Gone In a Flash
Lindsey Kauffmann, second place
What do I value? As I think back to the best and most painful moments in my life, I’ve come across many things that I value. One of them being knowing my self-worth. Self-worth is the internal sense of being good enough and worthy of the love and belonging of others. As I start my essay I would like to share my story.
In 2017, my dad became incarcerated in the Stanley Correctional Institution, for beating up his meth dealer. Growing up I always thought that if I had been a better daughter, my dad wouldn’t have gone down such a destructive path and that he would’ve chosen a life with me over a life with drugs. Fast forward two and a half years when my dad was released from prison. I thought things would be different this time around, and for a little while they were. Within the first month of my dad being home, we got very close and I thought I was finally going to have the great father-daughter relationship that all my friends had. But that all started to change when my dad moved out of my grandma’s house and into an apartment with his new girlfriend. In the beginning, I was happy for him. He was finally starting to get his life together and seemed so happy. We still saw each other but not as much. Until one day it stopped. He stopped reaching out, stopped caring, and stopped being present in my life. I clearly remember that on a random day in January, I saw my dad was having another baby on Facebook. I thought to myself, one minute. It would have taken one minute to text me, but he didn’t. That’s the moment I realized my absence in his life wasn’t affecting him as much as it was affecting me. He had a new family now, and he was happy. On the other hand, I was left to wonder what I did wrong, but thankfully I had my mom. She was there for me when I needed it and constantly reminded me how important I was in her life. She helped me realize that just because someone doesn’t see the importance of having me in their life doesn’t make me less worthy of love.
From this experience, I learned to value my self-worth. I now know that somebody’s ability to treat me properly is not based on me as a person. I truly believe people make time for the people they value and if somebody is not able to show up for me the way they need to, then it would be better for me to remove myself from that situation, because I’m worth so much more than that. Over the years I have come to realize how much happier I am when I spend more time focusing on the people around me, who have my best interest in mind.
From now on I will live my life making sure the people around me know how important they are and help them realize their self-worth because that is not an easy thing to do especially when people make you feel otherwise. Doing this is so important to me because as someone who felt unimportant, I know how draining it is and I don’t want the people I care about to go through that as well. But most importantly I will remember my self-worth because letting people make me feel unworthy of love and attention is not okay. I will let my happiness come first.
¨Know the difference between what you are getting and what you are worth¨ - Anonymous
