Learning to be happy alone.

New year is a time for reflecting, its been suggested that I start a blog. That’s what I’m doing, I’ve got a lot to talk about. It’s not going to be all avocado and kale, in fact its not going to be diet related at all. I give up with dieting.

I’m going to talk about life. The things that drive me mad, the things that make me happy. things that have made me cry, some of the best experiences of my life. And also makeup, I can’t forget makeup.

I don’t know how to begin… I think I have seen a lot in my life, I’ve seen more than maybe my 30 years should have, and in a way I think I’ve felt a lot more than I should have – and not in a ‘woe is me I’ve had a hard life’ way – I’ll leave that to the others. Things that have happened to me have been a by product of choices I have made and that’s how I think life goes and every card I have been dealt I like to think I have played to my advantage, turning hurt into strength.

One question a lot of people ask me is why I left reality TV, so I think I’ll use this opportunity to explain.

Imagine being in a room full of 30 people but all the voices around you sound like you’re hearing them from under water. I had got to a point in which I mentally couldn’t cope. Depression had got a hold of me badly. This day was the day when we were filming the music video to the 2011 Christmas single, every Christmas when I see that music video on TV I just see somebody so different to the person I have become.

It all started in October 2011 when I was in the hairdressers preparing for a day of filming TOWIE. I had a phone call from my agent to say a national newspaper was running a story on me. From that moment on I lost a piece of myself that only started to re emerge when I met Kelvin my current partner (now fiancé) and finally found solace. The story wasn’t true; it still went in a national newspaper. In that moment everything I had and everything I was fell apart, I felt like someone had ripped my soul out and had thrown it into a fire, I was existing and not living. My attitude changed, and I felt my light had dimmed. At this point in the show I was being ‘encouraged’ to date Mick Norcross on camera, if I didn’t do this I was reassured that “There are a lot of girls who want to be on the show who will”. I loved Mick- as a friend, he is a genuine nice man.

I had a meeting with the TOWIE producers at the end of series 3, they asked where my role in the show was heading, I didn’t know, they didn’t know. I was spending more time back in my hometown Derby with my partner at the time Lee (where he was playing football), and I guess you could say that was it. I didn’t fight for my place on the show. I simply agreed that I didn’t have a role (if I wasn’t going to be dating cast members) and by mutual consent I left.

Off screen I was in a relationship with a footballer- Lee Croft. I loved Lee (at least at the time I thought I did). He stood by me when I needed it the most, when I finished on TOWIE, he asked me to move to Scotland with him. Four months later he asked me to move out. I had nowhere to go. I’m not sure why, I’ll never know why.

It was the most intensely upsetting period of my life due to the betrayal from those people that let the story happen. it all hit me hard, I think the day we split I took the full force of the pain from everything that was bubbling away inside me well and truly felt it. I was out on my own. On reflection when I look back at that relationship, I don’t think it was who I was with that caused me the heartache, I think it was just the point of not having that someone there to make me feel ok. I had some terrible low points with internet trolls in the year following the split and I was pining for a rock, for someone to tell me things were ok, so above when I questioned how I loved Lee, the answer is I don’t know. What I do know is that I wanted to go out every Saturday, I wanted to be wearing expensive bags and shoes. I now feel that I don’t want to go out and I don’t care about material things a fraction to that I used to. I think true love is being happy staying in, being comfortable enough to not care if you don’t have this seasons Chanel bag. I know what I have now is love.

It took me 3 and a half years (and a terrible relationship in between) to realise my worth, to find my calling in life and to understand what life is about. I did some stupid things, I made some mistakes. I thought being seen with other guys would get his attention. I thought being papped was important, I thought my worth was based on the number of followers I had. I thought partying was the answer. Only finally when i healed, met my partner Kelvin and became a mother did I realise the true value of myself and the meaning behind the next chapter of my life.

The one thing I will always stand by is that you can never expect to be happy in a relationship until you learn how to be happy on your own.

 

Maria x