Truly Started Living

By Regina Vargas

If you're someone who needs extra inspiration to build up your momentum of gaining your confidence to discover truly started living, even when you're going through a rough patch, unsure if you can get through it. Lost your hope, thinking why bother? If you're just in some need of positivity into your thoughts today. If you're lost somewhere in this journey of life and need your cry heard in some way. What about if you're someone who is having thoughts that your life isn't worth living anymore, but needs to hear someone remind you that your life is worth living! I promise you if you take my book home with you and read, it will become like a movie you can't stop watching. You won't want to put it down because you'll come back to it as a reference of reassurance you have a life that is precious and worth every bit of time and effort it takes to make the time of experiencing the discovery to the true purpose getting one's hope back. Learning what the true beauty of life is...which is when you truly started living it out!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Covenant Books, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 14, 2024
• ISBN: 9798888519417

Book preview

Table of Contents

Introduction

Chapter 1: Life Is a Mess!

Chapter 2: It Has Swallowed You Whole

Chapter 3: Don't Give Up!

Chapter 4: Endured to Rise above It

Chapter 5: Are You Determined or Effortless?

Chapter 6: Letters to an Effortless Dad

Chapter 7: Heal the Soul

Chapter 8: Papa's Love of Messaging

Chapter 9: An Unconditional Father

Chapter 10: We Work Hard to Shine Bright

Chapter 11: Focus on Your Well-Being

Chapter 12: Your Survival Guide

Chapter 13: Accept Responsibility

Chapter 14: Stand Out!

Chapter 15: What Inspires Yourself?

Chapter 16: Unchain and Break Free!

Chapter 17: Remain Motivated to Growth

Chapter 18: God's the MAP

Chapter 19: Encounter Relationships

Chapter 20: Families Have Many Walks

Chapter 21: Life as Parents

Chapter 22: A Can-Be-Forever Marriage

Chapter 23: Treasure Those Simple Things

Chapter 24: Rediscover Life's Beauty

About the Author

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Truly Started Living

Regina Vargas

ISBN 979-8-88851-940-0 (Paperback)

ISBN 979-8-89112-377-9 (Hardcover)

ISBN 979-8-88851-941-7 (Digital)

Copyright © 2024 Regina Vargas

All rights reserved

First Edition

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be 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. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Covenant Books

11661 Hwy 707

Murrells Inlet, SC 29576

www.covenantbooks.com

Introduction

In my book, I look forward to giving you, my readers, an insight of my life experiences I went through and the battles in my life circumstances that were life changing for myself. Hoping you can see that struggles a person faces are real and we all have them, even unbearable ones. They do not have to conquer us, unless we decide to let them overpower us and win.

To help whoever you are that may be convinced otherwise. Who might believe that they're too far gone to come back to make things right. For a new growth to start fresh, making life far better than it previously had been. Everyone has the same opportunities of chances or choices they are free to make as individuals to turn their lives around. It takes us caring enough about loving ourselves and each other to accomplishing the task of having the life of your dreams ever desired. To follow willingly wholeheartedly the only survival guide that has true value throughout our life's journey and not to forget his MAP. How to receive and why to cherish this lifetime.

These chapters will cover your attentiveness of you paying close attention on what to do and not to do. To protect your life after discovering all the ways you've grown to learn actively to love life passionately. Keeping you striving with your best foot forward. Honestly, for you to receive the happiness God has promised by opening our hearts and letting him in. Giving him the chance to show you what true happiness is all about.

I don't claim to have all the knowledge or expertise of a genius. Simply just trying to state I know and believe each one of our lives do matter, though I need to reach out to remind the rest of the world of this. We need to all show this in our actions and words. To prove that each one of us in all sorts of ways do matter in every kind of way.

Chapter 1

Life Is a Mess!

A child that was filled with an honest, compassionate heart and a tender, strong-minded soul had to enter into the wilderness alone in the flesh. She had God's strength and willpower of his strong words of truth and wisdom as a compass and a survival guide to lead her through the ways of the paths she must go.

Let me take you down memory lane from where it all first began. I was four years old. We lived in a trailer park next to my papa's trailer park. I remembered just a tall silver metal chain-link fence in between the two parks separating them from each other. I would walk to his place every day! When scared, I would just get the urge to run instead. Found that telling myself to run like there's no tomorrow made me less scared. I figured that would make me get there quicker, but usually, my papa would show up on the other side, waiting for me every day each time. I spent a lot of my childhood years with him as much as my mother allowed me to. I felt so safe and loved by him. It was so happy and peaceful while I visited him.

My mom was also those things too! Well, besides feeling safe at home. That's where my survival to be led through to the paths I must go was the roughest, scariest, mixed-up feelings and emotions of uncertainty any child would ever endure in life.

My dad was a man who acted like a misguided teenager and nowhere near being a responsible, caring man. He was wild, more like a wild angry bull. He was an alcoholic who loved his partying over being a husband and a father. He went to bars to get drunk or some buddies' houses doing the same. He was never home. Usually, he wound up being arrested for driving drunk. He would go to local places causing trouble. I can remember when I was five, we moved to Stratton Capers. Some say it was the ghetto. I say it was just my neighborhood where I lived and grew up. My dad continued drinking and repeatedly getting high, smoking weed, and was really problematic, not caring if we were in the room or not. He would invite numerous people over to join him. There was this time we had our home shot at because he became too angry while he was extremely blasted drunk and on something other than weed alone, to the point he was wasted; he would stir up trouble because he offended many people in our neighborhood with his remarks and actions. At times, it made living there hard because my dad's behavior affected me too. He was embarrassing to be related to most of the time. He came off racist but would say he wasn't, but his mouth and behavior would speak otherwise. It made me have to work harder to show others I am my own person and not to hold him against me for something I can't control. But I still had to put a lot of time and energy proving myself, holding my own, and for others to see me as me. So I did just that.

My mom went into several occasions where she had nervous breakdowns as a result of all the stress and worrying of Dad's lifestyle. She always worried about managing us kids, household bills, and food because he blew his whole checks most of the time partying or using it to get him out of jail. Mom had tried working at a uniform company, but it didn't work out because what she did there was overheating herself that she passed out. She wasn't able to find much due to required skills that she didn't quite have. We struggled to make ends meet. Sadly, all Dad cared about was getting high and staying drunk. Things became really bad, and we were evicted and forced to move. We ended up moving on Eagle Drive. I was seven by then; we lived there until age eight. I would have to say it was really an eye-opener for us. I really wasn't fitting in, so I just kept to myself. I would just hang out in my room or stay with my papa.

My mom remained steady, doing what she had to do to go through the phonebook since back then, technology wasn't where it is nowadays, hunting her husband's whereabouts because he never made it home. So it was like clockwork. It's bar-hopping time, calling local bars, hospitals, jailhouses—her norm. He either would be at one of those bars or been there and well-known or made it to jail, if not hiding from them and the trouble he had made along his path.

My dad got so drunk this one time I remember and ran straight into a person's house and left the scene. The cops showed up at our house looking for him, but he hid. Which wasn't very good because the car he used was still hot and in plain sight in the backyard. Dad told us he's pretending he was asleep the whole time, like that was going to work. It ended with him being arrested.

Exactly why I didn't like to be in any automobile if he'd been drinking or was high. He would take us on his drug runs; if you were in the vehicle, you went with. I remember this day we drove down the road from the house. It was pitch-black outside and you barely can see anything in front of you. My mom was yelling at my dad to slow down! He thought his driving reckless was funny. He was a little more than tipsy and some good stuff too. He got onto the nearby train track; no train was coming, but for an eight-year-old, it was terrifyingly scary to be on there, afraid that a train might come while we are on it. In my terrified mind, I kept hearing a train, so I freaked out crying, yelling, even at some point screaming, Get off! Get off! All Dad did was just go on and continue laughing at us telling us we are the train. Woo-hoo!

After Dad said that, from the passenger seat, Mom had enough with him scaring us on the tracks and decided to intervene by grabbing the steering wheel and coasting us off the tracks. It so happens, I may or may not have heard that train for real. I wasn't sure we left just in time; that I will never know for certain. Thanks to my mom!

My dad liked going to Jacksonville, Florida, on vacations on the weekends once a month. This last time, we made it all together as a family. It sure was a life changer. Like each vacation there, Dad did the same things as he did back in our town. Had to find himself getting high and drinking, his two favorite things to do.

While on vacation, we did something good on that Saturday while there stopped at the huge wholesale bongo sale at this thief's store to get us some clothes. We got some cool clothes that were even still in style. I remember my uncle brought us there. He also found in the parking lot this black string, but it was actually a black rope necklace with a 14K beautiful pendant on it, a cross with two doves inside the cross. I remember thinking it was the most beautiful necklace I had ever seen. My uncle handed it to me and told me, Here you go, Regina, you can have this as your good-luck charm.

I thanked him while excitedly placing it around my neck. To get back before it gets dark. After shopping for clothes, the trip was over, and we went back to my uncle's house. Sunday morning, we went to my aunt's house to visit and eat with them and hang for a little bit. It was getting to be later in the day. My mom asked Dad, When are we leaving?

He replied, We leave when I am ready to leave!

Mom said, We want to leave early.

After I smoke one more, then I'll be ready.

Well, he decided he's finally ready after some time has passed by. We get everything, and we all loaded up into the car. But while there, he had asked about getting something that would take the edge off. Whatever that was supposed to mean to an eight-year-old's ears. And he was told that he absolutely cannot be driving once he swallows this white bar pill they gave him upon his request. I wonder if you have guessed it already: he ignored their advice. Because he's Mr. Nothing Can Happen to Him. His quote, I'm too strong for it and it won't faze me any. He consumed it as we were headed back to our home state South Carolina.

Just moments before leaving, I think if memory serves me correctly, Mom and Dad were arguing over it too! And knowing my uncle and aunt pleaded with him to sleep it off. Then, early the next morning, we left, but he refused. He had work on Monday and we kids had to return back to school. We went on the left, heading back to South Carolina.

We stopped a couple times for bathroom breaks and something to eat and drink before getting back onto the road before I had fallen asleep. I remember waking up to my mom telling my brother and me Dad left his fishing poles in Florida. Well, I never even saw him use them, not even once on the vacation. I just said okay, falling back to sleep. I was awakened by my knees hurting as my cheekbone was throbbing in pain too. As I opened my eyes, I saw myself in a crouched position with my knees against the driver's back seat. My metal Newton's cradle art in motion was still in my lap. As I was still coming to a fully awakened state, I looked around and I saw my mom was next to me in the back seat behind the passenger seat. I looked to the front, saw my brother's face up against the windshield, and saw lots of blood coming from his face. I yelled frantically, looking back at my mom again and saw her bleeding from her mouth and ear and then turning back and forth to look at both of them, screaming at my dad that was on the driver's side in a terrified, scared voice, Wake up! Wake up!

He woke up. I told him, Look at Mommy. Look at Bubba. What did you do to them? Why are they hurt?

He replied, I must have hit something, but there was nothing there. I remember looking up out of the window at eight years old in shock because I saw a white car up a tree. As I looked back, the front hood of our blue Camaro was all smashed into its windshield. I knew right then we had been in a car accident, and it was serious too!

Freaking out, I yelled, Daddy, you got to do something, they need medical attention fast!

My dad yelled to my brother that was ten at the time needing his help. He said, I need you to help me move your mom to the driver seat before I can let anyone see us.

I was very concerned. Dad wasn't all that worried about hurting her as much as him getting caught being the driver because he wasn't supposed to be driving due to the fact he lacked a driver's license. I told Dad, What about Mom being more hurt if you move her?

I knew you're not supposed to move someone in critical condition to prevent from injuring the person unless you're trained in doing so. Which I knew Dad was not!

He responded, I will be careful.

Then I say, When are you going to find help?

Dad yelled, I will go after I move your mom,

And as Dad was lifting up Mom, I was so scared, I needed to go pee. I remember he yelled back at me to shut up and get out his way and to go into the woods to pee. I was too scared to go into the dark woods by myself without my mommy. And knowing my mom was so hurt, I decided to just hold it. Looking at my mom, seeing her leg and arm looked broken as she was making groaning sounds in so much pain as they placed her in the seat. I looked at my brother and replied, Oh no! Your face! Bubba, your face has glass, your chin is dripping with blood. It had been dripping heavily too. Why don't you use the clothes from the truck to slow down that bleeding?

He said he doesn't want to mess all our new clothes up. I told him I didn't care about it; he can use whatever he needed to. He was more important than anything in there! Please go ahead! He said okay and proceeded to stop his bleeding with the clothes in the trunk.

Dad finally went to the side of the road to flag anyone down to use their phone to call for assistance. The police and two ambulances arrive shortly after calling for help. One ambulance came and took away my mother and me. As she was on the gurney in the back, I could hear them talking about my mom from the front. I remember secretly freaking out, trying to hold it all in, listening to them communicating back and forth with each other. It was my very first time in an ambulance, and I was so scared that I may have peed on myself. My brother was taken in the second ambulance with Dad riding in there with him.

The driver of the ambulance I was in was asking me questions such as Are you hurt?

I replied that just my knees were hurting and under my eye that was all. I asked, Do you think if my mom was moved from the back seat to the driver's seat, she could have been more hurt?

The lady then told me, Yes, that is a huge possibility because you never should move anyone on your own without proper procedures as a trained professional is taught to do.

I said, Yeah, you know that was exactly what I told my dad, but he wouldn't listen to me. He told me he had to because he had no choice.

And following that, I said no more the rest of the ride to the hospital.

When we arrived at Brunswick, Georgia, they took my mom with the gurney and rushed into the automatic doors saying, ER stat, she's losing a lot of blood. She was in critical condition and she was in a car accident.

As I stood there, they rolled by with my brother taking him too. This officer person called over my dad to take his statement of what happened. A detective man sat with me, talking to me. I told him I hope my mommy was going to be okay. He told me, She will be very strong for you. I just know it.

I said, Yes, that's if my dad didn't do more damage to her from moving her to the driver seat before help arrived.

I was then questioned, Why did your daddy have to move her?

I told him, He did it because he would get in trouble if he didn't.

They said, Why is that?

I said, Because he doesn't have a driver's license, that's why.

The officer asked me if my family had anyone to call in an emergency.

I said, Yes, my papa is the first I call for everything.

They asked me if I happen to know his phone number.

I said, Well, yeah, that's the first number I ever learned. He taught me that number since I could put numbers together.

He brought me to the phone, and I said, Can I do it?

The officer let me call my papa. It was very late. He was asleep, and I woke him up. I told my papa what had happened; he asked me if I was doing okay. I said I was scared but fine. He told me don't worry about a thing, he'll be there as soon as his wheels can bring him to me. He asked me how everyone else was doing. I told him that Dad is fine, brother was bleeding a lot from the face, and Mom was in a lot of pain and groaned a lot, not sure how bad she is.

Papa told me to just go to a window that looked out to the parking lot and stare out there, looking for him to arrive, not to focus on anything else but that. If I can go to sleep, that would be fine too.

I just sat there doing as I was told, staring out that big hospital window, watching at all