My Self Worth....

I didn't have any self-worth growing up, especially by the time I hit high school.  I didn't think I mattered in the least.  

I have written before about my childhood and how I really wasn't a person but more of an object.  I got in the way like an object, I was used like an object and I was expected to shut up.... like an object.  The sad thing was that I didn't cry over my childhood much because it was normal for me.  I didn't know any better, it was what I thought I deserved.  I truly believed at each instance of molestation or each beating that it was my fault, that somehow I brought it on myself.  I even blamed myself when I was raped thinking if I had not been where I was, had I not been wearing the clothes I was wearing, etc.  And I perpetuated the problem by going on to marry an abuser.... he fit right in with what was "normal" to me.  

Just recently I have reconnected with old friends from high school online.  I never kept in contact with anybody from school.  One of the idiosyncracies I developed throughout life with my view of myself has resulted in me not being a very good friend.  I don't trust people enough to truly let them become part of my life so, I am very warm, loving and kind until they get too close, then I back away.  I looked over my life many times and realized that I don't bond with people like others and have felt that I am somehow deficient.  But then again, my life has been completely filled with motherhood so, perhaps I have a good reason for not investing so much into friendships.  I am getting a bit off-track but, thanks for sticking with me, I do have a point to make.  

In connecting with my old friends I have had several tell me that I was special to them.  One boy who I dated said that he came looking for me three times.  I have been told by several that they looked forward to my smile, that they missed me when I left and that I made a difference in their lives.  Me?  Laurie Lee Crilly?  And I found myself wishing that I knew, I wished that I knew that I mattered.  I thought maybe I would have made different choices in my life.  Maybe I would have cared for myself had I known that I was an important person.  And I found myself wishing that someone had told me that I mattered.  But the voices inside my head repeated the things I had heard while growing up.... the voices I heard told me that I was worthless, stupid, a bitch, even crazy.  I heard them loud and clear and treated myself as such.

Looking back wistfully over life is a waste of time and you know the truly sad part in my story is that someone did tell me.  I have held in my possession the greatest love letter of all time.  I hold in my hand a letter that tells me that I am worth dying for, that I have been crowned with glory and honor, that I have been given dominion and power, that I have an advocate constantly working on my behalf, that I stand clean and spotless before my Lord, that I have a father, that I have a helper, that I have a guide, that I am chosen of God, that I am blessed, that I am a conqueror, that I am above and not beneath, the head and not the tail, that I am favored, that I am heard...... My Bible tells me all of this and so much more.  

I am so glad I now know who I am.