In that last few weeks as I have been faced with some very harsh realities about my life as a Single lady...more so a Single mother...I have had many different thoughts and memories come to mind that have left me only clear on one thing. One thing I will have to explain here in a minute...
I have made it pretty clear that for me love is what I want for my future, a truly amazing abiding love, one that can also handle the normal ebb and flow of everyday living, or should I say highs and lows...? I realize that life is not a fairytale but I do believe it can be magical at times if you have someone great to share it with. The fact is I do not want to settle for any thing less...as well as I don’t want to settle and become less than what I would expect and desire from my future partner.
It has hit me in the last while, as I have been looking for a better job and trying to run a household that...First off I am in a severe survival mode, and that my interest in men and even looking for a man has completely disintegrated. I mean other than a brief thought as I hit my pillow at night that I would sure love someone to cuddle with and share my life with, my thoughts are constantly about bills, my children’s needs and trying to figure out what to make for dinner, when all of the sudden the cupboards are bare and my bank account depleted.
Sorry, but my prince charming or personal chip and dale dancer (lol…kidding ;) is just going to have to wait!
The Second thing I have realized is that over the years since I have been divorced I have had more than a handful of Sugar Daddy and Marrying for Money opportunities that I just haven’t taken. I could go on and on about the desperate, but well off men that have wanted to sweep me off my feet, marry me or give me money...in fact I have had two offers just this past week from two men to be my Sugar Daddy, but it just isn’t appealing.
I think we typically think woman who want Sugar Daddy’s are out there trying to seduce this sort of situation, for me it always blindsides me. I am just going along trying to deal with life and all the sudden I have dozens of guys beating down my door, metaphorically speaking that is. What that really means is that they are calling, texting or filling my inbox with requests that they help me...funny that when I am the least focused on men they are the most interested...I learned years back that when it comes to men and their money you don’t touch it unless you want a life sentence or you are looking at a new carrier as a whore.
I knew a single lady who was divorced who used to brag about the wealthy men she would be a mistress to. They would provide for her and her children take her to exotic places buy her furs and jewels...well until they got tired of each other or the wife found out. She had been with so many men that by the time I meet her she couldn’t establish a real lasting relationship with anyone...mainly because at that point she was of a certain age, but that is how she made it through the first five or so more years after her divorce...you may end up alone doing this, just saying.
I made the big mistake of letting a male friend help me come up with my retainer for my divorce attorney, which I agreed to pay back or I never would have let him help (and I want you to know I did). He was one of those guys that always will tell you what a generous person he is, and so on and so forth...I agree he was very generous to help me when I was in a very difficult situation but as soon as he had, the whole dynamic of the friendship changed.
Naive as I was it didn’t take me long to figure out he had intentions other than being a friend and helping out a woman in a bad situation. All of the sudden he was calling me three times a day wanting to know where I was and what I was doing. He wanted to take me shopping and buy me clothes, when I refused he would bring clothes to my home he had picked out just for me. He was always insisting he take me out to dinner and I realized really fast I had just been purchased with a price.
I hate it when anyone tries to corner me so I resisted him and his games which created a whole lot of conflict...it really got ugly when I found out he was telling people that I was his girlfriend and that we had enjoyed his new shower together. Blah! I hadn't even had any physical contact with the guy so fancy that! I had never seen a man do so much to control a situation, well until I was divorced and now he is actually one of the mild ones I have met.
Holy Hell! This man was desperate! What kind of person lies and manipulates (using the mighty dollar I might add) someone into a relationship? Yep! You guessed it! Way too many...maybe almost everybody!
Yes, I may be struggling, but no! I have a reason for my so called pride. I mean honestly when I think about it I could be financially set now, either married to an immature attorney or the mistress of an already married architect who believes in sharing partners with his partner and who offered to provide money and support for being his special woman and participating in his brand of love(((gag)))...still offers every now and then too...but why do I want any part of that if I can’t have one person’s heart and that absolutely giddy feeling of excitement to be coming home to that person everyday???
I think that as much as men are bitter about woman being gold diggers and marrying just for financial stability they sure use money a lot to manipulate very desperate starving single woman to give them what they want. In fact that always brings me to one of my other pet peeves...the whole origin of prostitution.
If it weren’t for they way societies have been set up for centuries I don’t think woman would be out their selling themselves on these various levels just to survive. What in a way seems fashionable to the media of late, really has been and always will be a degrading profession. But if you look at the lady’s who have been selling themselves since way back before the Bible times, they did it because a woman was believed to be a lesser human than a man and if she was somehow abandoned by her family or her man whether through death or other circumstances she had no way to make a living. Without the protection of a father, brother or husband, woman were sold into slavery or forced to sell themselves as prostitutes just to feed themselves and their children. That is what is behind the story in the movie Moulin Rouge. I fyou do not get that then you’re missing an important point here. Woman did not and still in ways do not always have many options like a man would...back then they had to chose selling their bodies or starving to death...there really was no in-between.
What has always added more fuel to the fire for me is that it is the woman forced into this sort of position that were treated with derision, but not the men that enjoyed their company. Those men could still be up standing citizens, admired professionals and be a good church goers and it was fine in the eyes of society. In many ways now it is not that much different.
Now you have single mothers whose ex husbands refuse to pay child support and take any responsibility for keeping their kids and their kids mothers off the street. It shows that the value of woman and mother hood is still in the gutter. I remember one of my dear girl friends calling me up in tears so many times. Her ex was out living the high life (drugs and whores) and wasn’t paying her anything to help her take care of her kids. She was in a desperate place one day and ,was wondering out loud if the only way she was going to be able to take care of them was to go strip. I admit I have wondered if that is the only way a woman can make a living and still be home when her child walks though the door from school everyday. She of course has as much pride as I do, and that wasn’t an option.
The thing that kills me is just to be taken care of, woman will hook up with and go live with a man completely unsure of how committed he is, just to make sure she can feed and cloth her babies. Or as I have seen quite often as woman will marry the first guy who wants them, love not even being a part of the equation, just to survive. I am by no means a woman’s rights advocate but I know that single moms have a much harder time getting good stable jobs and a decent pay than a man.
Last year right around the New Year a guy who I had been talking to a bit with on the phone asked me if I needed some money. "I told him no." "I would be fine." He proceeded to tell me that it made him feel bad that I was under so much stress. I insisted I would figure it out on my own. Two nights later just after midnight I get a text from him, it said "Hey I am in the area, do you want to F***?" "I brought some money!" My blood began to come to a full boil really fast! I knew he had probably been drinking but that did not excuse the insult. "I told him I wasn't like that and to go to Hell!" Then in the hours it took me to go back to sleep I wondered how many woman desperate to pay for their kids school lunches would have accepted such and offer...
As far as I see it, our society treats woman as objects and is set up in such a way that you almost are forced into selling yourself on some level. As far as I am concerned men where the first to create whores, and as long as there is a demand there will always be woman settling for less just to survive.
But sorry dudes, I can’t be bought. That is the one thing I am clear on here...Not my body or my heart...so I will be living in a cardboard box before I go sell myself so move along now....!
