I’m the eldest of two daughters. The age gap between my sister and I is almost 8 years. This means we never quite played together and by the time she was born I had come to “my own”.

My mother’s name is Grace. She is in every sense graceful. While she couldn’t relate to what I was going through, she was supportive, loving, and protective of me. You want fire upon your life then talk badly about my mom’s children. It takes a while for my mom to get angry, but don’t touch her babies!

My sister is the most bubbly human being I know. The cup is usually half-full from her side on most days. She has always been my greatest cheerleader. Like my mom, she never understood what I was going through but would just cheer me up with her bad jokes and joyful nature. Her name means “Gift” and she has been that and more in my life and my son’s.

My father… I cant imagine what it’s like to be a man and see your daughter go through so much pain. Where it mattered my father showed up, especially with my son. He plays his part of grandfather and loves my son as only a grandfather could.

My family is small but a powerhouse of support, love and compassion. They are my covering, foundation and pillar. My parents have known me since birth and no doubt had different dreams for me vs my dreams. Even after I disappointed them with the choices I made (after defying their wisdom) they still love me.

Reach out to anyone in your family you trust and allow them to be that light, lest you be forever lost in darkness.

I’m generally not a “bubbly” kinda girl. I’m polite, but just not “bubbly”. So it’s very difficult for most people to approach me. That was my “saving grace” in hiding from people. I was fine with my solitude and humans just irritated me. It was about a few months after the divorce and I was still angry about life in general so that’s the energy I gave off.

The first person I met who dared to cross my barrier was Nozi. She was not at all intimidated by my high electric walls. Her motherly approach just melted my ice-cold heart. Slowly I started to warm up. She refused to entertain my coldness and instead poured out nothing but love. At the time I honestly believed no one could love me. Man or woman.

My two friends that contributed to my 15% of warmth that survived during my ang-er-thon are Sandra and Risana.

Sandra made sure I broke up with Shame A.S.A.P! She is compassion and warrior personified. That “dont negotiate with the devil” kinda girl❤

Risana prevented me from being a full blown psychopath and reminded me about the importance of humour. Till today we have 2 hour conversations which would probably land us in a psychiatric institution ❤😀

I believe that God puts every person in your life-path for a reason. I salute these women! God Bless them beyond their imagination!!

After dealing with Shame, I dealt with its treacherous friend Anger.. I was more angry at myself than the ex..

How could I, the psychologist in training allow myself to be in such a rubbish situation? The fierce, independent me had allowed herself to be in this state? I was beyond livid!

So I started building walls around me. I vowed to never allow any man, woman or living organism to hurt me ever again. What I did not realise was that, while building these walls I was also protecting myself from me.

I was bitter, angry, hurt and just limping through life. I was a functional hate-a-holic. Men were the primary object of my hatred followed by so-called Christians. My relationship with God was tainted by this hatred. I was isolated and depressed. My only purpose for breathing was this small human being depending on me.

My son is a miracle. Born at 27 weeks (800g), he truly fought to live. He was my constant reminder that there is purpose in pain. That I serve a relationship kinda God who meets you exactly where you are. Anger consumed my Joy, energy and hairline😄

I sadly spent about 2 years in a relationship with Anger. At the time I believed I needed to stay angry to be focused. But LOVE beckoned.. To be more precise, God beckoned me..

I would be dishonest if I didn’t share the not so pleasant stuff I experienced after the divorce. But first let’s take a step back..

I had one of those “mooi van ver” marriages. From far we were so in love but for those who decided to take a closer look the cracks were bigger than the Vic Falls gorge! I cannot speak ill of the departed, but on my side I knew it was a mistake within a year.

Before you judge, understand this – when we fall in love, it’s based on who we are and about at the time. The same applies for the other person. People evolve, or in my case, people reveal who they have always been. Love truly covers a multitude of sins, you know he has Darth Vader in him but you somehow brush it off.

So when I divorced him, shame was my BFF. She just hung around for a while telling me I was a failure – as if making a marriage work was all my responsibility. I was never too concerned about the gossip but the judgement, mostly from women, killed my soul.

Oh how easy it is to sit high and mightily on our “Holy Ghost Assistant” chairs and judge on matters we know nothing about! So a year after my divorce I broke the friendship with Shame. As a Christian, a verse from Isaiah 54 reminded me that God is not about shaming me. I also remembered a scripture by apostle Paul that “there is therefore now no condemnation in Christ”. Yes my religious people, I know God said He hates divorce – but HE LOVES ME.

Shame is dangerous. It condemns. You cannot progress until you kick it out of your life. There are no perfect people therefore there can’t be ANY perfect situations.

Deal with that shame by taking it directly to Jesus💜

Sometimes there are things we need to heal from through writing. I’m one of those people. I hope as you read, you can identify how God’s faithfulness is evident in my imperfect life and since He is not a respector of persons, He can show up in your life as with mine – if you let Him.

I decided to start with the Relationships theme because I just love LOVE❤❤! I love the concept of two people who are committed to doing life together with love as a foundation.

I got divorced. Like anyone in love I was shattered. Ideally, most people want that forever situation. After surviving the divorce process, I was broken in my spirit and didn’t have a clue what to do. Thank God for my parents who allowed me to stay at home while figuring out stuff.

It’s the figuring out stuff that I will be discussing during this theme of Relationships. None of the women in my life could relate to my experience. It was quite tricky but I lived to tell the tale!