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Growing Pains

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Growing Pains
Cheaque Gay
PSY202: Adult Development
7/18/2013

A person’s childhood is usually the most important time in a person’s life. During this time they experience innocence, develop personality, they build character and they develop maturity. Many people look as their childhood as a time where everything was perfect, no worries or anything. In reality your childhood has a lot to do with our character, personality, and why we are the way we are today. Many children that come from a broken home tend to have more struggles and problems in their adult life, versus children that grew up in a stable home. Although we are all destined to go through something or deal with hard times no matter what background you come from, we all struggle in our own way. My paper will discuss the innocence of my childhood and the not so innocent. You will also see how my childhood and a big impact or the decisions and choices I made in my adult life; it all will represent the pain of growing. Although it was painful growing up, it was because of my growing pains, that I’m a better person today.
As a child growing up, I can remember always being out with my parents. We did so much I almost forgot how our house looked. If we weren’t at the amusement parks, beach, my grandmother’s house, we were at another relative’s home. No matter where we were, we were always together. The unstoppable four: my mom, my pops, my sister and I. We lived in a nice single family home on the Westside of Baltimore, Maryland. The families that lived in the neighborhood were just as close as we were and we all became like family. It was one of the most memorable times in my childhood.

Then one day, my mom came to me and sat me and my sister down and explained to us that we had to move. I remembered everything because all of our friends where there, our school was exactly across the street, and the recreation center that we attended every day was on the corner. Our babysitter lived right next door, it couldn’t get any better. Everything I knew I had to say goodbye to, it was a very hard pill to follow. So we finally made the move to a bigger house than the one we had before. I recall being excited about the move when I learned that I would be having my own room, this was something serious decorating the way I wanted was amazing. This was always the way I wanted it, instead of sharing a room and a closet, what more could a 5th grader ask for. As time goes on and we began a new school, met new friends and started a new life. A new journey had begun and life as I knew it was wonderful. As maturity set in, I began noticing things I wasn’t aware of. My mother wasn’t at home like she used to be and my father just wasn’t himself. My mom was just always at work, to the point where I wouldn't even see her some days, and my dad he always acted so weird, and would get so angry at my mom. I noticed they had been fighting a lot as well, so I figured that was the reason my mom stayed at work a lot, to avoid my father. Later on I found out that it was his abusive ways that she was hiding from. One night my father came home extremely drunk, and because my mother was working, he decided to let his anger out on me. My father’s abusive ways caused me to go from a sweet, innocence teenager full of life, to a quiet, depressed, scared little girl. I didn’t understand why or how my father could treat his own child like that, and I never did understand until I was well in my adult years. It got to the point where I just couldn’t take it anymore, I couldn’t take the hurt, and I couldn’t take the pain. Somehow I just wanted it all to end; life as I knew just wasn’t fun anymore. This was my breaking point and the beginning of a very long painful road. That following year I dropped out of school, and I began distancing myself from my family, my friends, and everyone that loved me. I suddenly stopped doing the things I loved and started to do things that I knew wasn’t me. I lost myself and I knew I needed help now, before it was too late. After feeling tired, fed up, helpless and hopeless I decided to turn to my grandmother for help. She was completely unaware of everything that had been going on in my life. I told her everything; it felt so good to let all of my problems out to someone I know really cared. She listened and never judged me; she just embraced me and loved me like a grandmother should. I started staying with my grandmother for a while and she began to take me to church. I really loved going to Sunday morning services with my grandmother, it felt so free, and brand new every time I attended. I also began to develop a relationship with the pastor and it helped me so much and from that point on I found myself and became saved. Through it all my grandparents, my mom and most of all god have been the ones who never gave up on me and continued to push and motivate me.

The pain that I endured has taught me to always be alert and to never assume anything. To always keep pushing and always seek wise counsel. Now I can say that I went back to get my high school diploma and I received it. It wasn’t easy going back to school, I kept delaying and delaying but I knew I had to go back not only for myself but for my children, they were my biggest motivators. Finishing my high school diploma has greatly motivated me to pursue my bachelor’s degree in business administration. I’ve always had a passion for administration; it started when I took on the role as head administrator at my church.
“Perseverance brings about determination, determination bring about success (Witt,2010) .” My perseverance comes from the struggles I went through as a child, the things I went through in my past has made me strong. That strength that I developed in my childhood is why I so determined today. It was my struggles that pushed me to succeed and that pushed me to pursing my Bachelor’s Degree in Business Administration. Going back to school has not only helped me to become a better person but it has also helped me to become a better mother, sister, daughter, and friend. It has helped me look at life in a different light and it’s only because of the growing pains that caused me to want to pursue more, and that more was a college degree. So this is how my pain has allowed me to grow and persevere. We all experience pain but it’s because of that pain that we become who we are and this is the story of my growing pains.

References
Witt G. and Mossler R. (2010) PSY 202: Adult Development and Life Assessment

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