I’m a firm believer in having people around you that support your decisions, however, I don’t mean surrounding yourself with ‘yes’ people. You want people that are honest with you, help you grow, help you push yourself to the limits, believe in you but also keep your feet firmly on the ground. Over the past three to four years I’ve removed people from my life that aren’t like that, that haven’t treated me well, that made me feel as though I wasn’t important and my decisions weren’t important, in fact, they made me feel like complete and utter shit with their behaviour. I’m not just talking about friends, I’m also talking about family members. I wrote them a letter and said, good-bye I don’t need you in my life, if you’re not going to treat me with respect and caring then don’t expect it from me back towards you. I’m no longer going to take this kind of behaviour from you. Now, I know that sounds pretty harsh and it probably is, but I’m sick of being a doormat to people, they think that they can treat me any way that they want with no thought towards me and that I’ll always be there for them. No longer. If they apologised for their behaviour and made a true effort to change, well that’s a different thing completely. I’m writing this with Mother’s Day (here in Australia) coming up this weekend. Just because a woman is your mother, doesn’t mean you have to be loyal to her because there are plenty of women out there that don’t deserve to be mothers, they aren’t nice people and if you choose to have nothing to do with your mother, that’s OK, don’t feel guilty and don’t let others make you feel guilty with the ‘but she’s your mother’ line that they bring out. You do what is needed for you to be the best person that you can and if someone brings you down, then let them go, regardless of who they are in your life, whether a friend, relative, partner, children etc. If you have always done the best that you can towards them and don’t get that same kind of treatment in return. Then it’s perfectly OK to let them go.