What He Did RIGHT

"Respect yourself enough to walk away from anyone or anything that no longer serves you, grows you, or makes you happy."

Despite everything I've been through this past year as well as these past couple months, I am surprisingly positive about the future. I not only have an INCREDIBLE support system that has been behind me all the way in every decision that I've made, but I have a roof over my head with somebody that loves me & my daughter enough to help provide me with the tools I need to rely on & provide for myself. I have the birth of my baby girl to look forward to & I have the entire world waiting for me. I just have to take the first step, make the first move & let go of all the bullshit I've been holding onto for so damn long.

Being with Shaun taught me a lot. It taught me a lot about myself & about the people that I love. Our relationship helped me to realize who is genuine & who is fake, who is lying & who will always be honest with me, who really loves me & who will never love me enough... & the things that matter the most & the things that in the end turn out to be absolutely meaningless. He taught me how to be selfless in a roundabout way, & for the first time in my life I'm prepared to put the right people before myself & push the wrong people out of the picture entirely. Unfortunately, Shaun wasn't the one. I sincerely thought he was... the one who would love me & our daughter forever. The one that would fight for me even when it seemed like there was nothing to fight for anymore... but he couldn't even fight when he had all the right cards in his hand. I didn't mean enough to fight for, & neither did Ivy Rose. What he doesn't seem to understand is that regardless of my love for him, I've moved on. I may always love him, but not enough to allow myself to hurt over him again & not enough to allow him to hurt our daughter. I don't need a man (or a woman) to make me happy or to help me raise our Ivy. I have an incredible family that has grown in size thanks to his temporary presence in my life & I have some of the most faithful friends anyone could ever ask for. Anybody who says that my baby girl needs a Father obviously hasn't met me, because I'm strong enough to make up for his absence.

Now that Shaun is out of the picture, I can finally focus on moving forward with my life. I can finally do what is necessary to take care of our daughter & I am finally strong enough to know when I've had enough. There's nothing anybody could say or do to convince me to allow him back into my life at this point. He's had plenty of opportunities to change, & even though every day that he wakes up alive & breathing is a sign that life is granting him the opportunity to do things right this time around, that will never be enough to push him to change. People don't mean enough to him... even the ones that should. He doesn't mean enough to himself. He relies on excuses to be happy or to justify his misery, but he has had more than enough excuses to be happy & to change. He just doesn't care to, & I can't allow somebody like that into mine & my daughters life. I'll always love him, & I will never raise Ivy to have any hatred or anger towards him but if she chooses to develop those feelings on her own because he made the decision to be absent, he is the only one that is at fault. He is perfectly capable of changing, but until he does I will NOT take any more chances on him.

I have to be clear on one thing before I go... I don't regret falling in love with him. I don't regret the time I had with him or the beautiful baby girl we created together. I do regret allowing him to take advantage of so many people I love & to betray me & lie to me again & again when deep down, I knew the truth. I just didn't want to believe it. I am grateful for the influence he had in my life, because it truly changed me for the better. Even though every time I took one step forward, it was as if he had taken ten steps back... at least he did a few things right.

#1 Signing his son over to somebody who was more than willing to take responsibility for him.

#2 Helping me create this beautiful, innocent baby girl.

#3 Leaving & opening my eyes to the person he truly is & always will be.

It's sad that his children will never mean enough to him to help him change. It's sad that even though he loves me, it'll never be enough to fight for me or make the better decisions necessary to be with me... but in a way, everything ultimately happened for the best. Everybody is finally starting to see his true colors, & everyone is finally moving on because he's given them one too many reasons why he isn't worth holding on to or believing in. Maybe one day something will hit him hard enough to help him see all the damage he's caused & maybe somebody will be able to show him what it will take to make things right again, but that can never be me because in the end it would only ever hurt Ivy. My daughter means more to me than anyone else ever could, & regardless of any feelings I may have had for him, it'll never be enough to put her at risk of getting hurt. That's something he may never understand, but at this point it should be the least of his worries because now all he has become in my life is a shadow. A memory of good & bad times, & a constant reminder to continue fighting because he never would. Ivy deserves that much.