Delaney Lawrence

Meeting Her Father for the First Time…

“I just, a few weeks ago, met my dad for the first time. It was actually so weird. The first time that I met him, I looked at him and I could literally see his face and I could compare it to my face and we looked so similar. It was kinda scary. It wasn’t what I expected. What I expected, me seeing my dad, I thought it would be a happy moment and him recognizing that I’m his kid. It’s like a heartfelt moment in movies and stuff. And then I met him and it was like basically meeting a random person that you’ve never seen in your whole life. I shook his hand and it was so weird for me and I was pretty sure it was weird for him too but he acted like it was fine. It’s been thirteen years of my life without him, so I don’t understand how I was just supposed to just meet him and make this connection with him because bonds are formed over long periods of time. I don’t know if I want him to be a part of my life or not. He hasn’t been there for me, so why should I, all of the sudden, want him to be there for me. I’ve only met him once and I don’t know if I want to see him again because I didn’t feel a connection. However, I might form a connection with him and he might become really important to me. Maybe when I am older I will find a bond and I’ll be able to go visit him when I can drive and we’ll form a like father-daughter relationship. As of now, we just don’t have that yet. Honestly, my biggest regret would be not meeting my dad sooner. If I were to meet him sooner, then I would have been able to spend more time with him and there would have been a bond. I just don’t know if I waited too long, but I wanna try, I just don’t know if I should. Maybe once I have my life together I can figure out how to have a bond with him.”

The Irreplaceable Love of Family…

“I have my mom, who is not even like my mom, my mom is like my best friend. She’s the only person that has ever really been there for me. My mom and my Grandma on my mom’s side have been there for me my whole entire life. They’re not even like family, they are more just like best friends to me. And my Mom and me have a relationship that is really rare. I can tell her anything, I can talk to her, I’ll cry to her if there is something wrong. She’s just like there for me no matter what. My life without my mom would be… I can’t even. Last year, I think, she got married to her first love. In high school, they fell in love and then they broke up for like twenty years and then they got back together and now they’re married. My whole entire life, there’s been guys that she’s dated and then went out of my life and I never really liked it. Honestly, when I first met my stepdad, I had more of a connection with him than I did with my actual dad. I actually really love him. He’s really sweet and he’s trying to be there for me and I’ll talk to him, text him, and stuff like that. It feels natural.”

 Coping…

“Sometimes, I push my mom away even though I shouldn’t because I know that she is trying to help me, but sometimes I feel that I need some space. So I push people away and I know that that is one of my weaknesses because I know people just want to help me. I’ll go through times where i’ll just feel like I need to be alone. And then, I feel bad after because of all the people that I pushed away. I really need to learn to not think so much about so many little things. If anything happens, I always put them first, like literally anyone. Once I know that they’re perfectly fine and that I’ve done all that I can to help them, then that’s when I start to think about myself. I spend so much time making sure that other people are okay, and a lot of the time, they need more help, and then I don’t have enough time to make sure that I’m okay. I hold things in. If there is something really bothering me, I don’t talk about it. I write. I just write down anything I’m feeling and then I crumple it up and tear it up into little pieces. It just somehow helps me get rid of everything, forget about it like its over, and move on. I like to write whenever something is wrong or when I am really stressed out to help forget about stuff. It’s a really good way to release negative energy because you write about all the negative things and then you rip it up and throw it away for all of the negativity to be gone.”