From Vessel to Visionary: Reclaiming My Space

For thirty-four years, I lived a life where I was treated like a vessel.

A vessel is something that exists only to be filled with someone else’s needs, someone else’s schedule, and someone else’s drama. When you are a vessel, you don’t have a voice; you just carry the weight of whatever is poured into you. For a long time, I let that be my reality. I was the one who absorbed the silence, the “wimpish” excuses, and the attempts to diminish my worth.

I want to make this very clear: this post isn’t about the betrayal of the affairs. Those were just the cracks in the vessel. This is about the three-year journey of waking up that followed. It’s about the reality I discovered once the secrets stopped being louder than my own intuition. Even now, past the turbulence of that three-year nightmare, the noise hasn’t stopped. These aren’t just shadows following me from the past; they are current events and words happening today. But I am no longer in that circle and truthfully, I never was.

The Weight I Carried

Of course, I am not perfect. I carried a lot of pain and hurt deep inside me. I don’t know how to say this, perhaps they are correct that I am somewhat mentally “not there”… or maybe it is because of my upbringing, if that is what you would call it. Perhaps it is instilled in me because I do not know the difference from love or hate, fact or fake, or lies and trust. All I know is my deep gut feeling – something that got me to survive my entire life.

I know who I am deep down inside. I am not a liar. I am an honest person. I try to live by the 10 Commandments. I try to do good for all, including those that treated me so badly my entire life. I don’t take life for granted. On the other hand, I do not trust people. I love animals so much that I feel more for how they look into my eyes with pure love than people that I thought I knew, who can look directly in my eyes with lies, deceit, and secrets.

I hate to admit this, but these last five years of my entire adult life are all that I remember. The entire 34 years of marriage, I do not remember one thing that was genuine.

Let me be blunt. My entire timeline is a mathematical progression of survival. From the minute I was born, I was an unwanted child. My childhood was defined by severe abuse and torture, first by parents for thirteen years, and then through the system of children’s homes and foster care. The court aged my twin sister and I out when we were just shy of sixteen. I had my twin sister with me for most of that time; we were forced to navigate survival together.

A little over a decade, I found a man I believed was the one. I loved him so much that I did anything for him, even as the rage and the control became patterns –  patterns that are, looking back, identical to what has happened the last five years. It was a total of thirty-seven years of a counterfeit life. Someone who only wanted to “fix me,” and a foundation built on lies, secrets, and deceit that I never truly knew until 2023 (but in reality, it actually started with the end of us in 2021 with the last few because of technology). I sit here now and realize why I cannot remember much of either. I was a survivor, simply holding my head above water for thirty-seven years in a reality that wasn’t even real. Does that make any sense?  If we had technology back then like we do now, I would have NEVER been in this situation. I know too much now. I went through so much. I did not deserve any of it no matter what those two people say.

I was made out to be a very “bad mother”. I heard him say to her, “What a colossal waste of my f**king time with her.” She laughed and agreed. Imagine your father saying that about your mother to you… I heard her say, “That is MY f**king mother, when will you wake up” in low, hateful tones to her father… words no daughter should ever use toward her mother. Yet, not once did she ever give me a reason why I was “bad” for loving and caring for her. Instead, she uses him as a partner for gossip sessions about how “insane” I am. One would think that he would do a quick stop no matter how he felt about me, but he enjoyed the laughing and encouraged it.

The laughing, the cutdowns, the putdowns… that was a typical day. It went on for years, even before she helped him hide his affair. I gave everything to both of them. I did too much. I was giving everything to people who were busy deciding I was nothing. IF we had technology back then like we do now, I would have NEVER been in this situation. I know too much now.

The Turning Point

But here is the thing about vessels: if you keep pouring in pressure and trying to hollow them out, eventually, they don’t just sit there. They break, or better yet, they transform.

The shift became undeniable on March 18th. That was the day a judge looked at the words that I drafted with my own hands and made them the law. Suddenly, the “vessel” was holding the pen. I realized that I wasn’t just a passenger in this ride; I was the architect of my new life. I stopped believing in the version of reality they tried to sell me. I now see a fortress I built myself. So much for a 3rd grade level…. Right?

He still has his “Flying Monkeys” and they will never change, that is just who they are, but things have changed for me now. For three years, I was blamed for his choices, and now his victimhood is being played in full force! Those Flying Monkeys have no idea they are only pawns in his game. Since they are probably reading this… Yes, I still own that house and yes, I was given the same, exact rights to my home. Such low games people play...

Painting the Neon Green

Right now, I am working on a painting of an egret. It’s in that “ugly” phase where I’m thinning the neck, refining the silhouette, and adding a vibrant, electric neon green to the beak. It’s a lot like my life. I am stripping away the excess – the years of being told I was a “bad mother” or “insane” – to find the elegant, sharp, and resilient shape underneath. The neon green is my voice. It’s the part that stands out against the glittery black background of the past. It’s the part that says, “I am here, I am an artist, and I am in control.”

The New View

I’m currently in the “hunting phase” for something different for my life. I do not shy away from those that talk about me like I don’t even belong driving down my own street or going to my own home! I am no longer carrying anyone else’s weight. I am the artist. I am the homeowner. I am the woman that sees a completely different view of something that I finally took my blinders away from my eyes and OH WOW… I see so clearly now! And most importantly, I am no longer the vessel. I am the one deciding exactly who gets to step into my light.

Images in this post – AI-created.