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I'll tell you how I feel cheated. I never had a "real" wedding. I've had no children. While I spent the effort, time and money to get a LOT of education it's amounted to nothing. My friends, lifelong friends, have betrayed me in ways that are incomprehensible to me. The guy I wanted to marry - I have no idea who he really is but we are no more. I spent YEARS wasted on him. I am alone and fully expect to die that way. People don't "want to get involved" and everyone already has their life by this point. I could think of more, but I'll stop here.
Interesting. This is how you feel like life has been unfair to you? I am not going to invalidate those feelings, because those are your issues, and obviously you are dealing with the feelings. I hope you can see some thing positive in your life.
I used to feel like I never had a chance for the life I really wanted, and that is okay. I just lived the life I had, and somehow it has managed to be okay. Maybe not what I wished it had been, but better than it could have been. At my age, I am alone, barely making it paycheck to paycheck, no house, I own nothing, I don't even have a dog. But I think I am doing much better than many others.
Only way I feel cheated is due to being the de-facto oldest while growing up.
My parents who split up never really taught me much to begin with, but everyone had this crazy idea that I was capable of leading from the front.
Sadly, I made bad decisions too quickly and took too long to make any good ones.
Now, I've been stuck in a rut where some still look to me for answers, but slowly people are starting to realize that "this guy isn't going to work."
Jobs and money wise, it's just been a see-saw going from low-wage to slightly higher-wage, and then bad/boring jobs to ones I was eager to wake up and go to.
I guess if there was anything I could have to not feel cheated, it would be the ability to think more efficiently on my feet.
Of course I feel sad that my (longtime) husband passed-away...He was my best friend and the "great love" of my life. We were both "youthful" and I thought we'd have 20-plus (or more) years left together! It's been "rough" being without him!...But I can't just "shrivel-up" and die myself because he is gone. What good would that do? I'd just make myself miserable day and night!...I'm going to have to find a way to "reinvent" myself and my life. Who am I today? Who do I want to be? What do I want for myself at this point in my life?...And who am I without my husband as a person in my very own right?...I don't want to keep myself stuck in "limbo" forever and ever crying over "what used to be!" What "used to be" is "gone" now. I'm here on my "own" now and this is reality!...It seems like I've had a lot of "bad-breaks" in life over the past few years. (Besides just losing my husband.) But I don't want to sit here and "cry in my beer" and spend my days and nights feeling sorry for myself. What good would that do? It would just make me feel miserable!...And I don't want to be miserable! I want to find reasons to "be happy" despite all of my "losses." I don't want to "waste" the rest of my life crying about "what used to be." I want to find enjoyment in the "here and now!"
I think when I feel "cheated" and examine the feeling, it is because I had expectations of life that weren't met, but maybe those expectations were not realistic in the first place. I am now aware of how much I didn't know when I was younger. Some of it was because my parents both had emotional issues and really weren't the best parents out there for guiding a kid into adulthood. I don't mean to assign blame to them, and they weren't terrible parents--I had food and shelter and basic clothing and we weren't abused or anything. But I realize now that my dad had severe PTSD and my mother was completely clueless about how a normal family behaved because she didn't grow up in one, and she also had this bizarre mindset where she expected my father to take the reigns in certain things simply because he was college-educated and she was a high-school drop out. (She still brings this up--she was asked to make a speech at a local town event, and she's telling me "I can't believe they are asking ME to speak when after all, I didn't graduate from high school and some of the others have college degrees..." and I'm telling her, "Mom, you are eighty-three years old. Nobody cares at this point if you finished high school or not! They are asking you because you are one of the few people left who can tell people what this town was like during WWII!") Meanwhile, Dad was an electrician who was only college-educated because his legs had been blown off in the war and he went back to school and became an engineer on the GI bill because he couldn't work as an electrician anymore.
I just didn't know things that other people knew. Simple things. Like about football games and pizza and Chinese food, because my parents didn't care about that stuff. My parents also didn't participate in school-related things, only church-related stuff, so whereas I guess other parents talked among themselves and with their kids about upcoming events, I only ever heard about things from other kids, and so I missed a lot.
I can remember kids asking if I was taking the SATs and I didn't know what the SATs were. My oldest sister had gone to college for a year, but my parents made her drop out because she was drinking beer and failing classes, and the word was that college was a waste of time for most kids and that we should get a trade instead and the girls were just going to get married anyway. I just always thought that was going to be my life. I'd work for a while after high school, and then I'd get married and have kids and stop working. That was the expectation.
The reality was that I had no clue how to interact with normal people, had not been taught basic social skills beyond "please" and "thank you", and no men ever wanted to go out with me anyway because I was abnormally tall and unattractive to boot! So, the details of exactly how I was going to marry and quit my job and have children is something I'd never considered. It's so pathetic to hear myself say these things when I look back from the vantage point of 35 years later.
Anyway, I married an alcoholic because he WAS interested in me (or more realistically, he saw a great mark in this homely, dopey naive idiot who happened to have a decent job and a regular paycheck that he could exploit and so he pretended to be interested in me) and of course I thought I should try to fix him because I was taught that if you forgive over and over and take all the crap that other people hand out to you, God will reward you, eventually. I didn't expect what I got, but I SHOULD have.
On the plus side, I didn't expect that the daughter that would be produced from this hell of a marriage would turn out to be such a compassionate and intelligent human being, nor did I expect that I'd somehow excel in the job I didn't want in the first place and always be able to support myself despite my lack of education. So, sometimes the unexpected helps balance out the negative expectations, I guess.
Last edited by Mightyqueen801; 04-28-2012 at 10:19 AM..
May I ask how you feel cheated or is that too personal?
I'll tell you how I feel cheated. I never had a "real" wedding. I've had no children. While I spent the effort, time and money to get a LOT of education it's amounted to nothing. My friends, lifelong friends, have betrayed me in ways that are incomprehensible to me. The guy I wanted to marry - I have no idea who he really is but we are no more. I spent YEARS wasted on him. I am alone and fully expect to die that way. People don't "want to get involved" and everyone already has their life by this point. I could think of more, but I'll stop here.
The above nearly sounds like me, too.
To be concise, I feel cheated of friendships (the male kind), money, and life's great moments. So far, a "great moment" for me is sleeping half the day . It used to be spending time with a male, even if we're doing nothing but watching a movie together.
BTW, not feeling pity for myself; just taking "inventory" , and coming up short. But it's "fixable", somehow. Yet, I feel very safe being solo. That's because I trust myself -as it should be - more than anyone. I'd rather have a solo dinner in a restaurant than be bothered with someone that I'm trying to get to know. Guess I'm still not ready for a bunch of social interactions.
I used to feel like I never had a chance for the life I really wanted, and that is okay. I just lived the life I had, and somehow it has managed to be okay. Maybe not what I wished it had been, but better than it could have been. At my age, I am alone, barely making it paycheck to paycheck, no house, I own nothing, I don't even have a dog. But I think I am doingmuch better than many others.
I like your outlook. You are apparently grateful for your quality of life. That's vital. No sense in being miserable.
I'm grateful, too, but I still want more. However, I'm learning to be content and have peace of mind even when life presents its ugly side.
(A little wine on the side doesn't hurt, either).
I'm learning that it's occasionally okay to fall to pieces, just pick up the pieces eventually and walk/work through the challenges. It's harder than it sounds, but ultimately worth it.
I think when I feel "cheated" and examine the feeling, it is because I had expectations of life that weren't met, but maybe those expectations were not realistic in the first place. I am now aware of how much I didn't know when I was younger. Some of it was because my parents both had emotional issues and really weren't the best parents out there for guiding a kid into adulthood. I don't mean to assign blame to them, and they weren't terrible parents--I had food and shelter and basic clothing and we weren't abused or anything. But I realize now that my dad had severe PTSD and my mother was completely clueless about how a normal family behaved because she didn't grow up in one, and she also had this bizarre mindset where she expected my father to take the reigns in certain things simply because he was college-educated and she was a high-school drop out. (She still brings this up--she was asked to make a speech at a local town event, and she's telling me "I can't believe they are asking ME to speak when after all, I didn't graduate from high school and some of the others have college degrees..." and I'm telling her, "Mom, you are eighty-three years old. Nobody cares at this point if you finished high school or not! They are asking you because you are one of the few people left who can tell people what this town was like during WWII!") Meanwhile, Dad was an electrician who was only college-educated because his legs had been blown off in the war and he went back to school and became an engineer on the GI bill because he couldn't work as an electrician anymore.
I just didn't know things that other people knew. Simple things. Like about football games and pizza and Chinese food, because my parents didn't care about that stuff. My parents also didn't participate in school-related things, only church-related stuff, so whereas I guess other parents talked among themselves and with their kids about upcoming events, I only ever heard about things from other kids, and so I missed a lot.
I can remember kids asking if I was taking the SATs and I didn't know what the SATs were. My oldest sister had gone to college for a year, but my parents made her drop out because she was drinking beer and failing classes, and the word was that college was a waste of time for most kids and that we should get a trade instead and the girls were just going to get married anyway. I just always thought that was going to be my life. I'd work for a while after high school, and then I'd get married and have kids and stop working. That was the expectation.
The reality was that I had no clue how to interact with normal people, had not been taught basic social skills beyond "please" and "thank you", and no men ever wanted to go out with me anyway because I was abnormally tall and unattractive to boot! So, the details of exactly how I was going to marry and quit my job and have children is something I'd never considered. It's so pathetic to hear myself say these things when I look back from the vantage point of 35 years later.
Anyway, I married an alcoholic because he WAS interested in me (or more realistically, he saw a great mark in this homely, dopey naive idiot who happened to have a decent job and a regular paycheck that he could exploit and so he pretended to be interested in me) and of course I thought I should try to fix him because I was taught that if you forgive over and over and take all the crap that other people hand out to you, God will reward you, eventually. I didn't expect what I got, but I SHOULD have.
On the plus side, I didn't expect that the daughter that would be produced from this hell of a marriage would turn out to be such a compassionate and intelligent human being, nor did I expect that I'd somehow excel in the job I didn't want in the first place and always be able to support myself despite my lack of education. So, sometimes the unexpected helps balance out the negative expectations, I guess.
my father ( now desceased ) was the most selfish person i have ever met , he saw everyone around him as being alive to aid him first and foremost , including his children , he was not physically abusive but had a mean tongue , he was also obsessed with money and was incredibly tight fisted with it , my mother ( in her early sixties ) has an incredibly warm heart but is an incredibly clueless person , despite the fact that her husband never consulted her on anything , she never ever questioned this , we often had to go short due to my dad being a cheapskate yet my mother would never dare to simply spend his money despite having access to it , it was obvious that myself and my dad were not meant to be in the same room yet my mother never once pulled me aside while i was growing up for even into my early twenties and said , listen son , you need to make your own future away from your father , she was an incredibly passive person , subservient , very kind but very weak , didnt believe in standing firm , always folded and gave in to my father , also very religous , she didnt believe that a person could change thier own circumstances by will so whatever happened was because god willed it ,
To be concise, I feel cheated of friendships (the male kind), money, and life's great moments. So far, a "great moment" for me is sleeping half the day . It used to be spending time with a male, even if we're doing nothing but watching a movie together.
BTW, not feeling pity for myself; just taking "inventory" , and coming up short. But it's "fixable", somehow. Yet, I feel very safe being solo. That's because I trust myself -as it should be - more than anyone. I'd rather have a solo dinner in a restaurant than be bothered with someone that I'm trying to get to know. Guess I'm still not ready for a bunch of social interactions.
I do that, too. I decided a couple of months ago to go to dinner by myself one night. The chirpy little twit who was the hostess tried to get me to sit at the bar and eat, because it would be "so much more fun" and I could "watch TV". There were three couples at the bar. Yes, that would have been ever so much fun sitting alone amongst them. I don't watch TV at home, I'm not going to watch it in a restaurant. There were plenty of tables, and I had a book.
Thank God the waiter was smarter and nicer. I had a glass of wine, a good steak, read my book and tried to eavesdrop on other people's conversations, which entertains me. It was so much more fun than watching TV and eating on a barstool.
I feel cheated about a lot of things - some things I will grow out of feeling cheated about because they're just part of the growing pains of getting older, but others are truly unfair.
For instance, getting diagnosed with cancer at 23 - that makes me feel cheated. In addition to the absolute financial ruin it has caused, I was cheated of living the majority of my life without fear for my health. Most 24 year olds don't have to stop and think, "What happens if I change my job and I relapse before I qualify for FMLA?" I used to be SUCH a planner - and I can no longer plan any longer than my next scan because I am at such a high risk for relapse. I know that I am lucky - I was insured when I got sick and while very early in my career, I worked very hard for years to earn an elite education debt free and gain skills. But I took the first job offered after I graduated from college in 2010 which was fantastically supportive when I was sick, but is looking kind of dead-end, low paid, and is in a high cost of living area. I have gained great skills while working here, in addition to the volunteer work I do in the health community, and I hate that I can't leave this university for fear of what happens if I relapse. FMLA is unpaid and only 3 months - but at least that would be 3 more months of holding on to my health and life insurance.
I feel like there's a whole list of doors that are now closed to me because of cancer. I can no longer do the Peace Corps or Foreign Service (or, rather, must be in remission for 5 years before I can even apply - and at that point, I will want to start thinking about a family, not traveling every 2 years to a new post), I can't go to grad school full time because of insurance concerns, having a family is very up in the air from a biological standpoint and financial standpoint (for adoption), being able to move on the drop of a hat for better opportunities is gone because I can't move away from the best cancer hospitals in the country until I am considered "cured" - 5 years.
I have a lot of things going for me, and in the end, maybe it will be for the best that I got sick young. It's turned me into an advocate and people listen to you after you've had cancer - I say the same things, but suddenly I'm "inspirational". I resent it, but if I can monetize my illness to get out of the financial hole and do a little bit of good for my young adult cancer community, I will use it to my advantage. I also learned at an early age that people are not to be trusted after I watched almost my entire family and group of friends disappear during my illness. I went through 6 months of chemo almost entirely on my own while working full time. I am lucky that I was able to do it, but the wear on my body is noticeable.
There is nothing I wouldn't do to go to a place where I didn't worry about cancer, or the late side effects of cancer and treatment, every day. Or back to when I was financially secure - still a member of the working poor, but a clear path upwards and no debt. I have no idea how I will get out of the debt now, especially since my employment opportunities are more limited and must be MUCH more thought out now.
There's also the survivor's guilt. I feel cheated that I will always have to consider everything in my life in the context of my peers who didn't make it. Why did I survive when they didn't? How can I make my life worth it? That's a huge burden.
There are so many messages in your poignant post, and thanks for sharing.
It is so strange, and hurtful, that some friends and family conveniently disappeared as you were fighting the cancer battle. But you know what? You survived - wiser and stronger. You know how people can be. You know whom to put your trust in: no one but yourself. That's a harsh life lesson for you (and others), but the truth.
Anything you can do that will help you financially, do it. Be an "inspirational" speaker or writer, maybe both. Yes, use your experiences to your advantage - when you're ready. It happened, what can you make of it that will benefit you?
Also, you're alive. You are a strong person. You proved it: going through
6 months of chemo alone - and working full-time. Some people don't go to work if they have cramps or a head cold.
I hope you'll make it to the 5-year mark - and MORE.
In the meantime, use the experience to your advantage (sorry to repeat myself) if and when you can. Also, try to enjoy life. That can take daily effort, but life is worth the struggle. I know it may not seem like it sometimes, or even frequently. However, as long as you live, there will be something to live for. Find out what it is. "It" may be many things. You deserve peace and contentment, and I hope they will soon be yours.
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. It used to be spending time with a male, even if we're doing nothing but watching a movie together. 
, and coming up short. 
But it's "fixable", somehow. Yet, I feel very safe being solo. That's because I trust myself -as it should be - more than anyone. I'd rather have a solo dinner in a restaurant than be bothered with someone that I'm trying to get to know. Guess I'm still not ready for a bunch of social interactions.
