La Trenza del Barrio

They came to me in a dream. A tall white man wearing a white suit, unlike I've ever seen before. The fabric of his suit was not of this world. It was truly special. He was walking toward me with a beautiful little girl holding his hand. I was somewhere where there were trees surrounding us. I remember I had been there with the trees for some time, speaking with them, telling them how thankful I was for them saving my life somehow. It was the most incredible dream. He let go of the little girl's hand and walked toward me to rest his head on my chest, and hugged me in the most loving embrace. He knew I was pregnant. We looked at each other with such warmth, as if it was a reunion of some kind. It seemed as if the man was bringing her to me, to show her to me. It was my baby girl. My beautiful baby girl. She looked just like me at around four years old. I had long dark brown hair, too. They say the vivid dreams that pregnant women have are so intense. But this was truly a mi

Have you ever received an apology for something you feel someone did to you? Do you believe you are owed an apology for the perceived wrongdoing of someone else? Does it depend on what the other person did? Is it conditional then? It took me some time to empathize, I'm not gonna lie. This is in combination with my hormones being all over the place and me asking myself ridiculous victim-mentality questions like, why is this happening to me again? What have I done to deserve men like this? What have I done to be treated this way? Unfortunately, this is where ego can unnecessarily come in to extend one's feelings of remorse, pain, doubt, fear, betrayal, abandonment, etc. Once I realized we are not owed an apology for something we feel someone did to us, I immediately empathized. Sure, it is nice if and when someone apologizes, which is an act that typically never happens. But that apology should be given to oneself. Whatever someone does to you, they're literally doing to

If I think back to when I first saw him, he was walking from the threshold of where the gates merged into one exit, which lead to the entrance of the common area of the airport. With his black duffle bag in hand, not knowing exactly where to go, I saw him. I knew it was him. Him and his glorious black hair that just made you want to run your fingers through it for hours. Oh my God, what a beautiful man. I still say this about him whenever I talk about him. He is the most beautiful man I have ever seen. He has a mysterious energy to him, with his dark piercing eyes that mesmerize when you look into them; but upon spending time with him, he is down to earth with aspirations and goals, extremely talented, and funny as hell. A total New Yorker. And that moustache. That is definitely what got me. I admit, there is something about his energy that made me swoon. It is the memories of him that make me miss him today. We had experiences together that I consider to be so special. Thunder storm

I first felt symptoms of my pregnancy about a month after conception. Of course I didn't know I was pregnant at the time. I just thought I wasn't feeling well. I was mysteriously nauseous, and I know my body well enough to know that it was not normal for me to be experiencing nausea.  I hadn't paid much attention to my missed period because it was normal for me to be somewhat inconsistent. But when my sister told me to buy a pregnancy test, and it came up positive, I was blown away. I had never seen the two lines before, distinct and obvious, in the traditional bubble gum pink color in all of their two lined glory. However, a second test the following morning would prove that my life was instantly changed forever. The first trimester was not necessarily a wonderful experience, though, I feel like I didn't have it nearly as bad as some of the experiences my mama friends have told me about. I had nausea, acid reflux, minor headaches, crazy spells of hunger where I felt

One of the conversations I had with my daughter's father a couple of months ago was that he said this situation will not bring us closer together. And he was right. It has not and it will not. But at this point, I don't think it was supposed to. I want to tell him that even though it didn't bring us closer together, it brought me closer to myself. And for me, that's the whole purpose of this situation; the purpose of life itself; with each experience bringing us closer to ourselves, to meet ourselves, to learn self-love, to learn self-actualization. I hope that he has met himself as deep as I have met myself. Because then we understand that what we want as individuals does not have to comply with the standard marriage, house with white picket fence with 2.5 children living in the suburbs. We understand that it is ok to want things, do things, and experience things, in the manner in which we wish to experience them. A whole level of love and forgiveness envelops my ene