Sometimes, the media gets it right: there's a young child who's court ordered to be passed from mother to father bi-weekly or bi-monthly, who goes unwillingly and sadly from one house to another for Thanksgiving and Christmas and Easter before some big adventure that strengthens the bond between parent and child (like your father becomes Santa Claus, for example), and everyone lives happily ever after. But what the movies and television shows omit, however, is the unrelenting shame that comes with being the child that's tossed from place to place like a toy on a kindergarten playground. They fail to tell the viewer about the effect this has on the child, like "am I why mommy and daddy are so mean to each other?", and "would it be better if I wasn't here?", and my personal favorite, "did my mommy/daddy just not want me?"

Okay, okay. So all of those thoughts are just ones that I've had over my past years of life, only amplified by mental illnesses that don't make the situation any better.

My mother was with my father for quite a long time, if I'm to understand it correctly. Mom was so deeply, irrevocably in love with Dad, but there was just a flame there that was burned out too fast. Somewhere along the line, Mom and Dad "came together" and nine months later, I popped out into a world of blurred lines and gray areas. From what Mom tells me, there was a custody battle that my dad subsequently lost, and visitation rights were implemented. Growing up, it was almost as if I were forced to choose which parent I loved more (although I love them both equally), and it wasn't easy. Fun, especially for a kid that didn't understand why everyone else would be able to go on vacations and field trips with their parents, but not her (she could barely count on her fingers how many times her parents were in the same room together).

Now don't get me wrong, I love both of my parents and both halves of my family with everything in me that knows how to love, but there's a number of things that you miss when you're not there. You miss seeing your half brother every day before he moves out of the house after college, or your younger cousin's first steps and first words. There are nights when you wake up in a cold sweat from a nightmare, and you want nothing more than your father's arms around you, telling you that it will be okay and that he loves you before you drift off back to sleep. You find yourself feeling like a welcome stranger in the house where you have your own bedroom, and every night that you're not home you wish that you were. Tensions run high between you and one of your three aunts, and you feel almost as if she hates you and tolerates you only because you're her sibling's child. You grow up wanting a real family, with two parents who love and support each other rather than who live in two separate cities within a fifteen minute drive. It breaks my heart, knowing that I've missed out on so much growing up, and I hate myself for it.

So, perhaps my message is this: Hug your children tighter and kiss them more. Show them that no matter what happens, you will love them irrevocably and support them. Do it for me, a girl on the internet that you've never met before.