I do remember random acts of kindness from strangers. It was that accumulation of strangers being kind that eventually helped me understand that I do have worth. I am worthy of love and affection, I just won't get it from the people I believed had my best interest in mind.
Strangers would step up and help me. More than once I was at the grocery store and a young man would come running up to the car and put my groceries in the car when I was pregnant, telling me that they do not think I should be lifting the heavy things into the car. My MEM didn't care. I messed up my back on some heavy water bottles we used to buy for drinking water. Another time a young men came running up to help me with a heavy water melon saying that he thought I should not be lifting it. A business partner of my husband pulled up to get merchandise one time and immediately started unloading the groceries in the car and carrying them into the kitchen, explaining that a pregnant woman has enough to carry and shouldn't have to carry the groceries as well. One of my faith leaders brought a yellow rose to thank me for the work I was doing with the youth. And the list goes on. Simple acts of kindness at a time when I was deprived of any kindness. Those people will never know how they have helped me down the road to realize that I had worth. That being treated like a slave isn't normal. People show appreciation to their loved ones and even strangers. Kindness is not a dead art. Kindness is just dead do a MEM family. Expecting kindness from a MEM family will always leave you empty and wanting because there never will be any kindness. Not. Even. Once.