Life is full of disappoinments BUT....

In the 37 years that I have been upon this year, I have experienced many, many, far too many disappointments, and somehow they continue to come my way. I am not talking the I didn't get that outfit I wanted or I didn't have that dream vacation that I wanted.

I am talking real disappointments.

I am talking about things that could have BROKEN me! BUT THEY DIDN'T!!!!

Things such as being sexually abused by my worthless piece of shit father for many, many years of my life, starting as early as I can remember as second grade.
And...things such as living in a home where my father shot the gun off, or wouldn't provide food for the family or was continually abusive in one emotional or financial way or another...maybe, I should do the happy dance that that ass didnt beat us, but perhaps those scars would have healed much easier.
Things such as my mother not being able to protect us as children because she lived in her own fear ridden life. Survival was key within the four walls of the Swindle home, and you did what you had to do to survive, whether that was just being quiet and not speaking while father was home, or hiding in the closet when he starting shooting the gun in the house, or watching him shoot and kill the family animals without crying or saying a word, or just getting up from the dinner table hungry because he was pissed off and didn't like what mom had cooked and would throw it out in the backyard to the dog.

Perhaps these are things I should and could keep to myself, but it is the reality of how I grew up and I SURVIVED! It did not break me! I came out of that home with a resilence like no other. It is true that bad things happen to good people, but it is also true that those bad things can be turned into positive attributes. It is true that I am who I am in spite of those tragedies.

I MADE A CHOICE TO BE WHO I AM...LIFE IS FULL OF CHOICES!

True, statistics will show that I should be a loser, I should be someone who is non-functioning, someone who has lost her way to drugs, and alcohol, and promiscuity...but my spirit was much stronger than his abuse! I grew up with the thought that I would be someone, I would not live in his shadow. I would not live in fear. I would not become him and repeat that abuse on my own children.

Life is full of disappointments but it is what I did with those disappointments that made all the difference