When Life Gives You Lemons, Make Lemonade

Last week Katja of Skimbaco tagged me for the Lemonade meme. I don’t do a lot of memes here, but since I try to be an optimist in tough times, I thought this one fit my site very well. So sit back, grab a hot cup of coffee, and read about just one of the times in my life when I made lemons into lemonade.

When I was young, I had big plans. I headed off to college with every intention of getting my B.A., going on to get my Master’s, finding the man I was going to marry (who was going to be independently wealthy and who was supposed to love cooking), and settling into the life of a career family.

Unfortunately, I picked the wrong man to date. In my Junior year of college I started going out with this guy who seemed very charming on the surface. He was definitely charismatic, but there was something wrong. Something I couldn’t put my finger on.

I won’t get into details, but this charming guy became controlling and rather abusive. And I followed him right into a life of partying and drinking too much. My grades slipped, I overslept and missed the test I needed to take to get into the master’s program, and my self esteem was in the ditch. My boyfriend had me convinced that I would be nothing, were it not for him. I think that’s the lowest I’ve ever been. That’s the lemon part of the story.

Fortunately for me, I had a friend who recognized all the bad signs in my relationship with my boyfriend, and she convinced me that I had options. I started to think of the possibilities and realized that I might just have a future without this guy.

Long story short, I moved back in with my parents, who had moved to Oregon. I was hurt, scared, and in a place where I didn’t know many people. Over the course of the next few months I re-established my relationship with God. I met a great group of Christian friends, many of whom are still friends today. And I met the man that would become my husband. He wasn’t independently wealthy, and he can’t cook to save his life (though he has many, many other talents).

In that dark, dark time in my life, I learned that faith is important. I learned that money isn’t everything, and neither is a career. I never would have guessed I would have become a stay-at-home mom turned blogger. Yet, I love my life just the way it is. (There’s the lemonade).

If I had my life to live over again, I can’t say I’d change anything. The heartache shaped me into who I am today. The dark times made me reconsider my priorities. Now that I know my priorities, I try to live accordingly.

Yes, those sour lemons sure made some sweet lemonade.

Have you ever been in a situation where you’ve made lemons into lemonade? Please share!

And now for the rules and other technical stuff:

LIFE GAVE ME SOME LEMONS
- IT’S OK, I MADE DELICIOUS LEMONADE – MEME
Rules:
* Copy and paste these rules to your blog post.
* Link back to person who tagged you.
* Write about an incident in your life you first thought was really bad, but ended up being a blessing.
* Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
* Let each person you tagged know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.
(* And if you want to – link back to this original Lemonade Meme post too.)

I’m going to tag:

• Emily at Remodeling This Life
• Randall at Credit Withdrawal
• DebtKid at DebtKid
• Momma at Tales From the Road Less Traveled
• Cindy at Oh My Aching Debts

Photo by mewtate.

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