Author: TheAyeshaSite

I am a Black Guyanese woman. I'm thirty nine years old. I went back to college to take Early Childhood Education classes. I want to get a second 48-credit BA degree in Early Childhood Education by 2021. I go to NJCU. I have a BA in Creative Writing from NJCU. I graduated from NJCU in August 2015. I transferred to NJCU from Mercer. I have my AA degree from Mercer in Humanities and Social Science since May 2007. I write poems, I write memoirs, I'm a blogger and I am taking a children's lit course. I love reading memoirs. I also do book reviews from time to time. My favorite poet is Emily Dickinson. I grew up in Ewing, New Jersey. I live in Princeton Junction with my parents!

I know there may be different opinions about this but I think it shows signs of maturity when you try to learn from the mistakes you made in the past. I don’t focus on the past. I am trying to be more in the moment with the time I have left. I know we all make mistakes in life myself included but for younger kids especially if the kids are really young every thing from skipping school sometimes called truancy for children in high school or middle school. Playing hooky was what they used to call it. The country and NAMI National recently started creating more programs for kids to get a few mental health days I think elementary and middle school aged kids may get a few mental health days every school year or marking period. Kids in middle or high school have IEPs but the kids deserve a few mental health days school year. NAMI has newer programs that started a few years ago reading the NAMI Advocate magazine. I think this is a great step. I used to volunteer with Just Kids the kids program.

I don’t sweat the small stuff. I feel like my maturation process is good for me. It feels good to have come a long way from where I started. I was a bullied kid. Now all that is left is cyber bullying but I am older and wiser. I am Internet Ayesha now!

I have goals. I try to set short term goals and long term goals. I know if I have goals that is fine but first ask yourself are my goals attainable? I also need to say Esha stop procrastinating. Girl you are the princess of

I thank God for being there for me.

My mother and my father had the best of intentions but only God has been there for me on days I felt like giving up or throwing in the towel. I see life as a journey especially now that I am older and have more perspective on things. I was like seventeen when I graduated from high school and it took me while to see in myself what God saw in me. My mother has been supportive of me and so have certain members of my family. I don’t have a lot of supporters but I try to support my supporters too. We all need a few mental health days a month even if we work. I appreciate God and I thank God for his presence in my life and His diving intervention. Can’t nobody do me like Him. I could not have made it this far without God. I think the reason the devil tempted God was to cause Him to bow down to Him instead of the devil bowing to God.

I am older and wiser now.

I will continue to celebrate my life while I have my life. I may be an ordinary person, but I have faith in God, and I have hope for my future too. I try to help my mom more around the house and with laundry, cooking and grocery shopping. I know I can drive on my own. Although I am in my late 30s I will not judge myself. I will keep getting driving lessons. My mom agreed to help me pay. I went through a driving school because I knew a professional driving instructor was the best way to go. I have a driving lesson next week. I am hoping next Spring or next summer I can get a preowned car of my own. I need a cute little SUV. I like the Honda HR-V models I’ve seen. I also like KIA Soul and KIA Sorento models at KIA Motors. I will retest and take the road test again early next year. I pray I can pass the road test on the second try. I can’t go over 10 miles per hour when I take the road test. The road test examiner gave me reasons I failed on November 30th. I’ll get some help paying for driving lessons. I’ll set up four or five more driving lessons until I feel ready to retake my road test. I am enjoying my driving lessons too. Life feels different in the driver’s seat. New Jersey has a seat belt law where the driver and all passengers in the car need to wear seat belts and buckle up.

I have gained strength from doing more on my own, and rebuilding my life. You really can’t plan your life. I also have began to look at my diversionary activities in my wellness tool box. I found Mary Ann Copeland’s WRAP book to be invaluable. I have written poetry since I was a little eight or nine year old girl. I don’t put anything, but my own experiences, but I know from experience that mental illness is really hard. I started to get better when I took WRAP class at NAMI. I have four WRAP certificates of completion. WRAP class is an eight session course offered once in the fall, and once in the spring. I recommend NAMI also. I volunteer with NAMI. Over the years I volunteered with NAMI, and I continue to stay in contact with the friends I made. I recommend the organization wholeheartedly. One of the nicer aspects of being a volunteer for NAMI is that they have quite a few NAMI affiliates throughout the country in North America. It gave me a safe place to volunteer over the years. I formed friendships at NAMI and NAMI gave me social supports. NAMI sometimes offers social anxiety workshops. They used to offer events for special needs children, and a safe space for kids too.

The moment you own up to your mistakes as a person with shortcomings and flaws your whole life is revolutionized the moment you take that step in the right direction. I try to be a good person but I have flaws just like any other person. In moments where things are shifting even in my favor I say to myself “I thank God every day for getting to where I am”. Life happens you get me!

For my early life in my native New York I had gotten treated differently by people. I got teased very badly as a child about my color. I don’t blame anyone else. I try to remember that I had a choice and I chose myself. I like having opportunities to share my story with others. As a child so many other kids were verbally abusive to me that it made me feel sad. Sometimes I felt like I was the only kid that had this added stressful school day as a child. They would call me Karima wheat and say very unflattering things about me. It feels so good older to be in a good place but right now I am trying to finish reading the NJ driver manual and I want to get my license too. I should be able to pass the road test at the end of this month.

The moment I became more comfortable with myself as I am something in me knew God’s divine intervention was in the details of my life. I always felt like I was the only person who had all these disabling fears and an uncertain future. I pray now for five or ten minutes when I wake up in the morning even thanking God for a good night’s sleep. I am perceived a certain way by others but I don’t care. I choose to see myself as a good person who is worthy of having a new or more recent cute vehicle of my own. I have been getting driving lessons. I’m trying to get my license and get some more independence being able to get around on my own. I know once I upgrade to a probationary license I can take it from there. I don’t need supervision after the three months mark. I am thrilled but I will have to practice on my own for at least twelve months but that’s it.

I thank God I had quite a few successes older in my 30s. God has been good to me. I choose to hold on to my faith in hard times. I encourage myself I say “Esha you can do this, Esha you can make it. You can and you will.” The resolve to keep on trying whenever I succeed reinforces my confidence in myself, and my own ability to do things on my own. When I prove others wrong I say you know even despite this difficult mental illness I have battled since I was fourteen years old I choose to see myself as just as good as any other person. God made a way where I saw no way. I praise God for this breakthrough. Often times when I had a bad day I felt like giving up, but God is in this battle with me. I try to take life day by day. I will also continue to practice driving lessons, but I should be getting my probationary license by the end of November at the end of this month. I am happy I won’t need supervision once I pass the road test. I can upgrade to a probationary license at the DMV. For the 21 and over route to driving all you need is three months of supervision. I become eligible on November 28th of this month.

I believe in God. For me spirituality carries me through difficult experiences. I pray more now. I try to pray to God to thank Him for His divine intervention in my life. I try to stay close to family and friends. It’s easy to get stressed out but for me the Rx is sleep at night. I try to go to bed by 10 pm most nights of the week. I can’t function well without my sleep.