As we face Lily’s 2nd year of life, it has come to my attention on more than one occasion that parenting is a wild ride. Yes, you’ve heard it from me, folks: parenting is hard, confusing, emotional, revelating, and everything in between. I know, I know, it’s not exactly rocket science that I just discovered this, but well, this is my first time doing it and while I know that there have been countless others who have done this before me, it doesn’t exactly make it easier for me.

I struggle on a daily basis with being a parent. Everyday I have questions about whether or not I’m being the best mom I can be. Everyday, I think about how I can be better for her — more loving, more patient, more there for her. During the first year of her life, it was difficult, to say the least. Transitioning from being a two-person family to being a three-person family was hard for us, though enjoyable and beautiful at the same time. Every step of the way, I had questions all long the path. Questions about what to feed her, when to burp her, when to stop breastfeeding, how long I should breastfeed, when her naps are, when I should go back to work. If it were up to me, I would still be at home, on a full time basis, with both Lily and her daddy.

But alas, like 99% of the world out there, we can’t just dedicate our complete attention to raising our child(ren), unfortunately. I know I don’t talk about it a lot, but when I went back to work when Lily was only 6 months old, I struggled with a lot of emotions. The guilt, the shame, the idea that I was letting her down. The fear that she would lose that connection with me, or she would forget me, or she would not attach as much to me. I feared that I wouldn’t be as big a part of her life as she is in mine, and I feared that I would miss out on all the little daily milestones she had.

And for some parts, I was right: I missed out on a lot of the daily stuff, but I’m grateful that her daddy could be there when I was not. I still struggle with this all the time. I want to be the best mom I can be, and sometimes I feel like I fall just short of this. Where I felt my mother had failed in her parenting me, I want to correct those mistakes the second time around, in my own parenting with Lily. I want to not only be completely physically there, I also want to be completely emotionally there. There have been sacrifices that I have openly and honestly and happily made for my Lily, because the decision to have her was a miracle decision, and one well planned through and well thought out. She was a planned baby. We wanted to create her. We wanted her here to make this world — our world — a better place. And sometimes I feel that by not being there all the time, I am letting her down.

I was the eldest child. Naturally, or maybe not so naturally, I am used to being the caretaker. When my family isn’t doing well, it is a reflection of me. I take a lot of inner responsibility for how happy my family is. When we struggle, it is because of my failure, not anyone else’s. Because of this ingrained characteristic in me, sometimes I feel that I am letting my family fail because of my own failure.. by not being there enough for them.

It wasn’t Lily’s decision to be born, and it wasn’t her decision to exist in this hard world. We try to give her everything she is worthy of, and more. Not just all the Christmas presents or the Birthday wishes. Not just all the toys and the games and the awesome singing and videos we let her watch. Not just all of that, but also the many things in life that she should have merely because she exists. The constant love, the constant attention, the constant play therapy that she should be getting. The lessons in life that she should grow up with — knowing that she is special, that she is loved, that she should be confident in her very existence because she is meant to be here, because she is meant to exist, because she is meant to be alive. The lessons that we try to instill in her, ingrain in her, that she is one of a kind, and she can be proud of who she is and where she comes from. We want her to be constantly, at least while we can control it, be filled with love around her. We want her entire world to be filled with love. We want love to encompass her every breath, her very existence, her every environment and setting that we put her in.

Because I am a daughter of a mother myself, I realize how important the relationship is between a mother and a daughter. The daughter takes away with her everything from her relationship with her mother. The good, the bad, the neutral. Everything from that relationship helps shape who she is, who she becomes, who she will become, and what she is capable of becoming. I’ve witnessed both damaging and beautiful relationships between mothers and daughters. I have firsthand experience on what the relationship between a mother and daughter can do to a soul. I have firsthand struggles out of this relationship, and I’ve grown up wishing my mother could have done things differently. While I have come to forgive my mother for the many unintentional mistakes she made, and even have come to love her for them, I fear of making similar mistakes — or even overcompensating for them — on my little Lily.

It took me close to 30 years to forgive and love my mother for everything that she is, and everything that she is not. And still, I have my bad days where I regret the life I grew up in. I don’t want my Lily to spend 30 years of her life in that same journey. And sometimes — well, I should be honest: MOST of the time — I wonder if my life experience has come to haunt me in my new journey as a mother. I don’t want to be the highly anxious, hyper-vigilant mother so that I can over-compensate for my mother’s own journey. But I don’t want to make the same mistakes. The cycle has to end somewhere.

Everyday I struggle with this. Everyday I am painfully aware of what kind of mother I want to be, and what kind of mother I don’t want to be. Everyday I have moments where I think I am doing her more harm than good. Everyday I have moments that I have failed my family. Everyday I struggle with this. Everyday I struggle with not being there for my family, for my baby, for my husband. Everyday I struggle with not being a good mother, or a good wife. Everyday, I struggle with this. This is not easy, and this does not come easy.

And so when I go off to work, I count down the hours to when I will be finished, so I can go home to my family, so I can just be there. I count down the minutes when I can be good to my family, when I can be better for my family. I wonder if I have been gone too long. I wonder if she would resent me for going back to work (and yet, there was no other choice in the matter). I wonder if I am doing her a disservice by not giving her a mother for so many hours out of the day. I wonder if I’m not being a good wife by being away from my husband. I wonder if I’m not doing enough for my family. My beautiful family who I live and breathe for.

And then, I look at my Lily, who greets me every morning with kisses and hugs, and a big smile on her face. Who runs to the top of the stairs when she hears me open the door every evening, and exclaims, “MOMMY!!! MOMMY!!!!!” Who excitedly tells me to “SIT!! SIT!!” as soon as she sees me after work, so that we can instantly play, or spend time together, or sing and dance, even before I can get out of my work clothes and into my pajamas, even before I can take off my jacket, even before I can put down my bag. Who starts babbling about what she did that day and who she saw, and what she ate for lunch. Who almost always starts singing a favorite song to me that she’s been singing with Daddy all day long.

My sweet husband, the father of my Lily, always tells me what she is doing everyday while I am away. Sometimes I even get pictures and videos of their day together. Their dances, their games, the new things she’s learned to do. And I feel like I haven’t missed so much after all, being a voyeuristic fly on their wall while they spend their days together. And I feel less guilty, but shamed that I wasn’t part of their life during the day. I feel proud that they have such fun, great days together, where he can dedicate his entire being to her existence, and pick up where I have left off. Yet at the same time, I feel ashamed that I can’t also do that. I feel proud that he is helping me raise her and be there for her. I feel proud that he is the Daddy who had an integral part in teaching her to read. The Daddy who sings and dances with her. The Daddy who taught her the alphabets and how to sing the ABCs’. And yet, sometimes, I feel like they are growing right in front of me, and I am missing the beats entirely to their song. Sometimes, I feel a little left out.

I often wonder if this is just me, or if all parents who work feel like this. I wonder if fathers who work outside the home feel like this. I wonder if this is my intense struggle alone, or if others feel like this.

I look at how happy my Lily is, how healthy my Lily is, how cheerful, sensitive, kind and compassionate my Lily is. I look at what a firecracker of a personality she has. I look at her strong sense of self and her proud confidence of who she is and who she belongs to. I look at how she is so sure of her presence and existence in this world, where others have fallen short even after so many years of living. And I think… I must be doing something right, if she is this happy, this healthy, this confident in her world.

I must be doing something right, even if I’m not doing everything I want to be doing. And I must learn to feel solace in this. Because my Lily needs me to be happy, and my Lily needs me to take care of myself, and my Lily needs me to be happy for her.

When I was about nine or ten years old, my maternal grandfather passed away. I had heard numerous stories about him from my mother, ever since we left our home country of Vietnam only approximately six years earlier. The stories I heard were heroic, not of a man who was a war hero, or a man who physically saved lives or could lift a 5-ton oxen with his bare hands. None of that sort. He was a heroic man who cared for his family. A hard worker, dedicated to working 15 hours a day to provide food and shelter in times of stress in the small village I was born in.

I don’t remember the exact day or even the time that my mother passed the news on to me that he had passed. I don’t remember exactly how old I was, or what I was wearing, or even what she said. I remember that she had told me stories of this phantom man that existed halfway across the world from me, who loved me merely because of who I was born from (his daughter), who wished me well and asked about me often in letters and in our infrequent expensive phone calls to Vietnam. I don’t remember ever meeting him, though I must have because I spent the first 4 years of my life in his company and often in his home. I don’t remember conversing with him, though I must have because I learned his name and he knew mine. I don’t remember much about him except the stories my mother told — how he threw me up in the air when I was a baby, how he kissed and cuddled me, how he hugged me tight and teased me until I giggled. She told me I was loved even from halfway across the world, and that I meant something to someone out there, even if I didn’t remember exactly what his face looked like, or the color of his skin, or the sounds of his words, or the smell of his breath after a meal.

I remember the feeling of love when my mother told me stories of her father. I remember her stories of her childhood, how she grew under his firm, yet loving hand. I remember how he treasured me, one of his many grandchildren, because I was from his own flesh and blood. I remember learning, from that very young age, that family meant starting from the same blood, and continued to survive through unconditional love and friendship.

The night my mother told me that my grandfather had passed away, I went to sleep at the top bunk of the bunk bed my brother and I shared at the time, with a framed picture of him tucked under my pillow. I felt an incredible sense of loss, for this mysterious man who loved me from afar. This man I don’t have any recollection of hugging, nuzzling, cuddling with, speaking with. I don’t remember any type of relationship I had with him, yet I felt an incredible, overwhelming sense of loss. Never shall I have an opportunity again to see him, to meet him, to finally have ingrained in me a tangible memory of my own of him, instead of those that were passed on from my mother. I slept with a framed picture of this old man under my pillow, and cried myself to sleep. Suddenly, I lost a part of my blood that I never even got to know. Suddenly, the word “death” had a meaning to me. It wasn’t just that grass died, or leaves fell in autumn, or ants were crushed under our feet. This was a living person who I meant something to, who could have meant something to me, that I shall never be able to meet.

And I thought, “Wow. A family member who loved me genuinely, no matter who I am, no matter what a bad girl I’ve been today, or yesterday, or tomorrow. A family member who didn’t even know me and loved me unconditionally. And he’s passed. He’s gone.”

And I felt an incredible sense of loss. I felt that something died in me as well. The possibility of being loved unconditionally again. The possibility of being someone else’s life, someone else’s little gem. I felt, like, I lost a family when I lost my grandfather.

When I was nine, I lost my grandfather. And I was left wondering if I would ever feel that unconditional love again.

Now I’m almost 30. And I realized that family was here with me all along. All those years I spent with my sister, who is seven years younger than me, were for building that unconditional love. All those years we grew up together, teased each other, hit each other, cried together, laughed together, became spies together, disappointed each other, tattled on each other. All those years I spent nurturing her, and changing her diaper, and dreading her, and being pissed off at her, and teaching her, and watching her, and ignoring her, and loving her. All those years spent was just to build that love that I felt came unconditionally from my grandfather.

My sister, who has known me from the time she was born, who has stuck with me in my worst times, who accepted me even with all my secret failures and shameful experiences and choices. My sister, who cried at my wedding and made a speech that moved the room. My sister, who was jealous when I got a boyfriend. My sister, who I love despite her annoying strawberry-gum-chewing habit, and her slow, sloth-like way of getting ready in the morning. My sister, who despite being 7 years apart, often get mistaken as my “twin without glasses.” My sister, who has loved me from the very beginning — loved my failures, my joys, my happiness, my sadness, my losses, my gains. My sister who never let me down. My sister who never left me. My sister who never said “You’re too much for me.” My sister who has always said, “Oh, well. That’s Helen.” and loved me anyway. My sister, who never needed an explanation about who I am or why I am. My sister, who just knew I am me because I am Helen. My sister, who never needed a definition of me. My sister, who after all these years, is still here. The only one who’s stuck around after all these years. The only friend who hasn’t done me wrong, said goodbye, left and never look back. The only one who I can safely be myself with and not fear the consequences of rejection.

The only one I can completely. be. me. around. My sister.

Somehow over the years, she went from being a baby whose diapers I changed, to being a toddler who followed me around, to being the annoying little bugger who had to go EVERYWHERE I went with my friends, to being the teenager who wanted to dress like me and wear her hair like me, to being a young adult who has her own opinions and her own loves and losses (and now, her own fashion sense too). Somehow, over the years, we went from being just family or sisters to being friends. One of the few people in my life who I surely know I can always reconnect with if we ever lose touch. The heart never stops dying, the mind never stops remembering, the love never stops giving. Our relationship thrives, no matter what.

And suddenly, from since I was eight, when my mother told me someone halfway across the world from me, who loved me dearly and unconditionally, passed away, I felt again the overwhelming loss of someone who not only loves me, but who I also know to love back. The loss came when I drove her to the airport this morning, and hugged her tight and saw her off. The grown girl who is almost an inch taller than me, walking away. The other half of my heart, the other half of my developmental soul.

But, the only difference is, this time, I know we will meet again, and the loss is only temporarily physical.

Sometimes life is simple, and sometimes life is hard. I’m going to be turning 29 in less than two weeks, and I feel like in the friendship area, I haven’t accomplished much. Most people at this age have made lifelong friends already, and have had friendships that have lasted years, if not decades. Some lucky souls out there even still consider their grade school best friends their current best friends. I’m not one of those lucky ones. Sometimes I feel like I’m marked. Or dented. But I don’t have the receipt to trade myself in for a new one. I guess I’m just stuck to deal with the dent marks and make it work for me.

If I were to be honest with myself, I think in no uncertain terms, I’m a bit of a decrepit. I’m a little dysfunctional. I’m a little wounded. I’m a little scarred. If I were to be honest with myself, I’d admit that I am far than perfect, and sometimes I don’t always love everything that is who I am. If I were to be honest with myself, I would admit openly and willingly, without fear of consequences, that I truly miss having a “best” girl friend. Like, someone who I’ve known for years and years and can finish my sentences before I even start them. Someone who I feel comfortable sitting in silence with, or jabber on and on for hours with. I feel like all my life, I’ve been “on the move,” when it comes to friendships. While I found a best friend in the man I married, there is something that only another woman can provide in a friendship. The same-sex camaraderie, the intrinsic understanding, the “I know what you mean before you even say it” sisterhood.

For me, “deep” friendships with other females come and go. They start off strong, really really in depth. As if I just plunged myself into a swimming pool without looking if there’s even water in it to sustain me and keep me afloat. And during the flight itself, plunging into the air towards a possibly-empty giant hole in the ground, I feel ecstatic that I found the pool in the first place. I feel like I’m on a high. I feel hopeful, full of life, like anything is possible. I feel like there SHOULD be water when I hit something, simply because I am willing it to be. Simply because my secret Jedi powers are just. that. strong. That’s how friendships with females start with me: strong at first, powerful in the beginning.

And then, as if out of nowhere, I hit solid ground, in the dirt, and there was no water to begin with. I misjudged. Yet again. I eat dirt. My face scrapes. I bleed into the ground. I am left with more scars. And what do I do afterwards? As if I am a glutton for punishment, I go looking for more pools of water to dive into without looking.

I’m turning 29 in just a couple of weeks, and outside of my family, I don’t feel close to many people. I feel like I’m floating. I’m not grounded. I feel like no one cares about me. That I give too much and I’m discarded because I’m a dime a dozen. I’m 29 and I feel alone, without a friend in the world. Not just acquaintances, not just friends, really. But soul sisters. Without soul sisters.

Most of the time, I blame my mother. The relationship between my mother and me has been so confusing, so all-or-nothing, so damaging, so … UGH … that I feel like I’ve been stunted for life. I was never taught how to stay healthy in a friendship relationship with another female because the first relationship I had with a female was so unhealthy and suffocating. Most of the time, I blame my mother. But for God’s sake, I’m going to be 29. It’s time I take responsibility for my own mishappenings and my own actions. I can only blame her for so long. It’s time I take a look at myself deeper and figure out why no one wants to be my soul sister. Figure out why I’m so dispensable. And figure out why I don’t value myself enough to put boundaries on people and allow them to love ME for who I am instead of for what I’m willing to do for them.

Maybe by 30, I’ll have the answers. But I have a feeling this is just the beginning…

Life is funny, isn’t it? We go through our lives, so many of us, trying to seek what we want, trying to put a name to a face of someone we fantasize about, or something we fantasize about, that would make us happy for the rest of our days. And yet, what it comes down to is just the mere fact that we all want one thing. One simple thing. To be loved. It’s so simple, sometimes it’s ridiculous. Poets write long winded, elaborately phrased poems about love, the need to belong. There are people who make their professions out of it. There are those who swear by it. There are those who have been burned by it. And yet, it all comes down to the mere simple reality, the mere simple fact, that all we want is to have our mind match our heart. All we want is to know for an absolute fact that our heart belongs to someone, something. That the feeling is mutual.

When I was in graduate school, one of my professors had told us in class, “There isn’t another profession in the world that allows you to walk into people’s lives so openly, so shamelessly, so freely as being a therapist.” I thought about that, and since then, I’ve really tried to think of any other profession where the client, the customer, the consumer, invites you so openly, so carelessly, to be part of their lives without so much as a reciprocation from you. To be part of their being. Not just their home, or their money, or their career or profession, but to actually look into the very depths of their souls. In order to help them.

When I think too hard about it, I realize how much this profession of mine feeds on the helpless, the desperate, the most hurt, the most wounded. Sometimes, I feel almost like a vulture, preying on the very weak, inviting people to look closely at their broken hearts so that I may examine it to the very core. Other times, I feel privileged that no other job would ever allow me to get to know humanity at its most vulnerable, most venerable, most honorable. And each day, it surprises me how much, truly, we are such a lost species. Each day, it surprises me how much we are capable of loving each other, and yet we hold back for reasons that don’t seem to make sense to me.

I have kids who I’m working with who are developmentally delayed. Some of them have diagnoses that span several pages long. Others have behaviors exhibited that have gotten them into trouble with their parents, their friends, the school, and even the law. And when I sit down, and truly think about it — at my most stressed times — when I let it all get to me, when I let it all sink in, when this isn’t “just a job” for me, I realize that each one of my clients have one thing in common. They all have the same thing in common that the rest of us do. No matter how much we want to deny that we are “nothing” like the clients I see, that we are healthier, that we can go without seeking counsel, that we don’t need help, we all really just want one thing. How we get it, how we seek it, how we come to fight for it — those are the things that make us differ from each other.

Because you see, all the kids I work with — let go of their ages, their sexes, their behaviors and their diagnoses — all want the same thing: they want to be connected to love. To be genuinely connected to love. I think it comes from the very core of our very existence. When I question whether or not the human race has instincts like every other species, I always come to this conclusion: our instinct is to love. We bow into this world naked as the earth made us, and we cry for the need of attention, connectedness, comfort, nurture. We cry for our mothers who made us from scratch. We cry for the kisses and the croons. And while our cries may sound desperate, despairing, heartbreaking, it is the natural law of our bodies. We cry for love. We cry for our mothers. We cry for the blood that used to connect us with hers.

I don’t think we ever stop crying for it. All the kids I work with, whether or not they are in foster care, all want to belong to a mother, a father, a family. They all want to know that no matter what happens, no matter what they do, someone will always have their back, someone will always love them unconditionally. That basic need is always there. And when these kids become parents, the wounds bleed over into a new mode. The hurt shapes itself into a new form. The parents become desperate for that intrinsic, first need of love, and in turn, they don’t know how to give it to the next generation. And in turn, we hurt because that’s all we know how to do. We hurt because we remember feeling hurt, and we were never really reconciled in any other way. We hurt because we came into this world hurting. We hurt for love.

Each day, I go through my hours working to the very core of my soul to make others feel loved. Because that’s how I feel loved. I struggle with relationships, just like everyone else. I struggle with friendships, I struggle with what’s right and what’s wrong. I struggle with those “gray areas” where even when I feel I am doing the right thing, it still feels wrong. Each day, I struggle with being good, because I want the same thing that everyone else wants. I am no different from the clients I see. I am no different than you, and you are no different than me. I struggle with wanting to know, genuinely, that I am loved. Each day, I go through my hours hoping that people see it as real when I ask them “How are you?” because I truly mean to want to know the real answer to the question. Each day, I go through trying to exude the love that seems to be missing in this world. The love that never seems to be enough to hold us all together, to stop us from hurting each other, to stop us from hurting ourselves. We hurt, and we hurt big. We hurt long. And then we become defensive, we fear, we knock each other out. We scrape and we bind and we cry and we hurt again. And the pain starts all over, until someone, anyone, finally realizes that the only way to stop hurting, stop fearing, stop crying, stop screaming… is to love. Love freely, love openly, love without abandon, love without defenses, love even if it feels scary, love even if it has risks, love as if our lives depend on it.

Because really, what do we have to lose in our vulnerability? We hold back love, but when we do that, all we lose is more love. And that is my dream, my wish, my goal, my lot in life. My task is to love without abandon. Even when my heart is broken, my task is to go on loving. Even when the tears come and I am angry and fallen and broken into a million pieces of regret and despair, I must go on loving. Even when it feels hard to love, I will love. Because that’s how we fix ourselves. That’s how we fix this world. We love. We put aside science, religion, beliefs, prejudice, perspectives. We strip the layers off to find just one true thing: love.

That’s what we all have in common. We love.

She eats me alive, like I haven’t been eaten alive before. She bites into the core of my existence, scraping at whatever’s left. I find myself wondering if I’ve ever truly healed, or if the wounds were just waiting to be scraped clean again. Like scabs that only hide the surface of pain, when the cut is a lot deeper.

I thought I’ve dealt with this long ago. Years ago. I supposed to have moved on, to have embraced it all, accept it all, like the way you accept a scar on your knee. It’s just the way it is. The fall that almost paralyzed you for life instead made you stronger, and you wear it like a battle cry, proud and showing off its off-colored shadow against the rest of your skin. You boldly declare what you went through, for all who would listen, who would dare look. It resembles a broken heart. Its shape so lively, pulsating with every one of your move. Every time you move your legs, taking a step forward, you see the scar vibrate with the movement. Reminding you it’s still there. You be proud of it, or you die because of it.

I thought I was done with this scar. I thought i’ve accepted it, and sometimes, some days, I even have learned to mask it. Use make-up the color of skin, invisible and neutral, to ward it away, to pretend it never happened. Though like traces of skin, it tugs at my heart anyway.

She is the scar in my body. The scar in my mind. The scar in my life. Almost paralyzed, but never quite dead, she challenges me to be better, she challenges me to get up every time she strikes me to the ground. I don’t understand her, yet I am the one who most understands her. Who better than her eldest daughter to understand her? The first to share her body. Once, we were joined by the umbilical cord. For 9 months, I read her thoughts, wrote my name on her soul, became who she was. For 9 months, she formed me, lifeless from a tadpole, into a beating heart, until finally out delivered a baby that became who I am today. We used to be one, and I don’t understand her. I am reminded constantly that the evolution of abuse grows with time. It never stops, it doesn’t end. It just functions to the different beat of a drum.

It rips through me. I am a mother now, and it rips through me, forming new seams I didn’t realize existed. I am a mother now, and it rips through me, burying itself into my core in a new way, making itself known in a new fashion. It rips through me, and suddenly, I find that the scar has changed color on me. Pulsating, becoming bigger with time. And suddenly, as if to remind me that I need to pay more attention, the scar has moved.

And some days, I panic because I don’t know where it’s gone. I know it’s somewhere on my body. It never leaves. I would be silly, in denial, to think that it’s ever left me completely, even when masked with skin-colored make-up. But it’s not supposed to MOVE. It’s not supposed to just up and MOVE, relocate to a different, secret spot on my body. It’s not supposed to make me question how much I know myself. Every inch of myself. It’s not supposed to make me look again. It’s not supposed to make me search for it.

Haven’t I spent enough years trying to pinch it down, hold it down, live with it, embrace it, accept it? Why did it have to evolutionize? Why did it have to change? Haven’t I spent enough time on this? Haven’t I?

I haven’t mentioned this in very many places, and probably only a few know. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and I realized the other day that I needed to process it further, and the way I do it is by writing. On the 12th of February, one of my clients from my previous job committed suicide. I had worked with her mid-June of last year, and the last time I heard from her, she was in crisis. I was ready to go on maternity leave, though, and the case had already ended, so I wasn’t able to help. She committed suicide one month after her daughter was taken into state custody.

I am deeply, terribly disturbed by this. It feels so strange and intimate that someone I personally know, someone I worked with and someone who’s touched my life and someone I cared about (albeit on a more professional level) is no longer living. Her daughter I’ve also worked with about 5 years ago, when I was a school counselor. This feels so personal, so intimate. I am deeply disturbed and saddened by this news.

I had a dream the other night that I had called her up and asked her if I could see her one last time for a nice goodbye visit. A “closure session,” as they say. She said she was so happy to hear from me, and that she would be available that evening for our meeting. She said she and her daughter were going to move to Texas to start a brand new life together, and that everything will be okay. I was so happy in my dream, and I was looking forward to going to say goodbye to her, and I was happy she was going to start over and that her voice had such optimism in it.

And then I woke up, and I realized it was all just a dream. And she was still dead. She was still gone. She had still killed herself. She is still gone. I think the thing that gets me most is not that she passed, but how she passed. She viably chose, beyond a reason of a doubt, to kill herself. To end her life. She was only in her 40s, and she had two children. Now, these children are without a mother. I am not angry with her as I am frustrated with the system. She needed a lot of help, and when I was in the picture, I tried convincing EVERYONE how much help she needed. I tried getting her admitted into a mental institution so she could get the appropriate psychiatric care. She actually agreed at one point, and I went through this whole process to admit her… but the state said they wouldn’t support it as there was no “evidence” that she needed it yet. Meaning, there was no evidence that she was going to hurt herself or her child yet. Meaning, they needed someone to get hurt before they would agree to something like this.

I was so mad, I was so angry, I was so frustrated with the system. That here was this woman who was ready for help, who was actually responding to me (after years of refusing therapy and psychiatric care from everyone else), and they turned her down. Here was this woman who so clearly qualified, and if she didn’t admit herself, something would happen in the future where someone would get hurt. I just knew it. If it wasn’t herself, she would hurt her child. I just knew that it wasn’t a matter of “if” but a matter of “when.” And I was so frustrated at the bureaucracy of the whole thing. I was just so angry that no one would listen when I asked for help. That people were just waiting for her to actually hurt herself or hurt her child before something could be done.

And now, look at where we are. There is one less life on this earth. There is more pain on this earth because of that lost life. That 8y/o child lost both parents within the span of 6 months. Both committed suicide. What is this child’s world going to look like? What is this child’s future going to be? Had her mother gotten help, things could have been different. Sometimes, every so often, I blame myself for her death. Maybe I could have done something differently? Maybe I shouldn’t have given up too easily? Maybe I should’ve pushed it more? Maybe I should’ve convinced her more? Maybe I should’ve done something more. I don’t know. But somehow, I feel like what I did and how I tried to help amounted to nothing because the end result is that she’s dead. She’s gone. What good was I in their home if I couldn’t change that? If I couldn’t plant a seed to help fix things for them? What good was I, after spending 8 months with them, if all that happened was that this child is now without a mother, without a father, and in foster care, going through intensive trauma therapy because I couldn’t help the mother? What good was I? What good AM I?

The tears have not come yet. I still feel numb about it all. I am so saddened, so shocked that this had happened. I can’t help but dwell on it. This is a life. I should have done more. I should have been a better therapist. I should have been a better advocate. I should have done more. I should have made sure that this child wasn’t going to be left with no one. I should have been better.

I need closure, but I don’t know what this closure looks like. I don’t know how to get it. My best friend and I worked on this case together, and we both feel the same way about it. We both need closure, and we just don’t know how to get it. Every so often, one of us would mention it, and the room would go silent, and the air would grow stale. And the atmosphere would suddenly change.

I could have been better. For her. For them.

It’s been a while since I last updated on this site. That sounded like the start of a confession in a church somewhere. I have lots to say, but it seems that I have very little time to say it in, so I’ll go ahead and see what I can do while I am here.

It’s the start of a new year, and I’m determined to make it a good one. Last year was awesome, marked by the birth of our baby girl, Lily Bean. This year, we continue to have many more “firsts,” from her first crawling experience, to her first steps, to her first birthday, to her first words. It will be so exciting. I can hardly wait. I watch her grow and it seems like she is growing so fast. There are many things I worry about, but I also have to remind me that her adulthood doesn’t come overnight — it is marked by slow and gradual experiences, gradual lessons, and gradual parenting. We will do what we can to ensure that she has the most stable upbringing to prepare her for a stable adulthood. Whatever the case, I can’t imagine ever loving her less. It feels like everyday, the love grows and grows.

I sing this song to her… it has the melody of “You are my sunshine” but we’ve changed the lyrics around:

You are my Lily,
My baby Lily,
You make me happy
Every single day

I know you know, dear
How much I love you
It grows more and more everyday…

We’ve been singing versions of this song ever since she was born, and now every time she hears the start of it, her whole body relaxes and becomes limp. She would stop crying, and just nestle into our arms. She’d rest her little head on my shoulder, and sometimes even let out a long sigh. As if everything is perfect with the world. As long as the song keeps going, and she is in Mommy’s arms, everything is perfect with the world.

It’s amazing how wonderful motherhood feels. I feel like I’ve been born to play this role in life.

Last year was marked with many good things. Some things still bug me, but I am still and will always be working on bettering myself, not holding grudges. Sometimes, though, I know that I have to let go, and the best way to do that is to just… purge. Purge whatever is left that is blackening my heart. Purge the last vestige of things gone past that I can’t yet let go of. I have come to realize that the more I deny myself true feelings — both good and not so wanted — the more I “suffer” inside this head of mine. Every emotion is valid, regardless of how they make me feel. When I accept that, I am more readily able to move on. And I find that this site is more able to help me carry on, accept myself, and just “be.” It is the site that bares my soul.

Recently (or not so recently — I don’t exactly recall), I found out that a certain ex-friend of mine who is also pregnant is naming her child after the same name as Lily. Granted, “Lily” is a nickname, and not her legal name. She is actually named “Lilias,” after her great-grandmother, Dave’s maternal grandmother, who lives downstairs below us. We’re very close to her, and naming our firstborn baby girl after her was an honor. She feels the same way. It was an easy decision to make. We had thought about it for a while — years, in fact. We were too superstitious to dare hope that our first baby would be a girl so that we can indeed make true this plan of ours. And when we found out we would be blessed with a baby girl, the decision was immediate and mutual — we would call her Lilias. “Lily” for short.

“Lily Bean” is indeed a nickname. Everyone calls her Lily, or Lily Bean, or some derivative of the two. The name is not just pulled out of a hat. It is special to us because it is a family name. Her middle name is “An,” after my mother, which means “Peace.” Together, she is our little peace child, our little “peace lily,” so to speak.

So, when I found out that this previous “friend” of mine is also pregnant with a baby girl (which I was very happy about, knowing that she wanted a baby for a while now) and is also planning on naming her “Lily,” I was a little miffed. But then, I got over it. “Lily” by itself is a very common name, and I hear it’s making a comeback into the general population. However, what got to me even more miffed was that she felt that WE had stolen the name from HER.

Now, see, shit like this just makes me into a raging, petty little bitch.

First of all, she’s been trying to copy my life for years now.

Second of all, she was the one who never let me inside, so how the hell would I know she was planning on naming her kid “Lily” in the first place? It’s not like we talked. She called me her “best friend” but it was more of a stature for her. It was “cool” having Helen as a best friend, as long as she didn’t have to actually do the work of BEING a best friend. How fucking clueless can someone be? I think she should grow some social skills and learn how to be a friend before accusing others of stealing anything from her.

Third of all, our Lily is named after her great grandmother. There was NO copying involved, and this name is a family name. How on God’s green fucking earth did we copy her? Seriously. How fucking dense can someone be?

Fourth of all, why the FUCK would you choose to name your kid the same name of someone else’s child who you just stopped a relationship with? How tacky, and full of bad energy. Geez. I think it’s incredibly ridiculous that she is also naming her baby “Lily,” and I feel that it is downright WEIRD. WEIRD, I tell you.

Or, in Dave’s words, “That’s absolutely psychotic.” Not only to take a name that has already been taken by your ex-friend, but to turn around and accuse your ex-friend of stealing it from YOU. That’s psychotic. What did we do? Did we go back in time, and make his grandmother be named “Lilias” when she was born in the early 1900s just so we can now copy my ex-friend in naming our baby “Lily”?

Right. Again: psychotic.

Okay. Now that I got that off my chest, I feel a lot better. I suppose I should be flattered. After all, who was it who said that imitation is the greatest form of flattery? Hell, if I were other pregnant women, I would pray and pray for my baby girl to be just like this Lily Bean, too, right? Heh. We have the best little girl ever. She is beautiful, sweet, kind, and a generally easy-going little baby. Who wouldn’t want to have a baby like her?

Yes, yes. I keep telling myself that. But I feel like I just purged, and now I can move on. Let the psycho-friend have her imitation baby. I don’t care. It’s not like we’re friends anymore and therefore it wouldn’t matter what she names her kid. Rumpelstiltskin, for all I care.

In the last year, I’ve lost two friends. Friends that I considered “good” friends too. I thought I was over and done with this phase in my life. The thing about it is that… I suppose the saying is true: Time does make things easier. The breath of time has caught onto me once again. As this continues to happen – as people come in and out of my life like mere breaths, I’m slowly beginning to get used to it. I can’t decide if this is a good thing or a bad thing. Should I be getting used to people just phasing in and out of my life like this?

Sure, yes, there are constants. There are those here who have been here for years, and some of them will most likely never leave (I’ve learned a while ago never to say never or always… “most likely” is the closest I can get because everything is transient and everything must be held in perspective). My husband. My daughter. My parents. My siblings. A couple of my friends who I won’t mention because at the risk of getting too personal and jinxing myself at the same time, they’re going to end up phasing out of my life just because I mentioned them here. Sometimes things are too good to be true. I’ve resorted to superstitions now.

Knock on wood and all that crap, y’know.

But you see, when I really think about it, I even surprise myself at my reaction to these “leavings.” At the end of the day, after evaluating how I feel and analyzing what the hell happened and if I did something wrong, I often come to the quick and sometimes sudden conclusion of, “Eh, well. I don’t care.” And then I move on. Sometimes I stay “moved on,” and sometimes I don’t. But I’m quickly finding that I’ve developed a thicker skin when it comes to relationships. I’m finding that not a lot fazes me anymore. Like water off a duck’s back. I could get easily hurt one minute, and then the next it no longer holds any place on my mind’s shelf. Suddenly, I’m over it as quickly as I was under it.

So many people have come and gone out of my life that somehow, I’ve lost a little bit of that hyper sensitivity that I thought I was just “born” with. Somehow, over the years, people leaving became easier, almost expected. Somehow, being “hurt” doesn’t feel so bad anymore because I get over it quicker. Selective memory has given me a gift: the gift to forget why these people were important in the first place and why I wanted them in my life in the first place. The gift of forgetfulness for the sake of not slipping away into self-pity and vengeance and all that icky stuff. It’s become a coping mechanism. I forget all the ickies so that the ickies don’t get to me. It seems to work. And if these people come back, it’s all the better because I forgot why the hell they left in the first place. Or why I left them.

And when I start drifting apart with people (as it tends to happen: I have come to also accept that it is this thing called life and sometimes “it is what it is”: no more, no less), I am more okay with this than I have ever been in the past. It’s a weird feeling for me: the feeling of not being as neurotic as I used to be. The feeling of not letting things get to me. The feeling of just living one day at a time… not dwelling on the past, not demanding more of the future, not analyzing everything the present.

Most of the time, it works. Though, sometimes, I still have my neurotic moments. I suppose I need those to keep me on my toes.

The past always comes back to haunt you, if you don’t have things resolved. For a while, I thought it was well in the past that I lost my childhood best friend. She had decided to stop the friendship, so to speak, sometime in my second year of university at UCI. After trying to track her down and confronting her, thinking everything was okay, she finally let it out that she was tired of my drama and that I had such a good life but didn’t know it. She said she wasn’t wanting a friendship that was too deep, that I was too overemotional for her, and that I had it good. She said she only wanted a shopping buddy, not someone who constantly makes her think.

At the time, I was very angry, and appalled, and hurt. I was going through a time when it was a huge struggle for me to re-define my relationship with my mother, and I didn’t really have any good girlfriends I can talk to about it all. I suppose I used her as a crying shoulder far too often, and eventually she got sick of it. I didn’t realize all she wanted was a fair-weather friend. Now, looking back at it, I know that it was during a time that I wasn’t most proud of myself, and indeed I did take a lot of the good things I had for granted. She said that I had a good boyfriend (Dave), financially supportive parents, a nice studio apartment, good looks, etc. What was I complaining about? To her, I was merely acting like a whiny rich kid who doesn’t know what she’s got.

It took me a long time to let the bitterness out of my system. It took me a long time to forgive her — and myself — for letting the relationship go. She was my “best” friend since we were in the 8th grade, and despite going to different high schools, we kept in touch and remained best friends until halfway through college. We went out of our ways to see each other, sometimes driving hours just to spend the day together. And I realized how much I had missed her. She’s a good person and I can’t say I blame her for getting sick of how I was acting.

I haven’t thought of her in a long time. It’s been close to 8 years since this happened, and we haven’t talked since. There was a time a few years ago that I found her on friendster and wrote a message of love to her, saying that I hope she is doing well and that I hold no remorse or ill feelings that we were ever good friends. I didn’t hear anything back, so I assumed that she still wasn’t having it and still saw me as the over-dramatic girl she once knew. I let it go.

This past week, she crept back into my life. After not having thought of her for years and years, after fighting the demons I had to fight when she left me, I came across that stupid “People You Might Know” thing on facebook. There, blaring into my screen and making me a deer caught in headlights, was a wedding photo of her. All I had to do was go to facebook and there it was. I didn’t even have to look for her. And then suddenly, all the old feelings came rushing back, and I found myself going through her photos — especially the ones where our mutual friends from junior high and high school commented on, and I saw how happy she looked in her wedding dress, married to the man I assume is the man of her dreams. She just got married this summer, and it was a small wedding, and I wasn’t there. Granted, she wasn’t there for mine, but it was by her choice and not mine. When I was a girl, I always assumed that we would be at each other’s weddings. I didn’t allow myself to think about it when I was planning our wedding last summer, but seeing her wedding photos made me really miss her. I’m glad she’s happy, and I was surprised to find myself a little angry and a little hurt. Still. After all these years.

After momentarily beating myself up for still feeling the negative feelings of the past, I decided to make a shift in thinking and just “observe” my feelings, without judging them as good or bad. I saw myself feeling angry that I was “cheated” out of a best friend. I saw myself feeling sad that we were no longer in each other’s lives, and she was one of the last childhood friends I had. I saw myself feeling hurt that she could throw away years and years of closeness, just like that, while I was going through something so big in my own life and needed a friend to talk to. And while I was “observing” these feelings run in and out of me, I felt a certain peace come over me. When I wasn’t judging whether or not these feelings were bad or good, it gave me the freedom to let myself feel them, and then move on.

And now, what do I see now? I suppose I will always have images of her haunt my life. We have too many mutual friends to not let this happen again. Now, I am feeling truly happy for her, yet sad that I can’t talk to her. Now, I’m not angry or hurt, but I have to admit that I’m a little disappointed. Disappointed that after all these years, the wall that separates us seems to not only get stronger, but bigger and taller.

I hope she knows that I’m happy for her.

Sometimes I am an old, bitter woman who holds grudges. I’m not proud of that aspect of myself, though I’ve come to really just accept it and move on (that sounds like quite the hypocritical statement, haha). My birth sign is scorpio, though I come just at the very end of libra, as well. Most of the time, my nature tends to shift towards the libra side of things, but every so often the scorpio in me jumps out as well. Sometimes when I least expect it.

When I say I hold grudges, I do really mean it. Like, for instance, when I said goodbye to certain people in my past, I dwell on what happened and why and how and all that crap. I analyze it to death to ensure that yes, I did make the right decision in ruling them out of my life forever. That yes, I wasn’t just overreacting and that yes, I am healthier and a better person without them in my life. There was a person in my life who I thought I got along with really well. However, as the time went on during our friendship, I started noticing things she says and does that make me wonder what kind of crap she has going inside her head. She’d compare herself to me (and everyone else) and that would make me feel bad. It would come to points where I feel like I had to give her compliments about her own life in order not to feel bad about my own and the fact that I’m so happy. I don’t like making excuses as to why I deserve happiness. I don’t like being compared to anyone. I want to share my happiness without feeling guilty about it. That’s what friendships are for, right?

I decided to rule that relationship out of my life last Christmas, when I realized that my pregnancy was just another “thing” that got in the way of her happiness. When it was my moment to shine and look towards my best friends to be happy and giddy for me, she fell short. I didn’t want to live with such negative, jealous energy, so I said goodbye. So why in the world am I still dwelling? It’s not like not being in her life has changed mine dramatically. I still talk to her the same amount as I always did before I broke it off (read: none at all). Nothing’s really changed. She never asked me how I was feeling or doing, and she doesn’t now of course. She never became giddy for me and the new family I’m creating with Dave, and she doesn’t care now of course. So as far as changes go, nothing has really changed. Yet I am so bitter and sometimes even angry that I’m dwelling on the fact that I feel like I’ve put so much into this relationship with nothing to show for it. It’s downright annoying.

I give a lot to my friendships. People in the past may disagree, but to me, I give my all. I try to be there for people, and I expect the same in return. I let a lot of things slide in the name of friendship and respect. I’ve even learned how to be *nice* about things I don’t agree with (yeah, you heard me!). But there are just certain things I can’t live with. I can’t live with a “friend” wanting me to intimately share her misery. I can’t live with a “friend” being jealous that I’m happy and she’s not. I can’t live with a “friend” who gets so caught up in her own crappy life that she can’t even bother asking me how I’m doing. I just can’t live with that. And I know, I shouldn’t feel slighted or angry or anything like that. Most of the time, I’ve moved on. I’m happy that she’s happier now. But goddamn it, would it KILL her to even say congratulations once and mean it, without any weirdness or selfishness behind that word? Would it kill her? Probably.

Yeah, see? I hold grudges, too. I’m not perfect. I fight my demons. When I feel I’ve been wronged, I really go all out with that feeling. Most of the time I do well. I hardly think about her at all. Then other times I catch myself thinking, “Man, I would LOVE to tell her what happened today!!”… and then I realized there’s no “her” there anymore, nor was there ever a “her” there for a long time before I made the end official. I’ve lost “her” years ago, way before my pregnancy. And then I get all angry all over again, and ask the universe why she can’t make this “her” a little more understanding, a little more unselfish, a little more of a friend. Is that too much to ask? Maybe.