Take the Trip, Buy the Shoes, Get the Lashes

Recently, I took a spring break trip with one of my best-friends. We are both empty nesters and beginning a new chapter in our lives. Until just about four years ago I have been a mom to three great kids, full-time employee with a side hustle for the past 26 years and active in the community. I never felt I had time to travel and embark on new experiences but with much encouragement from friends and family I have begun to step outside of my comfort zone.

My BFF and I traveled to Nashville, TN because we are both country music fans and this was a destination on our bucket list. First, we made a stop in Memphis, TN to stretch our legs and visit some of the sites there. We arrived in Nashville Wednesday evening checked in the hotel and after a long road trip decided to visit the hotel bar & restaurant for a cocktail. We had the pleasure of being entertained by Lizzie Cates; a very talented young lady I might add. We decided to get some rest so we would have the energy for our busy day of site seeing the next day (we are almost 50 after all). Thursday was packed full of walking, site seeing and touring the Johnny Cash Museum, shopping (where I splurged on a cute hand beaded cross body purse), dining and listening to music on Broadway. We dined at Luke Bryan’s place, had cocktails at Jason Aldean’s and discovered a little hole in the wall place named Crossroads that made us feel at home, Texas style. Friday we toured the Country Music Hall of Fame, had a quiet lunch at a Pizzeria, and shopped a little more then headed back to the hotel to get gussied up for a night on the town. We had the pleasure of making new friends the night before from Detroit, Amber and Ed who we reconnected with that evening. The four of us bar hopped like a bunch of 20 year olds on spring break, danced everywhere we went and had a blast. After a few hours of fun the BFF and I had our fill and decided to head back to the hotel but not before we bought street side hotdogs for the walk back. We laughed all the way back to the hotel, oh the memories! Saturday, that was the cherry on top! We both grew up watching the Grand Ole Opry, Hee Haw and listening to all the greats like Loretta Lynn, Johnny Cash, Dolly Parton, Conway Twitty, Minnie Pearl with her comedy show and so many others. Touring the Grand Ole Opry brought with it childhood memories and so much more. I even got a little emotional just thinking about what it means to country music artist to become a member of the Grand Ole Opry. As I’m writing this I am still in awe of that place. After, we visited Belle Meade Winery and did a wine tasting. We didn’t get to tour the mansion so we will definitely be going back. We were able to walk the grounds while enjoying a class of wine and the scenery was spectacular. So serine we just sat and enjoyed the peace and beauty that surrounded us. This was our last night in Nashville so we kept it low-key and had dinner and drinks at the hotel restaurant while being entertained by great local talent. We were in our room and pajamas by 9:30 p.m. still in awe at how Saturday was definitely a great way to end the trip. Sunday morning came and we headed back home to Texas and reality but we were well rested and grateful we decided to embark on this adventure. We are already talking and planning another trip to celebrate our 50^th birthdays this year.

I can remember looking out of the hotel window on that first night and gazing out over all the twinkling lights and thinking “wow, I can’t believe I’m in this place” not the actual location but this place in my life. Once I became a Mom I had sacrificed so much of what I WANTED (not needed, there is a difference) to ensure my kids had what they needed and sometimes wanted. I’m sure many of you ladies out there can relate. It has taken me a very long time to be okay with doing the things I want to do and not having to justify rewarding myself. I shared this experience to encourage you to take the trip, buy the shoes, get the lashes or just do whatever it is you want to do! Life is too short to have regrets. Like King George says “I’m not here for a long time but I’m here for a good time”. So, I’ve decided to live the life I’d always imagined!

~ A Diva Living Life to the Fullest

Unraveling My Brokenness

You never truly know how broken you are until you are in a situation that forces you to look within yourself. Over the past nine months I have been dealing with personal situations that have forced me to take a deeper look at my mental, emotional and spiritual well-being. God has begun to reveal some things to me that were so deeply buried I never even knew they existed. It’s been painful but the bright side is that I can now begin to address these issues and heal the brokenness to become a better version of myself.

One of the issues that was unburied is where my sense of insecurity and inability to trust came from.  If I’m completely honest, it is the inability to trust men. As a little girl, I had a relationship with my father that was not as close I had wished for, but it was a relationship. I remember my mother dropping me off to spend the day with him and my Abuelita. He eventually got married, and I didn’t see him again for about 15 years. There is one specific time that has haunted me my whole life and that was when I saw him at the grocery store.  I stood right next to him in hopes he would acknowledge me. I’ll never forget how I felt when he turned away from me like I was a complete stranger. Did he see me and just deliberately not acknowledge me or had so much time passed since the last time he had seen me that he didn’t even recognize me? Growing up through the years my mother would encourage me to call him and reach out to him, so I did. We would talk on the phone for a bit and then a month or years would go by before I would attempt to reach out again. The last time I spoke to him on the phone, I invited him to my quincenera and he promised he would be there. He never showed up. A few days later, I remember telling my mom “do not ever ask me to call that man again” because I was done trying. My heart had been broken one too many times by him, and I was not going to allow it to happen again. Little did I know, this would shape how I viewed men for the rest of my life. When he married, he had more children, and I then became just a “person” from his past. I was just another girl once in his life. This other woman, his wife would now be my replacement as was his other children. No fault to them, but this is how I felt. Since then, I have carried the feeling of rejection, unworthiness and insecurities into my adult relationships. These feelings soon led me to finding myself in relationships that mirrored how my father made me feel that day at the grocery store. The feeling of being replaceable or expendable.

When I was 15 years old, I met a boy who eventually became the father of my children and my husband. We were childhood sweethearts because we grew up together. Unfortunately, because of my past I held him to a standard he could never live up to. How could he? He was a child himself! I was a few months older than him so he was only 14 years old when we met. Looking back, we were both broken children looking to each other to fulfill voids we both had that neither of us had the emotional, mental or spiritual maturity to fulfill. We finally married when our oldest son was 18 months old and from that point on Luis Sr. not only became my husband but also the surrogate for my father. So, when he made mistakes, as we all do, not only did he have to pay the price for his mistakes, but the man (my father) before him. As time when on, we grew and matured but never really healed. Our marriage eventually came to an end, and we parted ways. The scars of abandonment and rejection were reopened and the wounds were made deeper.

As a single woman for the past 20 years I had unknowingly fixated my thoughts on “no man can be trusted” and had the expectation they all leave at some point. In the years I’ve been single, my attempts at dating and relationships have not been successful. All these years, I’ve always blamed “the man” due to my inability to trust. I had pushed people away. There were a couple I can honestly admit attempted to stick it out with me and prove that not all men were the same but because of my brokenness, I was relentless in my beliefs to the point I would give them no choice but to concede and prove me right. I have been forced to take a deeper look within myself lately and have asked God to reveal to me the root of what has caused me so much pain over the years. The beautiful thing about God is that He will not force you to address the painful scars of your past until you are ready, its then that He will reveal it to you. Now that I know where the root of my insecurity and mistrust come from, I can begin to heal. Part of that healing is coming to a place of forgiveness, true forgiveness. As one of my friends recently told me “because you have not come to true forgiveness of those who have hurt you in the past, you’ve allowed it to impact your future”. I recognize that now but it has taken me many years, broken relationships and pain I’ve inflicted on others to fully grasp just how broken I was.  It’s taken me so long to come to this conclusion. I not only have to forgive others. I have to remember to work on forgiving myself as well. I also had to finally admit to myself until I address these issues I would not be able to establish a happy, healthy, loving and trustworthy relationship with someone else.

Romans 8:28 “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” My purpose and prayer for this blog is that you find hope in healing, courage to face demons and generational curses that secretly haunt you and comfort in knowing you’re not alone in your brokenness. I urge you to seek God ask Him to reveal to you areas of your life that need healing so that you can live the life God always intended you to live. John 10:10 “…I come that they might have life and that they might have it more abundantly”.

~A Diva Healing Everyday~