Seeing myself in the mirror after almost two years of letting time go by was one of the most haunting things I’ve ever done. Everyone experiences motherhood differently and in my own experience it swallowed me during my postpartum stage. The taste of my coffee became really bitter…the same way my thoughts towards myself became. I could hardly sleep and when I did it felt short lived, filled with nightmares…of the other woman.
I could hardly handle the touch of his rough cheating hands on my delicate hands that would wipe tears and anxiously scratch my arms that held our little girl, Nenetli. I hated myself, my motherhood felt robbed like the thief that comes in the darkness of the night. Have I woken up yet? My thoughts are rambled, irrational, out of context maybe? He swore he changed. He said it right? I need to trust him. Isn’t this all about my motherhood? Am I a bad mom because I can’t seem to focus on Nenetli, instead I’m worrying about his whereabouts, his actions, why did he buy me flowers when he’s never been the romantic type? You're confused but so was I this entire time I just wanted to love my motherhood, love my child, love myself again. Instead, I spent two years in the same circle, the same cycle of manipulation that almost ruined me.
My thoughts were written in notebooks and post it’s on my wall and the more I wrote the more confused I became because how did I let a man control my every thought to the verge of insanity. My escape? Jade. Jade, my best friend, my center of gravity, my pros and cons list maker, the friend I made in the middle of this chaos. A man can be the head of the house but a woman, a woman builds it brick by brick, Jade built my house out of solid brick and jewels. My thinking snapped and I let myself be helped. The sound of “Eternity” by Alex Warren became the normal I sang and I finally began to love myself. I became powerful again, in control of reality and in control of my sanity. I moved a thousand miles away, I began to shine on my own again. I finally woke up from the nightmares I could barely endure. Postpartum became a dream that I have long now forgotten.
When I began writing this piece I was a bit afraid of opening up that vulnerable side of me that I am extremely embarrassed about. My postpartum journey was filled with a lot of self hatred, depression, and anxiety. I moved to North Carolina for almost a year to live with my recent partner and father of my child, after a hard patch between us where I found him cheating with someone younger than me we decided to start fresh in our relationship especially with our daughter who was almost a year old. In my writing you can infer that my daughter's name is Nenetli which means "doll" in Aztec language and doll had been my long nickname when my child's father and I dated so I believed it to be a token of love in the beginning. I believe I was mostly scared to become a single mom and raise a child on my own so I gave him multiple chances despite me always finding more reasons of how he was using me.
During my time in North Carolina I had the honor to meet the wife of one of his friends, Jade Leal. She was a cinnamon roll coffee mixed with a warmth that I can only describe as a summer day. Jade became my greatest friend and one of the few that got to see first hand how my child's father treated me. She saw the conditions he had us live in, we slept on a mattress with no bed frame on the floor and believed that we did not need a couch because it took up unnecessary space. I can only tie this with how our different upbringings culturally affected his decisions, he was very greedy with money and I would have to explain the reasoning for spending every dime. My biggest inspiration in opening up and writing about my chaotic postpartum journey is how chaotic it was.
Every woman goes through a difficult time in their life but very few can say that they were in a vulnerable moment and still found the strength to move on when they had fear in their heart. Moving back to Houston and realizing how much I was manipulated opened by eyes in wanting to become someone better and someone that can be of help to other women, just how Jade helped me open my eyes in the financial and mental abuse I was going through without realizing it because of how blinded and scared I was during postpartum.
I hope to keep writing my thoughts and in the future seeing how much I will evolve and become a stronger version of myself that doesn't need to be dependent on someone else. I am inspired to become a police officer one day and show other women that they ARE capable of getting out of situations where they are not happy and that they indeed have that courage to do whatever their mind is set to.
Citlallic Castro is a 25 year old that grew up in Houston and is a mother to a 2 year old, despite becoming a single mom she has pushed herself past her fears and is ambitiously working hard to become a police officer and hopes that one day she can inspire other women that are facing the same difficulties that anything is possible.