How Selling Helped Me Cope With Leaving My Abuser and Post Partum Depression

Seller Sellers’ Perspective How Selling Helped Me Cope With Leaving My Abuser and Post Partum Depression

Hello everyone! It’s Barbie_Dreamz.

If you read this, thank you. It means a lot to me.

This past year has been one of the hardest years of my entire life. I’m 26 years old and a single mother who is now living at home with my mom again after leaving my daughter’s father and getting sober. I’m gonna try to keep this to the point. Bare with me, I have ADHD!

My story unfortunately starts off the way a lot of stories do, with child abuse. I was abused as a child by my great aunt and uncle from ages two to seven years old. Because of that trauma, I have always had incredibly low self-esteem and have been a people pleaser. Constantly needing to fit in. Constantly worried something was wrong with me or my appearance.

As a child I was about average size, more thin if you will, but as a went through puberty I got heavy. Not to mention I have always been insecure about having an “outie” since I was about 11 years old when I learned what it was.

It was when I turned 18 that I wanted to make a change. I started running every day to lose weight but then fell into a heavy stimulant addiction. It took over my life for years and it’s what got me involved with my most recent ex.

I met him when I was 22 years old. The man I thought was the man of my dreams turned out to be my worst nightmare. Constantly comparing me to other women, verbal, emotional and physical abuse. I stayed with him for four years because it was what I thought I deserved.

I never felt good enough but at least I had someone and wasn’t alone. I’m sure you could imagine what being with him would be like for someone who already has low self-esteem.

But, giving birth to my daughter was the day I knew things needed to change. It made me realize it was now time to really grow up. I have always wanted to be a mother. I let my ex ruin my experience of being pregnant, I wasn’t going to let him ruin my future relationship with her.

She deserves a healthy and happy childhood and if I stayed with my ex she would never see that. Only fighting and heartbreak. Abuse is not love, abuse is not normal. I could not have my daughter growing up thinking that way.

So, now was the time for me to heal myself in order to be the mother my daughter deserves and to be able to teach her to be a strong woman!

I had no clue where to start or where the road to healing even began. After leaving my ex I fell into a deep depression. I was torn between going back to him and doing the right thing for my daughter and for myself. I was lost in the chaos of becoming a new mother and being single for the first time in so long.

The truth is I didn’t know who I was anymore. What I was actually interested in, what made me happy. What my goals were, or if I even had any. I thought I was just an abuse victim, an addict and now, a mother who was overweight, with an undesirable vagina and a lot of emotional baggage.

I also lost my sex drive during pregnancy and had to work on getting it back, this time without a partner. I would go through phases where I would start feeling a little better and then slip back into the depression again.

I then discovered All Things Worn. This website has helped me find my confidence and self-worth again. All of the things that society puts people down for (or my ex put me down for) are encouraged and loved here on this site.

It’s made me explore a side of me I didn’t know was there and it’s made me realize a lot about myself and what makes me happy sexually. It’s also made me love everything about my body that I’ve always hated.

It’s normal to have a smell, normal to be chubby, normal to have an outie. This website and the community make these things desirable and appreciated rather than something to be ashamed of which is amazing for everyone involved.

It’s also beautiful to be a part of a website that is so supportive of women during these current times.

So thank you to all of the sellers and buyers who make this community so great. Thank you for opening up and showing these intimate parts of yourselves that the outside world doesn’t always see. You never know who you could be helping by opening up!