Adina’s RJN-Chapter 3 “I Had a Void Inside Me”

I moved to the city 100km away on Kevin’s wedding day. I started at my new job, but suddenly I found myself all alone. I was far away from my friends and family. I had no friends there and this new job was a disaster from day one. I still continued in this other relationship, but it started to fall apart, but I knew deep down that it wouldn’t work out in the long run.

Weekends I would either go to visit John, or I went to visit my father and brother. I rarely stayed at home over weekends because the loneliness would get to me. And in this loneliness a lot of hurt from my childhood up until my mother’s death came back to me, hurt I never really dealt with and I locked away somewhere in my heart.

For a while I tried to supress all the hurt that came back, I tried desperately to keep it locked up, but in the end it just got too much for me to handle. Within a year I found another job even further away, it was a management position with a very good salary. I had an empty void inside me that I was trying to fill, and I was searching for something to fill it.

The first two days at this new job I cried so much, I just felt lost, not finding a place where I belong and could be happy. The other relationship finally ended and that broke me, not because I loved him that much or even because of the relationship, it was more like the final nail in the coven for me to finally face all my childhood hurt.

Since I can remember I always knew there was a God. I never doubted it for one second. As a child my parents always took us to church, when we went to visit my grandparents, they would always take us to church. I went to Sunday school and eventually did my confession of faith to be adopted as a member of the church we belonged to and to enable you to use communion.

But although I knew He was out there somewhere, it never occurred to me that maybe He is what I needed in my life. I guess I always felt like He was there for others, not for me. I did not receive any love and affection as a child from my parents and I guess it spilled over in how I viewed God; a God that sits on His throne and just waiting for us to do something wrong to punish us, I did not see Him as a loving God filled with mercy.

When I finally faced all my hurt, I did the only thing I thought I could do, I went to see a psychiatrist. When she did not help me to feel better, I went to another one, and she booked me into a psychiatric hospital and gave me a lot of pills to drink. But after three days I told her I do not belong there, I threw away the pills and made my mind up that I will not follow in my mother’s footsteps. But one good thing came from this, the second psychiatrist was a Christian lady and she started to plant the seed in my heart that God is my Healer and my only Hope.

But although the seed was planted, I still couldn’t get to a place where I started to look to Him to heal me. But He was there, always knocking, always waiting for me to open my heart to Him. Yes, I read my Bible and my daily devotionals, I prayed and I cried out to Him, but it was like there was always a wall between us, something that prevented me to fully surrender to Him.

Now, looking back I know it was all the hurt and all the pain from my childhood that hardened my heart. As a child and into my teenage years I used to lock myself in my room over weekends to escape the reality of the things that happened in my parent’s house, things that no child should see or go through. And that was exactly what I did with my heart, I locked my heart away and that prevented me to have a relationship with Him. I tried desperately to fill the emptiness myself, but I couldn’t.

My earliest childhood memories were happy memories; we were a normal family. We went to church and we did a lot of normal things as a family. Everything felt and seemed normal. When I was born my dad was studying towards his doctorate degree full time, my mother was a teacher and she supported my dad in his studies, my dad had a bursary and that is how they survived financially.

After my dad finally graduated and received his doctorate degree, he was offered a very good job at a company in the town we stayed. My mother was able to stop working and became a housewife. My parents started to attend a lot of work functions together, but my dad also attended a lot of work parties alone, that is where he started to drink. They also had friends they used to go out with, and something happened there that changed everything. Until today I don’t know what it was, but something happened that changed my parent’s relationship. I do remember fights about a blonde lady, but that is all.

My dad started to drink more and more, not just at work parties, but also at home. At one point he was admitted to hospital and I guess he was there to get sober. Afterwards he didn’t drink again, not that I can remember, but he applied for another job and we moved to another town. And that is where things turned really bad.

Before I continue to the next chapter I do want to add something here. I feel led to add things that happened in my childhood in this novel. It is not my intention to talk badly about my parents, I’ve reached a place in my life where I can think of my parents with love and understanding. I understand that things happened in their lives that caused them to do what they did and I forgave them completely. But maybe there is somebody out there that went through something similar and it is my hope and prayer that my story might help them, while trying to remain as discreet as possible.

Chapter 1 “Firmly Planted In a Man’s World”

Chapter 2 “I Fell In Love With My Friend”