Once upon a time…

Recently I posed a question on ye olde bird app and asked what people would like to see more of on this blog. As is usual when I utilize the poll feature, I didn’t get many responses, but it seems like people want to hear more stories and adventures.

Well, tuck in kiddos, it’s story time…

Once upon a time, I was in a bad way and looking for a movie to cheer me up. Something empowering or uplifting. Something that showed a woman in a powerful light without having her “saved” by a man or a relationship at the end. Unfortunately, after scrolling through every streaming service and conducting an extensive Google search, all I could find was exactly that… movies where a woman is saved by a man at the end.

I was flabbergasted. I couldn’t understand why every single one was advertised as “look at this powerful woman” and in the end… it’s just a love story. I was frustrated that it seemed the only image for empowerment was you must be saved by a man. As someone who got herself out of her own situation and saved herself, it didn’t make any sense to me. Why couldn’t these women be saved by loving themselves or finding power within themselves? Why did it always have to end with them being saved?

As my frustration grew, the words of Lin-Manuel Miranda once again rang through my head:

Gmorning
Don’t wait on anyone to make your favorite thing.
Make your own favorite thing
Go.

I wasn’t going to find the story I was looking for by sitting around waiting for it to just appear. I had the story I wanted to see… I lived it. I wanted to see a story where someone was saved by themselves and it wasn’t wrapped up in a neat little bow at the end. I wanted the messy. I wanted the struggle and the tears. What I wanted was my story.

So I wrote it.

I wrote and wrote and wrote for 2 weeks straight until it was all there on paper (metaphorically speaking) and I could finally say, “Ah, see! These stories do exist!”

… but that wasn’t the end.

The original ending to my book was very different than what you can read today. It was much more detailed about my first year in New York and had a sort of “savior” element to it. A wise friend said to me, “Who is this story about?” The answer was obvious: me. The story is about me and in that moment I knew I had to change it. I had to show that things continue. There’s no end credits with a secret hidden scene. Life goes on… and so does the story! There was no magic kiss from a prince to wake me from a spell. I was the only person who could wake me from the nightmare and that’s the story I wanted to tell.

As I’ve said many times before, my story is not unique. There are thousands of people living through abuse every day and many are never lucky enough to get out. I was able to find my voice amid the chaos and tell my story how I saw it and how I wanted a story of this nature to be told. Maybe some day someone else will be searching for something to read (Or watch? Maybe? We’re manifesting here!) and they’ll come across a story of someone who was not saved by love or a magical kiss, but by finding the strength within herself.

When that day comes, I’ll know that my story served its purpose.

- Danielle