Kind Of Woman

Only a few people know this, but when Peyton was in the hospital the first time she didn’t want me near her. She would always call for her father. The reason was my energy was too cold. She wasn’t receiving the love and affection that she desperately needed.

I am the everything is okay kind of woman, the we don’t have time for this kind of woman, the one that keeps our feelings under control and doesn’t allow anything to stop us kind of woman.

I am also the never got coddled kind of woman, the one who can’t go to her mother and tell her she doesn’t feel good and get sympathy kind of woman. The one who was told to go lay down and go to sleep kind of woman. The one who had a stomach virus and got in trouble for vomiting on the floor kind of woman.

I am the one who has to be strong kind of woman, the one who could show no weakness kind of woman because my strength is holding everyone else together kind of woman.

I am the woman that has to cry in the shower in order to get some type of reprieve.

I am the woman like so many before me who had no time to be sick because it was a sign of weakness, no time to be sick because our parents had to continue to make our world go round.

I am the woman who used to be jealous that others could go to their mom and lay in their lap and tell them what’s wrong.

I turned out to be the woman that’s grateful for the strength that my mother instilled in me. The strength that could survive without human contact when it seems like I need it the most.

I am the woman like so many before me that was raised to be independent, but in that independence never learned how to be properly loved. You see my tough exterior not realizing there is someone who is soft and sensitive inside screaming to be loved.

You see my pain as anger. You see my passion as having an attitude. Stifled by my own thoughts because I’m not allowed to have my own feelings without being offensive.

I am only one woman, but this one woman comes from a collective whole that feels the same way.