to tell them who their daddy actually was. So I told them that daddy and mommy couldn’t be friends anymore, but he would still be their daddy. Of course, that lead to more questions, with answers of details they didn’t need to know – so avoidance came.
I wanted to sink into a hole, and never come out.
Thank goodness for a great support system. My parents were there every step of the way. Watching the kids, making me move, praying for me.
In 2016, I filed for divorce. Yes, a year later. It was hard for me to come to terms that I was being demoted to baby mama, ex-wife and single mother. But I started to date again and found someone who treated me so much better.
We had to be legally separated for 6 months before the divorce was final. During the proceedings, he lied about everything – the drug use, the abuse and his financial status. The judge believed some of it because he could sell sand at the beach. After many recesses, he finally agreed to a child support amount that y’all would laugh at, and I turned down alimony like a fool (again, take the alimony!). I just wanted it to be over. I wanted the stress and anxiety of having to see him in a court room to end. I couldn’t take returning to look him in the face and relive all that trauma, so I agreed to whatever he wanted.
My divorce was finalized toward the end of 2016, but not before he had cleaned out our joint bank accounts, and the kids’ accounts too. I was left with no money, a crappy job and bad credit. Me – a college educated woman who grew up in a loving two-parent home – had taken a completely different life path than all the things I had learned and seen growing up.
I had to rebuild everything from scratch – including myself.
My new guy would tell me I was beautiful, and I wouldn’t believe it. He would always want to be up under me, and I questioned it. He would tell me I was a good mom, and I would think he was just trying to tell me what I wanted to hear. That poor man had to work through years of PTSD with me, and he chose to stay and help little broken me.
He supported me at fashion shows, he drove me to photoshoots, he brought me soup and medicine when I was sick. He was the type of man I had forgotten existed due to the relationship I had in the past.
He never told me I was fat. Never told me I smelled and had bad hygiene. Never made me feel less than. He loved all parts of me – including my ugly feet.
In 2018, he proposed. I said yes. We purchased a house in 2019 and planned to be married in 2020…but then Covid came.
Life was life-ing to the max and things never perfectly aligned to even think about my dream wedding.
Oh wait, I realize I never told you how my previous wedding went. Let’s go back in time real quick.
Our apartment had been broken into twice. Tired of replacing items and feeling unsafe, I called my mother to come back home and live in her multi-family house. She said yes, but had one rule – that man can’t come unless y’all are married. I relayed the message to him, and this was his response: “Well, you’re not taking my son away from me so let’s get married.”
Isn’t that the most romantic thing you ever heard? We went to Wal-Mart and spent about $250 on rings – an engagement and wedding band set for me and a band for him. I made an appointment with the local Justice of Peace at his “office,” he went shopping for a new outfit and told me to pick something out of my closet.
The Justice of Peace’s “office” wound up being his office in a carpet store with stacks of papers and tile and rug samples piled up to the ceiling. I wore a black J. Crew tube dress – because I had no white in my closet. I chose to change the location of our ceremony to the parking lot – ya’ know for optics since my friend was there to take photographs. My son sat in his car seat on the ground, as we exchanged vows in front of my 3 coworkers with the backdrop of a brick wall and broken pavement. It was absolutely beautiful – just kidding. I hated every second of it. The Wal-Mart ring literally made my finger break out – but he did upgrade it to a JC Penny one when I caught him cheating. So yayy me.
With this knowledge of the prior ceremony, my current boyfriend wanted to give me the wedding of my dreams. But with me having to quit my job due to Covid life, money was tighter than we had planned for it to be.
We kept postponing, but things continued to get more complicated.
Tired of trying to wait for the perfect time, we decided to plan a wedding - in a month.
Shein and Amazon were God sends for décor and clothing. A fraternity brother did our photos for a discounted rate, and we opted to do dinner at a local restaurant for a few close friends instead of a huge reception.
It wasn’t the dream, but it was done out of love. It meant something. It wasn’t forced or obligatory. It was beautiful.
I settled but in a different way for different reasons. This time, I settled because I had a man who loved me and couldn’t wait to be with me forever. I settled on my dress, the wedding venue and the reception. What I didn’t change my standard for was the man, the respect, the love or the honesty.
Get the treatment you deserve from the start, queen.
You are not a fixer.
Got made you perfectly in His image to fit a crown, not a hardhat.
If you're feeling overwhelmed, you're not alone. Support from a therapist can help you navigate these emotions and find practical ways to care for yourself. The clinicians at New Chapter Counseling Services specialize in supporting women through life transitions, pregnancy, postpartum, and everyday mental health challenges.