Won't Regret What I Did For Love
the Queen of Cheap... eek.... awwww come on yall you know me... *Smile* So I'm doing it again... sharing something that I wrote to someone else... I always hope that maybe things I've read and stuff will help others so I just have to share... Sweetie... forgive me if I sound patronizing... I'm desperately seeking a child... teasing... well sort of... anyway... I don't think you won't look back... nor even that you shouldn't... but look forward most... I remember my mom telling me when I was 15 and had broken up with my first "true" love... she was so sad for me... she said when i found out about you and Harvey I didn't know what to do... I could have told you not to see him anymore... but I'm not stupid... I know you'd have done it behind my back... I thought about having him arrested but then you'd have hated me (he was 32)... so I just loved you and prayed for the best... and then she told me... did you ever give him anything you didn't want to? No I had to say... everything I gave him I gave because I loved him... that's right my mama said... so don't regret it now... let's just hang tight and we'll get through this together... so that's my love yardstick now has been all these years... and no matter how much I've ever been hurt... I've never given anyone anything I didn't want to... foolish... maybe... but that's ok... we're all fools sometime... Its funny I was just telling this story to a friend today... thank you Alice... As I often do I'm going to copy and paste this to my journal... I do hope it helps someone the way mama's words helped me then and are still helping me today 35 years later... I told yall I hadn't lost them....
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The first man I ever loved was 30yrs old. My mother threatened to have him arrested! I was 15 as well. He told me that the first time I made love it should be with someone who knew as little as I did (which, at the time, was nothing as he knew) in the back seat of a car. I asked him if that was REALLY what he wanted for me because I wanted someone who knew enough about it to make me feel good about it.......
It was an argument that I eventually won and have never regretted it once. I learned more about love and acceptance from him, unfortunately, than I ever did from my mother. I can\'t say I never gave anything to a man that I never regretted. But I can say that, in the end, it was some of the lessons Jim helped me learn that are the reason I\'m a happily married woman today. He told me once that his biggest fear was that I would end up being a woman who hated men ( for the rest of my life) and it would all have been his fault. He couldn\'t have been more wrong. In the end, I really learned more about how I should expect to be treated from J.T. than I could ever have realized at the time and I will be grateful to him forever. I guess it\'s an experience I wish I could have shared with my mom and I would wish what you had with yours for all of us girls. But in the end, as long as we learn that sharing real love with someone also includes being truly free to love yourself........ then I guess it doesn\'t matter quite as much who we learn it from, or how.
What a wonderful thought-I go over and over that I was too lenient with Chris-that I shouldn\'t have always given so much or done so much for him, just endless thoughts that I somehow could have prevented his accident-to hear your Mom say \"did you ever give him anything you didn\'t want to\"-I have to say no, and just like you with your first love, with my son I gave him what I did because I loved him, plain and simple. I find in my darkest moments, when I\'m most plagued with the \"what-ifs\" that I say, \"all I could do was love you Chris\" and I guess that\'s the most important thing any of us can do for anyone.
Sorry to see that you are not feeling so good today. Hang in there! I wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed reading about you and your mom (above). My mother was never close in any way through my childhood. It\'s almost as if she was not a mom at all. I have grieved for the absense of this incredibly important relationship much of my life. You are so fortunate to be able to look back at those close and personal interactions. I cannot say that I really remember my mother ever touching me or hugging me with motherly affection and it is amazing that no matter how old I get to be, I still am sad about that emptiness in my life. I try to be as close to my daughter as I can and give her the expression of my love as much as I can. I hope that she knows how fortunate she is to have that. I\'m not perfect but I certainly tell her and show her how much I love her in many ways words and actions.
As far as my mom and I, I feel like I have a missing piece. Try hard to appreciate what I did have. I know she and my father were far more neglected. I know too that they both did not know how to express loving feelings and communication.
Sorry to go on and on. I just was taken by the love your mother showed you when you were a young girl in love. Thank you for sharing!