You may ask me questions about my life story, but you may not condemn me or punish me for it. The important thing to remember here is firstly, this is my story. It is my outlook and views on the events in my life, both as perceived by me, and as revealed by God. Second, it's in the past. It's also important to remember that God is continuing to change us, and offers us grace for our screw-ups, mess-ups, mistakes, and failures. That being said, no matter what I share, you should know that I don't regret a single thing that makes up who I am. Because, as God as revealed in His Word, we must be broken in this lifetime in order to make us beautiful in this lifetime, and prepare us for the surpassing beauty we will have in the next life as the Bride of Christ.
That being said, I'm going to quickly note that because I'd like to put my full story, not the quick 5 minute testimony I give when talking to newer students I meet on the street or at Outreach events, and not the 20 minute testimony I give during Fusion, Lifegroup, or Project Group times, I think I'm going to put it in small installments on here for everyone. Because, for me, every time I reflect on even just a small event in my life, God teaches me something about myself and where He's taking me. For you, who knows, maybe you'll learn something, or maybe it'll serve to explain who I am, and the events that have shaped my life and the core of my being. Okay, that being said, let's get started.
Some background information prior to my birth. My parents married when my mom was 19 and my dad was 21. I was born in August 1988. I'll let you do the math, if you know my parents birth dates. Otherwise, you should just know there was at least a few years before the wedding and my seeing the world. Anyway, yes, I was born in Kentucky, not Ohio. We only lived there for a year, but my dad's from Franklin, and some of my family lives in Kentucky... so if you've always wondered about the occasional accent I sometimes sport... wonder no more. My parents moved to Cincinnati, and then divorced when I was 2. My earliest memory is of us moving out of the house in Cincinnati, it had this dark brown shag-like carpet, and I definitely remember kissing it good-bye as we left the house for the last time. My parents moved to separate apartments nearby, and eventually my mom moved back in with my grandparents in Miamisburg (just south of Dayton, OH) and eventually bought a house, and my dad finally bought a small house in Cincinnati (Springdale to be exact, but our city and zip was still Cinci). During that time I remember my mom working a lot, and so did my grandma, who eventually retired. So, for the most part, I stayed with my grandparents a lot during the week. Through the divorce I saw my dad on the weekends. It seemed like a decently long drive when I was that little, going all the way from Dayton to Cincinnati down I-75 every Friday night and then back up Sunday night. When I started Kindergarten my mom began dating and eventually married my first stepdad, John. I acquired a stepsister who was 4 years older than me, and then when I was 6, my mom had my half sister. We then moved to Moraine (getting closer to downtown Dayton) and I went to elementary school in West Carrollton.
So, the small child to elementary years. You know the background, but what did I do during all that? Well, a typical weekend with my dad was watching the latest Disney animated release (I'm not sure who was more into it, me or dad... maybe both), or watching TGIF on Friday (yeah, you remember all those shows). Saturdays I played with a few friends in the neighborhood, or we would go play games at some arcade in the one mall, and then go up to Franklin and take my grandparents out for dinner. My grandpa always had to buy a lottery ticket on the way out to wherever we were eating, and occasionally had me pick out some of the numbers (maybe for good luck?). He never won. Sundays was church, dad was a youth pastor, and then lunch from McDonald's, and more playing outside until dinner and the long drive back up to Dayton. I remember my dad buying me a lot of things. At the time, I thought it was cool, but looking back on it, it generally makes me feel like a spoiled brat.
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| Playing @ dad's. Proof that I was a natural redhead, as well. |
Back in Dayton, I generally went to school, and then spent the majority of my time with my grandparents. My mom worked a lot, I remember. I watched a lot of TV at my grandparents when it was too cold to be outside. Otherwise, my grandpa and I would play baseball in the driveway or go for walks and bike rides around the block or up to the high school and back. I was the first grandchild of the family, and the apple of my grandpa's eye. He taught me how to play marbles, hit a ball with the baseball bat, and spent a lot of time with me when I was little. He had a big garden in the backyard with vegetables, a strawberry patch and compost piles, peach trees, an apple tree, and dahlias growing along the sides. It wasn't even that huge of a backyard, yet it was, because it had all that in it. He used to let me help him plant all the seeds, and then pick everything in the fall. That used to be the highlight to my fall, going out in the green bean patch and finding green beans and picking them. If I wasn't doing that, my grandma and I were putting puzzles together, coloring in coloring books, or playing Yahtzee or Go Fish. We used to sit on the back porch at night, or in front of the TV, my grandma, grandpa, and I, eating ice cream and watching the sun set or watching Jeopardy.
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| My grandpa, me, and our dog, Buster, picking peaches |
I remember in school I was the smartest in the class from the time I started until high school. In the second grade once, my mom got called in for a parent-teacher conference and was told that my teacher didn't know what to do with me, and that I was a problem in her class... because I was usually the first person to get my work done, and had already finished every activity you could do on the extra-credit board (I wish I still had that kind of diligence in school). At the end of that year, I took a Gifted test, and my mom was told that I did so well on it that I was eligible to skip a grade. I wasn't allowed, because I was already one of the youngest in the class (i.e. I turned 7 on August 2, right before school started, then everyone else turned 8 during that school year). However, I was placed in the elementary Gifted class that met at a different school once a week. I guess this kept me out of my teachers' hairs for a day, being that I was a "problem". Growing up in Dayton, and looking back now, I don't think I knew what real friendship was. The friends I did have only wanted to play with me when they didn't have something better to do or someone better to play with, or they only wanted me around when I could give them answers to their homework. That was my concept of friendship growing up.
I think my stepdad always wished I was a boy. He always treated us girls (there were only girls in the family) a little rough. He also didn't give us as much attention as we might have needed growing up, and it didn't help that he didn't treat my sisters, his actual children, like the "daddy's girls" they should have been treated as. I was also the middle child, which didn't exactly help. A lot of times I felt ignored and uncared for, which really lead to unhealthy habits to get attention. I can remember getting yelled at, and getting into a lot of trouble for fighting with my parents. Again, I was told the reason I was like this was because I was a spoiled brat. At times, I could be quite a pill as a child, which, thinking about it a few years ago, made me sick to think about those times. I didn't really like the way I was treated by my stepdad and didn't like him, and I remember my stepsister didn't like the way my mom treated her. I can remember a few family vacations where we would run off and do our own thing while they had our little sister, because we didn't like each other's parent, which seemed to unite us. As I got older, she stopped coming down on the weekends as much. I thought it was because she didn't like me for awhile, being that I had never had a sibling before because of my parents' early divorce, and I thought she was the coolest thing since sliced bread. I later figured out that it didn't have to do with me as much as the parents and her church.
Looking back on these times a few years ago, I used to be repulsed by who I was as a small child. Why did I act the way I did? Was I really a spoiled brat, like everyone said? It really ate away at me, until I thought I was still that way, and didn't like myself. Now, understanding who I am, and the longings God has placed in me, I can better understand this part of my life. Of the 5 love languages, the most important to me is Quality Time, and the second is Words of Affirmation. I think, during this time, I never knew what my real needs were or what I really desired deep down, but I knew there was something I deeply wanted and wasn't getting. Because I didn't know how to accurately express what I wasn't getting, I was just a pill of a child. I didn't know how to, or if I was even allowed to express being unhappy. My dad gave me gifts and toys, and my mom generally yelled at me for being unruly, and so in general, I really didn't get a lot of the quality time I needed. I think a lot of this lead to believing the lie that my parents don't really love me. They tolerate me. I think I've believed that lie for longer than I'd like to think. It's been so imbedded that I didn't realize that I was believing this lie until more recent years. Some of that, I think, eventually carried over to my belief of what God thought of me. Luckily, through mistakes I've made in the last 4 years of undergraduate college, I have deeply come to understand that God absolutely loves and delights in me and there's nothing that will ever change that. I wish I could say the same of my parents. I still occasionally battle that lie when it comes to my parents, and what they say and do. Especially when it's paired with a lack of Words of Affirmation. But, that comes later in my story.
And that's just the beginning of my story. If you're still with me, sweet. Like I said, feel free to ask me questions about my life, but please take your condemnations, judgments and punishments straight to God, first. Because He's already forgiven me, and is using my past to shape me into His beautiful creation.
Next installment: Middle School (oh boy... you can just hear and feel the drama there)
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| God unfortunately doesn't provide us with training wheels in real life. We just have to keep getting back up and getting back on the bike after each mistake and fall. |
Wow. This is very well written. I don't even think I could fit together all the pieces of my childhood in a way such as this. Thanks, Kross!
ReplyDelete*high five*
-APS