The Ultimate Vampire Resource and Directory

And so I think I've finally understood what people mean when they say that you shouldn't have kids before you're ready to take on full responsibility and change your own life for them.



I wasn't ready then and I'm nowhere near ready even after 4,5 years.



When I got pregnant... Having an abortion didn't cross my mind, not because I'm against it, but because I saw it as a way out. A way out of the miserable, trapped life I felt like I was living and a fast ticket away from my parents, my relationship to them has only gotten worse with the years and today I can honestly say I want nothing to do with them. They do nothing but disrespect me, hurt me, and fail to understand me in every way. I'm so different from them, from the way they see things, from how they are, from what they're used to and from what they expect me to be... That the differences have just become impossible the look past. They don't appreciate anything about me, they keep wanting to change me even though I'm nearly 25.



Not to mention the bad influence they have on Ryan and the way Ryan can see my whole mood shift when I'm around them...



Not that they've ever helped me much with Ryan, I got my mom to babysit for 4 hours in October when I went to a Britney Spears concert. Then I was away 2 hours one night to see Sisters of Mercy but my mom played the guilt card to make me rush home. Then I went out with a friend for the first time since I had Ryan, my mom agreed to babysit. She didn't have to do anything though, other than just be at home in case Ryan woke up... I put him to sleep before I went and got home before he woke up.



I would need a lot more help then I'm getting, but I'm afraid to ask because I know she'll use it against me. Or she'll be drinking around him. So I don't. The other week when I had a final exam to write in the evening, a friend of mine took care of Ryan and let him stay over at her house. She's the only one I can count on, the only one who honestly respects me and helps me out just because she wants to. But I feel bad about asking her too, I don't want to put the responsibility on her and be a burden to her. So I don't ask her unless it's an emergency.



The life I have... The way it's been formed and the restrictions, it's just so far away from how I imagined it. I never wanted to be a young, single mom. It wasn't anything I had planned or even thought about. Today I can't say I wish it hadn't happened, cause it would be unfair to the wonderful child that Ryan is. I just feel that it's so unfair to him to have me for a mom, it's unfair because I'm supposed to have fulfilled my life before I had him, so that my focus could be entirely on him. So that the strong feeling of disappointment and bitterness I walk around with every day wouldn't affect him, make him feel like it's his fault. It's not his fault, it's the circumstances he was born into that are wrong. It's my frustrating inability to DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT that's wrong.



He's happy. He has a great school, wonderful teachers, great environment when he's at school, good friends, he has it all... Except he doesn't have a proper family. He wants to stay at home from school sometimes to be with me, but most of the time he seems to be liking school more than being at home... Which I can't blame him for, I'd probably feel the same.



I hate that he doesn't have a proper family, a genuine, nice, caregiving family. Not the dysfunctional, sick, alcoholic, careless, respectless family I was born into. I wanted something different for him, and I feel like I need to move out of Stockholm for him to even have a shot at that...but I can't for now, not while he's still in preschool... he's happy there.



I want to be a better mom for him but I need to get away from my past, deal with it... I'm trying to, but I feel like dwelling on it doesn't help at all. I've been making progress all along by doing the exact opposite of what my parents did to me, by realizing their mistakes and taking care in not repeating them... by letting Ryan grow up to be himself, and be confident.



I feel so broken and it feels like a damn cliché to say it, but I feel like.. the way I was emotionally and mentally abused, combined with the fact that I'm extremely sensitive and eager to please... has just destroyed the very person I could have grown up to be, under different circumstances. I constantly dream about being the person I know I am, I could have been, I want to be... In the right environment, I know there is more to me than this. I know I can be great. I know I have the energy, the will power and the strength to do what I really want to do... To make something of myself. It's just been buried under so many layers of abuse, self doubt, insecurity, bad experiences, wrong environments... That the me, on the surface, has become a weak, quiet, withdrawn person without any confidence worth mentioning.



Every day I ask myself how to stop this, how to dare me to come out, how to draw the real me out of there... How to gain the confidence to be who I want to be, without fear of being taunted for it or be pushed down again by people, especially does who are supposed to "love" me unconditionally. What kind of role model am I to Ryan if I dont rise? If I stay like this miserable being, wasting my life?



And I realize that Ryan is not "in the way" for me becoming myself. Having sole responsibility of him with no help around, definitely makes it harder... but it shouldn't be impossible. I stand in my own way but how do I get myself out of the damn way? That's the question I never seem to find the answer to. I suffer when I don't want to suffer, I want to be past this already. If I'm not past it by now will I ever be? I thought when I fell into depression, that it would pass. In 7th grade I thought it would pass, but it only got worse. Sigh.



Now I finished the courses I had to to get accepted into university, finally, and I start asking myself if this is really what I want? Do I want to become an english teacher? Seriously? Sure, the idea was planted in my head years ago back in high school and I've been thinking about it and though I try to look at other options this is what I always seem to come back to... i just can't see myself, realistically, in another profession. I don't know what else I could do?



But then there's the problem that I don't feel like teaching itself is a passion of mine. I don't feel enthusiastic or passionate about it at all, wouldn't that just make me a bitter, tired, boring, horrible teacher? Repeating day in and day out how to name the colours in english, is that really "fun" for me? Is that what I want?



I'm close to getting my degree in child care as well, but I know for sure I don't have any interest in working with children for a longer period of time. It's not fun to me. Sure, once I'm there at work, I enjoy being around children but it doesn't give ME anything... I feel like I'm always the one giving, like I've done all my life, not getting anything back. Taking care of children is just... a way for me to get a good use for my empathy while getting a paycheck for it. I've realized anyways that I'm almost "too" sensitive for that line of work, I get into the children too much sometimes and seeing they way some parents treat their children just gets on my nerves, gets me angry. And believe me, most parents that I've met are totally ignorant. But I realize this ”problem” is a result of my past, I don't want children to have to go through such pain, they don't deserve it. But being a preschool teacher... I can't help them, it's not really my responsibility to educate their parents even though I'd like to.



Sigh...



I know what I want to do, I've been feeling it for years now, waiting for it to go away, expecting it to be some kind of naive idea that will go away if I supress it enough. But it doesn't. It's been there for 8 years now and I still haven't done anything about it... Because I'm too scared to be rejected, to fail, to work hard for something I will never achieve. It feels unrealistic, stupid even to fulfill such a dream. Like I'd just be another one of those pathethic ”hollywood actresses” who think they can, but really can't, act. Like people would actually laugh at me for trying. And then there's also the fact that I need a stable environment and stable income in order to provide for Ryan, something I don't think acting would give me. Plus, I'd probably be crushed in the competition. I have no chance. I'm old, too, how could I start taking acting classes at my age? Seriously? People do it when they're kids and grow up with it. I remember I used to love role playing and come up with my own stories when I was young, playing different parts. I just loved it and obviously, I still do. It's the only thing that has ever made me feel... happy, like, truly happy, and I know that sounds corny and stupid. But it's true. In high school drama class I got an A and my teacher praised me for having talent and encouraged me to apply for theatre college, but I never did... because before I even graduated high school I got pregnant, but again, Ryan is not the problem. I know that.



I just... can't let it go. I walk around in a daze every day, ignoring, supressing, forcing myself to go through life and suffering through occasional strikes of depression. Every now and then this desire just peeks out and takes hold of me, and it takes time before I and shake it lose and hide it again. Because I don't believe in myself and I know that realistically I have no chance to ever make it as an actress. I mean, actress? Me? I shake my head in disbelief... Laughing at myself, on the inside. I'm so childish and stupid.



I'm not talking about fame and wanting to make it as a big star, I'd be happy just acting on a local stage, acting out plays. That's my dream and I wish it wasn't. Why can't my dream just be something easily achieved like teaching? What bothers me the most is that it stays with me and I can't get rid of it, I want to get rid of it, would make my life easier. So I've been thinking about just taking some acting classes, just ”for fun”... but I can't, because those are either in the evenings or on the weekends and I have no one to take care of Ryan.



Ah, whatever... I just felt the need to write. Now I need a shower and then I promised Ryan a trip to the museum.