NB: First I just want to clarify the title of this article as jeopardizing my own life in this article will not make any mention to physical self harm or any suicidal thoughts. So please keep on reading :)
You ever have a near death experience? I recently had one where I was routinely coming home from a shopping run stocking up on food and gas when all of a sudden this car hit the median in the middle and was headed right for me until miraculously the driver woke up or whatever and immediately got back into their lane. Admittedly I had some Wendy’s in the front seat and the bag went flying with the food and the fries went everywhere but obviously I didn’t care. When I finally arrived home after shaking uncontrollably, when I went to clean up the food my hands just wouldn’t stop shaking just not caring about the food and losing my appetite and understandably so. Who cares about food when you almost just died?
I was reflecting on that moment afterwards and while there was no reliving of my life in a flash of a second, it did make me think how close I was to never seeing anyone ever again. It would have been a head on crash and surely I would have died with engines colliding head on. It also immediately made me think secondly to I never would have finished my transitioning, probably the deepest regret I could ever have if I left this world prematurely at this stage of my life.
Fast forward to the present and things have been going great recently personally. To be honest, they were going so great that you ever just get the feeling like “Oh no, something definitely bad is coming my way, the universe has to even itself out.” When I first started researching this phenemon and then discussing it in therapy, it’s basically a defense mechanism to a previous trauma that you may have had and buried deep down. It’s almost like a survivor’s remorse and makes you think that you can never achieve happiness ever without something bad happening in your life. Well that bad thing happened recently…only this time it was by my doing.
Just as I mentioned above, when I say I jeopardized my own life I am talking more of a financial sense and then ultimately a mental one I am going to be as vague about this as I can for several reasons but ultimately I unfriended any and all past and current coworkers from social media (I know I know, please don’t lecture me on how I shouldn’t have had them as friends in the place, I know that now). I don’t think I need to spell out why I needed to do this…the thing you are thinking about as to the why is probably the correct one.
But in an instant, all the financial security and more importantly my future was jeopardized for what amounted to me being a selfish immature child shouting from my little social media soapbox. Normally the soapbox is reserved for me posting life updates, stupid/funny memes and me sending a question out to the women on my Facebook something to the effect of “How does everyone wash their bras and not have the bra padding come out? They get stuck in all my clothes or get lost! What am I doing wrong?!?” (cue someone sending me a link to laundry zip mesh bags, lol).
But really the wakeup call is for me is not to take life for granted. I did it once awhile back where early on I wrote about how I was assaulted and robbed in a liquor store before I started transitioning (if you want to read about that, I detail it here (https://medium.com/@Amber.Poe.302/what-am-i-getting-myself-into-what-am-i-signing-up-for-as-a-woman-6bbda3580451). But like the car coming into the lane barreling towards me above, like the liquor store assault and robbery and now this one recent experience has shaken me to my core. It’s rattled me but in a way that has told me you’re on your 9th life and you’re not a cat so stop taking everything for granted damnit.
The financial toll would have been weathered but the mental toll has been unbearable. Just knowing that I could have thrown away my life…a life that some people would probably kill for all because of what? Me trying to make myself feel better and for what? At the cost of not only my future but my mental well being.
This is the part where I say I can and will be better! But in reality it’s more of an ultimatum to myself of this won’t ever happen again…THIS CAN’T ever happen again. I won’t let it. I have too much on the line to worry about self-gratification and really my ego. I believe everything happens for a reason and while the last week has been met with a lot of lost sleep and a loss of appetite and me dwelling over and over on this one experience, I’m finally getting over it and focusing on the positives in my life. I don’t want a life where if I experience periods of happiness that I somehow inevitably must experience a great loss too. That’s no way to live.
My future is still intact and on track and I won’t let it go to waste…I won’t take it for granted anymore.
All the Best!
