The Disintegration of Dreams

I had wanted to be a model since I was very young. I wanted a platform to influence from and I also wanted the money that comes with being a super model, as cliche as that is for any teenager. But I was chasing this dream. Eating diet pills, exercising 7 days a week, eating salads, doing yoga, and snacking on more diet pills.​

Chasing this dream or not nearly one year after the first violent incident with captain douche, we became engaged. As you could imagine, it was a romantic proposal, where he was drunk outside of the club and telling me how much he would miss me if I went across the world to pursue my modeling dreams. As wooed as I was I could not see his intention was to keep me there with him through marriage. I said yes, without full understanding of his intentions.

I was upstairs one evening doing my exercises and yoga when I got a call from Italy. It was an agent out of Milan saying that they would like to fly me out for an indefinite amount of time. He wanted me out there in two weeks. He was buying the ticket that night. (In the modeling world, they will often foot the bill for international if they think you will earn them money. You slowly pay them back through work.)
I ran downstairs to tell captain douche. There was no celebration. He was crushed. Jealous. Angry. The next two weeks were tense and exhausting. I could not wait to get on the plane. I left with bruises on my arms from fights he started and ended about me moving on without him. It didn’t stop me from going but it did have its effects.
This was the moment in time that I started believing that being in a relationship and chasing your dreams were two things that could not coexist. 


He cheated on me while I was gone. Then he came to Milan, draining our savings account, in a last ditch effort to control my success. It worked.  
His appearance there was the death of my modeling career, though it did not officially end until a few months later.
His visit made me look like a fool, like the girl I never wanted to be. Everyone I lived with and worked with knew what he was and when he came, they knew what I was... too broken to leave.


I guess I was just that. But the straws of our relationship were quickly breaking and the final one would be what would come a few weeks after my return from Italy. 


His family had a trip planned for Mexico. I planned to be in Italy for 6 weeks before returning for the trip to Mexico, and then heading straight back to Europe. 
During my time in Mexico I was awaiting an email from my international agent to confirm the next 3 years of my career. 
It never came. 
Instead I returned home to a voicemail telling me never to contact her again because I had missed my deadline, an unacceptable career move. As it turns out, she had sent an email. Captain douche had gotten to it before I did and deleted it. That was the actual death of my modeling career and our relationship, (which will be its own post). I was blacklisted internationally for having a psycho boyfriend. That is how it worked then. You fcked up. You were cut.
It was a 6 country contract. Guaranteed monthly income to live off of. All travel paid.

Looking back it was not the worst thing that could have happened. Between being told I was fat modeling and being hit and criticized at home I can see why I am mentally resilient now. 
I can also see why I often feel so fcking insecure.

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