The Story of Me

This is my story. My purpose in telling it is to convey the circumstances of my heritage and birth; and to gain an understanding of my family dynamics and show that no matter where you come from you can still find God in you life.

I was born in 1958 the second child and first born daughter of a 15-year-old mother. My own mother her brother and sister, had been left in Memphis Tennessee to live with relatives. My maternal grandmother and grandfather had divorced long before I was born.

My grandmother, whom everyone called Madea, had moved to Detroit without her children to continue a wild and rebellious lifestyle. Lou, enjoyed the many pleasures the carnal world had to offer. Lou was a tiny light-skinned Negro, with a beautiful smile, big eyes and a zest for life. She could out drink and out curse the average man. My beautiful grandmother went through men like most women go through pantyhose. When she got tired of them or wore them out, she simply discarded them and moved on to the next one. On more than one occasion, she would leave broken men and broken lives in her wake.

My mother, Barbara, looked a lot like her mother. She too was light skinned, tiny, with a big beautiful smile. I believe my mother had become promiscuous at such a young age because she was looking for something that she felt was missing in her life; The love and affection of her own parents.

What a burden that must have been for my mother; knowing that both of her parents were alive and feeling that they didn’t want her. Maybe she felt that if her own parents didn’t love her enough to want her, how could God?

Aah, but here are these young men in her life telling her how cute she was, how desirable she was, and how much they wanted her. You see, back in the forties and fifties especially in the south, light skinned Negro women were thought to be more attractive than their dark skinned counterparts.

My mother, a young girl of 13 started being a mother long before her time because she was looking to fill an empty void in her life. I never had an opportunity to talk to my mother about this. Maybe she felt that these men she slept with could replace the love she felt she wasn’t getting from her parents. Maybe she felt that only her children could give her the kind of love she had been missing. Or maybe she just didn’t feel she was worthy of God’s love. Only she can answer that question.

I didn’t meet my birth father until I was 29 years old and had returned to Memphis for the funeral of my beloved Auntie. My grandmother chose this opportunity to introduce us. I asked him why hadn’t he tried to meet me before now? His response was that he was never allowed to contact me when I was a child.

My father stated that it was my mother who never wanted him or his family to have anything to do with me. There I was, standing before this man, the man of whom I am a biological part of, and he is telling me that it’s my mothers fault that he never got to know me. Even though as a child, I along with my other siblings was sent to Memphis each summer to stay. Even though I was now a grown woman, with a family of my own and family still living down the street from him, He was never allowed to contact me.

I was not angry with my biological father just uncaring. How could I care for someone who was a virtual stranger to me? I didn’t feel hatred, anger, sadness, or disappointment. How could I? You only have feelings for those people in your life that you care about. I don’t know anything about my father or if I had any other siblings. I didn’t have a chance to have the grandparents, aunts or uncles that being a part of his family would have provided.

What I do know is that it was he that missed out on being in my life and the lives of my children. He has missed out on seeing my two beautiful sons grow up. He has missed out on the love that only a father and his daughter can share. He has missed out on my joys and accomplishments. But most of all, he has missed out on me.

Psalm 146:9
The LORD protects the strangers; He supports the fatherless and the widow, But He thwarts the way of the wicked.

One thing that I have now come to realize is that my relationship with my birth father was the first of many failed relationships that I would have with the men in my life. My father was the first man in my life who would leave me.

Wanna-be - a person who wants or aspires to be someone or something else or who tries to look or act like someone else.

Many of us go through life wondering who we are and what we are suppose to be in life. As women, we are taught to believe that that when we grow up we are supposed marry and commit ourselves to being the perfect wife and mother. Many women do succeed in part of that goal, the part about being a wife and mother. Some become do become wives and others realize their goals of becoming mothers. However, it wasn’t until the months leading up to my forty-third birthday that the realization hit me. There is no such thing as the perfect wife and mother.

What has led me to this conclusion was a letter I had written to a life long friend. In that letter, I took a long hard look at not only my life, but also at the lives of various friends around me. Men, women, black and white. I have concluded that there is no such thing as perfection in a relationship or in life. It just does not exist.

This is not a derogatory statement about men or women but a realization that what we think to be true about everyone else but ourselves is not true about anyone. The facts are that what we would like our lives to be about isn’t a part of reality. We think that if we look a certain way, act a certain way, have certain things, obtain our dream job or do certain things, that we will find that mate that will help us live happily ever after.

I want to share some things that I have learned about not only myself but also other insights that have been shared with me by other women. I had ignored so much about myself for so long; I hadn’t realized how much I needed to share those thoughts and feeling with others. You see, after awhile reality starts to set in. What we really want isn’t necessarily what will happen. In sharing how I feel I have to stop and think am I being realistic. Do I live in a fantasy world? Am I really being honest? I have to answer, maybe all of the above.

Everything that I will write is very true. Is it colored by fantasy? Maybe. Were we being realistic in what our hopes and expectations were? I really don’t know about that. You see, every little girl wants to live happily ever after, even those of us who are in our forties. Will we ever find the man who can fulfill our dreams? Now, that may be where the fantasy comes in.
No matter what life throws our way, we still hold on to the dreams and hopes that have been a part of us since we were little girls.

The problem is that life has somehow changed or discolored how we view our dreams. The relationships that we have had and the experiences that we have gone through have somehow tainted what our original believe system was. Our first desire is to be that virtuous woman that is highly regarded in the bible. We want to be a loving wife, mother, and most of all handmaidens to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. We want to be that respected elder of the church, that reveled servant of God, upright and outstanding member of our church community. We want to be regarded with the love and respect of our saved brothers in Christ.

The problem is, that because of unfulfilled dreams, past hurts, and low regard for ourselves, we have become that fallen woman, that woman who Jesus met at the well. That Jezebel, that scorned woman that was so despised in the bible.

Somehow, somewhere along the way we have been brainwashed into believing that we are not worthy. We women are not worthy of the love we receive from mortal men and certainly not worthy of God’s love. We are taught that whatever life dishes out to us we must accept it. We as women can’t even take a compliment without making some sort of negative response back.
Much of what I am about to tell you is hard to admit to myself let alone others. There are many things that I had chose to forget because of the pain I caused not only myself but the pain I inflicted onto others.

So what happened to us? I will share with you not only my story, but also the stories of women just like me, who strive for a higher calling, but fall down in our pursuit to find carnal love. Women like me, who thought that our chosen path would lead to a fulfilled life. Women, just like me, who thought by giving in to the lies of this world, that it wouldn’t matter and that we would and could change a situation and make it work for us. That God would understand and overlook our little indiscretions. That a moment of pleasure would wipe out a lifetime of longing, past hurts, and loneliness.

What you will discover as you take this journey with me is that no matter how we try to justify our wrongs, say that the rules have changed, make excuses for ourselves, and we can never find our way home. We will continue to be like the prodigal son, lost in a far country, eating with the hogs. It’s not until we say enough! I am a daughter of the most high king, and even if my Prince Charming doesn’t come along to rescue me, I am okay, because I have a prince from the kingdom of God. The one and only true love of my life. He has given me more than mortal man could ever give me. Not diamonds, pearls, furs, or money, but respect of self, love of family and most of all, the love of God.

We are not saying that we are any better than the rest of our sisters who are trying to find happiness, but we have come to realize that happiness is not found in bed or in the arms of that mortal man who whispers, I love you as we give him our ultimate gift, ourselves. What we are saying is that I want to live my life the way it is suppose to be. I don’t just want any man in my life. I want a man who respects God first, me, and the sanctity of his family. I want a man who is the head of his home. I want a man who realizes that I am not his maid, bed warmer, child breeder, cook, personal bank account, chick on the side, baby’s mama, baby’s mama’s drama, freak, chickenhead, whore, hoodrat, or booty call, then and only then can we be happy in a relationship. Then and only then can we become the wives and mothers, raising our children the way God wants us to that we will truly be happy. And if we find that the man of our dreams is just that, a dream, it’s okay. God loves me anyway.

Ladies, if we don’t stand and be that virtuous woman that God wants us to be, our world won’t get any better. Our relationships won’t get any better, and our children won’t learn to grow and be the men and women of God that he wants them to be. We as women of God must learn to first love ourselves enough to stop accepting just any old thing. We women must learn to forgive ourselves, accept our mistakes and move on.

As I share not only my story, but the stories of several other women as well, I am sure that some of you will see parallels between women in your own lives. My prayer is that in taking this spiritual walk with me and seeing the reflection of yourselves and other women in your lives in the following pages, that we will start to see some of the mistakes that we have made, correct them, and move on to a more righteous way of living. I pray that you will let go of the past and start your healing today!

The Story of Me
(and other wanna-be Virtuous Women)
By Jacqueline D. Moore


Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far above rubies…………………

Foreword

This is a book about honesty. It is not for the faint of heart. It is a tell- all, about a Christian woman who wants to show other women how to put their past exactly where it deserves to be . . . in the past. No other virtue can do this except for honesty because when one is being honest it requires that they not only tell all (the truth) but tell on all. That means that this books deals with Jacqueline but also with every other influential voice that helped to shape her into the woman she was and is today. If you are interested in hearing a woman of many experiences talk about hopes and unfulfilled dreams; pleasurable moments and past hurts; marriage and mother wit; relationships and the harsh realizations that they can teach you in a language that is not bitter but aware that such experiences, even when they are very painful…can be the path that God leads us down to make sense of someone’s appointments and disappointment, then you will want to read this book. In it, she refers to her experiences as a journey that she wants us to take with her while she feeds us with healthy and helpful nutrients, sometimes scriptures, sometimes stories, sometimes admonitions and sometimes just good sound advice to keep the reader from experiencing the agony some of her decisions caused her. Honesty leaves one unprotected like that, but in the end it allows the reader when faced with similar decisions to benefit from her godly advice. Of course the hope is that her experiences will prevent us from making similar decisions. She accomplishes this with the theme that runs through from preface to conclusion: honesty. Plain and simple the book is critical of some of the choices she has made, some of the advise she has received, some of the ideas others interject into her mind but with God’s help she outspokenly is grateful for each experience. It is a must read for everyone who loves themselves enough to honestly critique their past, who is willing to learn how a personal relationship with Christ will bring daily deliverance for the wounded and give you strength to expose your experiences with clarity and courage for just what they are… a journey. In writing this book, Ms. Moore has taken the first step in what I expect to be a long and prestigious ministry, namely the ministry of helps. And like others with this precious gift I believe through the power of literature she will help those who are fearful, or in denial of whatever torment that seeks to prevent the fruit of their ministry from being developed. Remember I told you this is not a book for the faint of heart. So the remaining question is…Are you up for the journey? If so, perhaps this book prophetically will call you and other wanna-be virtuous women out of their shell and birth a generation of clear, courageous… clarion voices that are willing to use their testimonies to liberate women and men who are yet bound.

Rev. Larry Smith, Senior Minister
New St. Mark Baptist Church of Detroit