I was chatting to a friend of mine the other day and they made a very valid point “your past is what makes you who you are in the present”. 

So, as I’m approaching my 45th birthday, I decided to look back at what has made me the person I am today.

I was married very young; at the tender age of 19 my husband to be was a serving soldier of only 20. Swept away with the allure of a uniform, I was ignorant to the “Janus” that lived behind the charming smile and the plausible lies that where yet to be told.

Admittedly, I now question what led me to get married at such a young age. After all, I had a wonderful childhood with two loving and doting parents. I couldn’t have asked for more, yet I always felt that I was never good enough.  As a pretty, curly haired and slightly overweight only child I found it hard to mix with my peers, and served as a beacon for bullies.  I was an outcast, and that overwhelming feeling of being an outsider then followed me into my adult life.

Upon leaving school, I followed my very outgoing mum in to the glamorous world of cosmetics.  Working in the West End of London for (then) top cosmetic companies, my mum was amazing at her job.  However, I was always met with the same greeting: “oh your *****’s daughter?!  You’re not like your mum, are you?!  Once again my self-esteem had a sledge hammer taken to it, and I was on the fringes and cast into the shadows – defined by who and what I wasn’t, as opposed to who I actually was.

With my self-esteem at rock bottom, along came this “knight in uniform” who paid me attention and said he loved me no matter what…Who wouldn’t fall for that?  After having only known one another for less than a year we were married a week before my twentieth birthday.  At last I felt that I was worthy, fitted in, was normal and accepted. But, how quickly this pictured changed.  Over the next twenty-two years he proved himself to be an alcoholic, womanizing, wife-beating, feckless father.

Why did I stay?  It is rather simple. 

When you are in a situation it’s hard to see beyond it.  The daily grind of life and the gradual erosion of your self-esteem all come about so quickly – in the blink of an eye you are middle aged, slowly disappearing, and think this is how your life is and will be for the rest of your years.  Domestic abuse takes many forms and in that moment I was unaware I was a victim of such abuse.

I completely withdrew, as friendships were hard to maintain.  I could never feel comfortable in the company of others for fear of what he may say or do or the repercussions of his actions. As a consequence, I chose to isolated myself and always said I never needed friends and didn’t want them.

However, three years ago the scales where lifted from my eyes.  My daughter was the catalyst, as she wanted to go to university and where we were living didn’t offer the program she wanted.  So the deal was that I would move with her to a new area and my husband would stay on and work at our previous location, as he had a well-paid job.  At the time it was a terrible wrench because, at that point, I didn’t think I’d be able to function.  I felt lost.  Though, unaware of the changes in me that would arise from this separation, I grew to realize that I had the opportunity to throw off the shackles of my toxic marriage and slowly began to rebuild both my life and my person.  Brick by brick I became anew.

A year passed and due to the travel costs he remained at our old location.  My daughter and I carved out a life for ourselves where we were living.  It was like a breath of fresh air – no arguments, no fear of saying or doing the wrong thing. My daughter had always excelled at school, but was now an A+ student with a bright and sunny disposition.  For the first time in my life I began to like myself for who I was, and felt I was valued.  People really liked me for me, and though I was funny and charming.  I was at last a person, worth something in the eyes of others as well as myself.

One year then became two and then three and this distance solidified my resolve to break away from this man I no longer wanted to be with: the man who I had given most of my adult life to, the man who had broken my spirit, made me feel so worthless, kept me so emotionally starved that I was grateful for any crumbs of affection or kindness.

So in tracing how I came to “be” and piecing together the patchwork of my past, I’ve come to realize that you’re never too old to start afresh, and age should not hold you back from making life changing decisions.  It’s always easier just to stand at the crossroads, and never choose to take one of those many possible paths. Just because you’ve spent twenty-plus years with someone, doesn’t mean you should spend another twenty with them, especially when you‘re unhappy. Whilst it may be scary to make such a radical decision in your mid-forties, life is to be enjoyed not endured.  So, I stood at my own personal crossroads and chose to start living and wander into the unknown. 

Will I be upset that another birthday has arrived and that I’m embarking on a new life journey in my forties?

No! Not by any means, after all I may be another year older but I’m another year happier.