What About Me?

I  grew up in the province of Biliran with my family. I guess I can say that I had a happy childhood, but I would be lying. My father and mother are annulled.  When I grew older my mother told me that my grandmother (mother's side)  didn't like my father, that's why they got separated. My father used to pick me up from Samar to spend time with me, I never questioned why my father and mother lived in a different house away from each other, but I didn't care. Because my father only spent time with me on some occasions, I grew up close to my mother. Whenever he picked me up from our house, I would always go with him.  I had no choice for the matter, he cried if I didn't go with him.

But then one day, my father didn't visit me anymore. I realized that the reason why  he no longer visited me as I got older. It was because he had another family.

My mom was a hopeless romantic based on my observation. She was constantly wanting to find love and her "forever" just like what she read in her romance pocketbooks. She got married with an Australian guy she met when she went in Australia and ended up divorcing him. Around that time I realized that my mother and my grandmother wasn't considering what I would have felt as a child. My mother wasn't even considering my feelings, she didn't realize what her actions was doing to me. They were becoming bad examples for me.

I was still a child back then, and in order to learn, I observed my family because they were my role models. But in a young age, I could see all the flaws they had. Every single one of them was selfish in their own way and it taught me how to be selfish too .  I still love my mother though. Even though I felt like I wasn't enough for her. 

My mother said that lying is bad. Which was quite ironic for me because my mom had many debts and she was always hiding from her debt collectors. It was always me who lie to the debt collectors that my mom wasn't home because they thought that I was an honest child. In short all the bad things I was doing was because of them, and they are reprimanding me of those bad things I've done when I learned that from them.

My mother and my grandma were always busy with their work. The one who took care of me was my yayas, but in the end I didn't have only one yaya, because the others have all left me. No one wanted to be with me for the longest of time because they thought I was spoiled. I was just a kid who wanted to play, like every other child would want.  But I was deprived of doing so because I had asthma so my mom forbid me to play with other kids except my neighbor ate Khayla. I was lonely but nobody noticed that not even my mom or my yayas. They were all too busy to spend time with me.

To add things up, my uncle have always hated me (even until now), maybe because he thought I was the favorite. But he was my grandma's youngest child. He may not realize it but everytime we fought. My grandma always picks his side. I shout at him because I feel frustrated. I feel frustrated  Because every little mistake I do, even while I was a child and now a teenager, I am always at fault. There are times I told them what I feel and they would just scold me.  For every mistake I did, even small mistakes--they don't say "it's okay. It's just a little mistake.". But I still respect them, so I say nothing.

Now, I don't talk much as a teenager, I was not how I used to be when I was younger. My Grandma always points out how indifferent and emotionless I was to them. Again, they  still don't notice I am what I  am because of them. I always think that I am unwanted. I had thoughts of suicide and I cry alone. It must have been a long time since they saw me cry. But I learned not to cry in front them, because when I was child they would scold me whenever I cry instead of comforting me.

After a few years  my mother decided to go abroad and work there. All the time while she worked in Dubai , she always ask how I was. I should be glad she was concerned about me but I wasn't. While she was working there she met a guy. She never told me about him and she didn't ask if I was ready to have another father again, thrice. She didn't even  ask me if I was okay. She did ask me one thing: If I wanted another sibling. And I thought she can barely raise me and she wanted another child? But whatever my answer was. It wasn't needed since she already got herself pregnant anyways. But of course, they won't consider my feelings again.  

Now she has two children with my step-father. Despite the long-distance between them (from Dubai and Philippines), they are loving each other deeply. I loved my two brothers but I am also sad because they  seemed like a complete happy family. They are almost living a "happily ever after" kind of story---and what about me? I don't look anything like my mother or my step-father because I looked like my biological father. It seemed like I was now a bastard's child but I would never tell my mother that. She looks so happy with her family. Meanwhile I am lonely.

Everyone is slowly leaving me behind. Even my grandma went to US to live there. My father moved on and now he has a child and a family of his own. My uncle would soon have a family of his own, and my mom has the family she had always wanted. And what about me?

What about me?