One Queen to Another: How to Live Your Best (F*ckboy Free) Life

By Melissa Bunbury

Part autobiography, part self- help book, "One Queen to Another: How to Live Your Best (F*ckboy Free) Life" is an honest look at how obstacles thrown your way can be overcome. This book aims to teach you how to maneuver sometimes toxic interactions with family, friends, and in intimate relationships. With topics ranging from "What to Wear on Dates" to "Breaking Up," and everything in between, this book gives you a comprehensive guide to maneuvering through some of life's more complicated situations while empowering you along the way. One Queen to Another, it's time to put your crown back on.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Aug 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543982459

Book preview

Copyright © 2019 by Melissa Bunbury.

All rights reserved. NO part of this publication may reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

ISBN: 9781543982459

The names of some individuals mentioned have been changed to preserve anonymity. Any similarity to other people and events is purely coincidental and unintentional.

Cover Art by Jael Lewis.

Author Photographs by Jacob Krupnick.

Do not ever let anyone make you feel like you do not matter, or like you do not have a place in our American story- because you do. And you have a right to be exactly who you are.

Michelle Obama

From the Author

There are many things I wish I had known before I became a woman and was tossed into the world to navigate myself in the sea of relationships- with myself, with friends, and in romantic relationships. Growing up in a Caribbean household, there is a certain taboo about speaking about personal trials and tribulations, especially those in relationships. As a young woman, I was taught that my focus should be school first, anything else after. After completing school, the conversation shifted from succeeding in school to when I would be married and having kids, with nothing in between. There has always been pressure to be successful in all aspects of life and I have tried, often successfully to live up to the expectations placed on my shoulders. Many of us women have, especially when you happened to be a black woman living in America like me. We try our hardest to make the people we love happy and proud. However, there is often little consideration left for if we ourselves are happy, or proud.  We learn from a young age, especially as women, to people please so our own feelings are often put on the backburner to how we make others feel.

For me, the people pleasing manifested and showed itself in the fact that in school, I was often the teacher’s pet. The approval of adults was something I desperately craved as a young girl. Then, in my friendships, I would often try to dim my light so others could shine. If I were happy about something, I would downplay it so it did not seem as though I was bragging, or like I thought I was better than anyone was. I made jokes at my own expense so others did not see me as a threat to their own self-esteem and therefore, would like me more. In dating relationships, I gave my all, often pouring out the love I wanted for myself to a man that would say he loved me too, but whose actions didn’t always prove it.

I have had quite the adventure on my journey to womanhood and self-love. I can personally attest to the fact that the storms absolutely will come while you are moving along your path. Sometimes these storms will turn your entire world upside down. They will shift you, mold you, and create a stronger, more resilient version of you. Life is said to be the greatest teacher but I say if you can learn from someone else’s mistakes instead of having to feel the heartbreaks and the tough times personally, you can save yourself some time and get on the right path faster. Life is hard enough.

With this book, I aim to encourage you to love yourselves wholeheartedly. I want you to fully accept and love every single part of who you are and what makes you, you. I want you to embrace each of your flaws and find the beauty in them. I want you to forgive yourself for the mistakes you have made in the past and move forward, becoming better and glowing brighter because of them. I want you to never be embarrassed about how wonderful you are or feel the need to hide parts of yourself in fear that you will not be accepted.

From One Queen to Another, I hope this book truly touches your spirit and helps you to feel worthy of love, acceptance, joy and all the blessings that will come your way. I also hope it helps you to discover and stand firm in your own voice and power as a Queen. It’s time to put your crown back on.

To every woman that has ever fought to be enough when you already are a Queen, it’s time to put your crown back on.

CONTENTS

The Back Story

On Womanhood

On Family

On Friendships

Before You Decide to Start Dating

First Few Dates (Interviews)

Questions to Ask On Dates

What to Wear On First Dates

While Dating

Becoming Exclusive

Friends with Benefits

On Relationships

On Being Dumped

On Breaking Up

Final Thoughts

References

As you become more clear about who you really are, you’ll be better able to decide what is best for you- the first time around.

Oprah Winfrey

I am beautiful, strong, loving, and courageous. Everything I need is within me.

The Back Story

Everyone has a moment that determines the path of his or her lives. Mine came on October 9, 2017 at roughly 12am. I was already fast asleep because I had work the next morning at 8 am. Then it happened, the call that interrupted my sleep and life as I knew it forever. On the phone was the number of my then boyfriend. He was working with a major on- demand taxi service at the time and often worked late hours because apparently during that time, the rides would surge. This meant that a normally $10 ride would now be anywhere from $15- $20 something. It was lucrative for him and at the time, we were working towards being engaged after several years together, or so I thought. The phone call that night changed everything and set me on a completely different path.

Let us step back a few years and talk about how we got to this point. In 2010, I started working at a government job in downtown Brooklyn, close to Barclay’s Center. In 2011, that job transferred me to a new location in the Mill Basin area of Brooklyn. It was an easy transition and the people I met here became some of my closest and most treasured friendships. One of the friendships I formed was with a younger, self- proclaimed nerdy but cool guy. Our shifts started and ended at the same time each day and we took the same bus to work each morning and evening. We later discovered that we lived a few blocks away from each other. One day at the office, everyone was exchanging contact information and social media pages, except him. He seemed shy and a bit standoffish so I struck up conversation. I mentioned that everyone else had given me their contact info and was being friendly besides him. He responded with a sarcastic response that made me laugh and a bit interested but I left him alone and continued getting to know all of my new coworkers, excluding him. Our worlds just orbited each other until one day he finally openly spoke to me on the bus on our way to our separate homes and we hit it off. Soon, we were taking our lunch breaks together and were virtually inseparable. We bonded over our love of the twisted humor of the animated show Family Guy and Welch’s Fruit Snacks. Throughout our workday, we would share countless inside jokes and after work, he would walk me home from the bus stop (his stop was the one after mine) and we would talk for hours on the steps of my parents’ house. These conversations varied in subject matter from silly shows we watched to religion and politics and everything in between. We spoke of ideals and morals. We spoke of future plans. We spoke of love, lust, and the fact that our religious backgrounds had kept us from being as experienced as many others in our age range. Our conversations would go on until it was dark each night and my dad would start clearing his throat from inside or my mom came outside to let me know it was time to tell my company good night. When he left, we would text each other through the night until one or both of us fell asleep. Our connection was undeniable and our desire to be around each other was insatiable.

Soon, people at work started to feel our palpable chemistry and started asking questions. Are you two dating? When are you guys going to just get married already? On days he was off, they would ask me for him, and vice versa. We would always know exactly where the other person was because we had developed a sense of accountability for and towards each other. While we worked together, however, we were strictly friends. I had been casually dating another guy who was older, more mature, and whose life was already pretty much settled. He had his own house, cars, and a motorcycle. He was the kind of guy you could bring home and both parents would approve. He was unbelievably handsome, polite, affectionate, caring, ambitious, and good gawd was he SEXY. He was the perfect mix of good guy, bad boy. If you watched the show, Sex and the City on HBO, he was the Mr. Big to my Carrie. However, at barely a few months into being 22 years old and not very experienced in the relationship department, I was terrified of him.

Up until meeting him, I had previously only been in one serious relationship- with my boyfriend from high school. That relationship was very sweet and innocent, but it was not what I was looking for in something lasting. Though my high school boyfriend and I got along very well and he helped me through some difficult times, it was clear that he was very content living an ordinary life while I had the flair for the extraordinary. I wanted a partner that was actively working to make his mark in life, and going to be able to provide the type of lifestyle I wanted to live (traveling regularly, large beautiful home with lots of green space around for our children and dogs to run, the option to work from home while raising our children- a girl can dream). Throughout our relationship, no matter what forms of encouragement I tried to provide him, he seemed very content living in his mother’s house, in staying in the same neighborhood forever and not sure of what he wanted to do for a career. The uncertainty and lack of motivation made me uneasy and resentful. After being together for about three years, I had to call it quits.

Around two years later, I met Mr. Big. My friend Lauren and I had gone on a ski trip that a guy she knew and liked was promoting and Mr. Big was one of his close friends. We met on the bus on the way there but then reconnected later in the day, once everyone had been settled in their rooms. While there was immediate attraction, I played it cool and got to know him. We ended up spending the entire trip bonding and getting to know each other. On the way back home, we sat together on the bus and he expressed that he would like to see me again once we were home. I agreed but there was one problem- he lived all the way in the Bronx. Since I did not drive at the time, I would have to take the subway for over an hour to get to his stop. Every time I made my way out to see him, I would get butterflies in my stomach. Each time I rode the train out to his house, I would physically feel sick because I was so nervous. Everything had to be perfect when I was seeing him. I would try to take that hour-long trip only when my hair and nails were done, when my skin was clear and cooperating, and when the stars aligned. I was too afraid that at some moment, he would come to his senses and realize that I was not good enough for him. I thought he would point out all the things he had going for himself and how little I had going for me. In my mind, I needed to do more so that I would be worthy of him. I had already been looking for my own apartment, working on finishing my degree, and I felt that once I had accomplished those things, I would be a better contender for his love. After I got those things, it would make more sense why someone so perfect in my eyes would want me too. It was a crazy place to be in.

In the meantime, I was going to work every day, trying to save as much as I could, and in the process, getting closer to this new coworker friend I made. I did not think much about being in an actual relationship with him because we had just flowed so effortlessly and we had both seemingly put each other so far into the friend zone that we were giving each other advice on other relationships with other people. I had even told him about Mr. Big. This was until his birthday, towards the end of our job term.

For several weeks, we had been talking about his upcoming birthday and he mentioned that he was not too big on celebrating because he had been so disappointed for many years. As an empath and a Leo, I never met a birthday I did not want to celebrate or a person close to me that I did not want to make feel special, if even for the day. I told him that I was going to make sure that he felt special on his birthday so I secretly set out to get him his favorite kind of cake (red velvet) at the office. It came in around lunchtime and everyone gathered around to sing him happy birthday. He was happy but not very surprised- he had seen the cake coming in and figured it was his. Later, when we walked to the steps of my home, he mentioned that his closest guy friends had convinced him to have a small celebration at a lounge in Queens. At the time, I had no car,