Thank you for allowing me to share my story anonymously and I really wish my story can be an uplift for another person, or as you named us, a Purposeful SoulVivor. I had always been a hard-working man, providing for my family as best as I could. I was doing a great job by the way. My wife and children never wanted for anything. But when I lost my job, for reasons I can’t disclose, everything in my life fell apart. My wife left me and I was unable to handle the pressure of providing for my family without my income, and because of that, she kicked me out the house and I was devastated. I thought to myself, how could a woman who I loved with everything in me, a woman that I took care of, could end our marriage at the drop of a dime without even thinking twice about it?
I tried to make ends meet by taking odd jobs here and there through a small local job agency, but nothing really worked out for me and eventually, I found himself homeless and staying in a shelter. It was indeed a humbling experience. Talk about being embarrassed and humiliated. I was everything. I had it all, and just like that, it was gone. I didn’t want to be around my family, my friends or colleagues who had become friends.
One day, as I was exiting the men’s restroom inside a McDonald’s near the shelter that I was staying at, for the first time since I lost my job, I cried. I exited with tears streaming down my face and when I say I was crying, I mean I was crying and I couldn’t contain myself. So, I’m a man and I cried. Men can cry too, but let society tell it, we’re not supposed to. We’re supposed to muster up in our shell and always pretend like everything is okay when it’s not. We’re supposed to act like we don’t have feelings, but I’m here to tell you that society is wrong. Cry if you want to, and as hard and as long if you need to. I promise you will feel much better after. Anyway, after I sat at the table drowning in my own self-pity, I heard a woman’s voice say in the distance to her significant other, “go ask him if he’s okay honey,” and within seconds, he was standing over me with his hand on my shoulder. “Yo homie, you good?” He asked. Dumb question, right? Especially since I was crying as if no one was around. It was clear that something was wrong me. I was feeling completely hopeless and lost, but somehow, I managed to gain my composure and as if I knew the man and his wife, I began to tell them my life story. I figured, it couldn’t get any worse. Plus, they both seemed genuinely concerned.
After I finished my story and my second episode of crying, the stranger and his wife introduced themselves to me and offered me a job, at their company, and it was a good-paying job too. When I say I was in complete shock that I stood up and blurted out, “you’re kidding right? Please, don’t joke with me like that. Are you serious man?” Long story short, I took them both up on their offer and started the following week. Paid training and all.
I’ll end with this, I had never hit rock bottom the way that I did at that point in my life. I lost it all and when I got myself together, I married a woman who frequented McDonalds and always, even at my worst, asked me if I was okay.
I am a Purposeful SoulVivor and thank goodness, I was able to pave the way for a stranger who felt the same loss of hope as I once did.
Your life changing situation may not come in the same form as mine, but know that it’s coming! It’s okay to beat yourself up, and even feel a little self-pity, but don’t ever let it consume you. Let it be your drive.
Signed,
The McDonald’s Crybaby