Gisella (43) uit California vond via Wifty jeugdvriend Willy terug. How cool is that!

Gisella

Hello, my name is G.G and I was born in Peru to a family with deep spiritual roots. Our family was never the kind to go to church on Sunday, instead we were told to find our faith on our own. When I turned 8 my parents decided to send me and my siblings to an all girls Catholic School. It was an expensive commodity to have your kids go to a private school when living paycheck to paycheck, but all I could think about was seeing myself becoming a nun. 

I have always had a deep desire to help others throughout my life even in my High School years. While others were partying and being rowdy, I preferred to reach out to people who needed a helping hand. This is what made me happy, but me and my father were never really in the same page he always told me that helping our family was the of the utmost importance. I played the good daughter role for far too long, to the point were I actively suppressed my happiness to please my parents and gain their acceptance, for going against their will was to ask for quick discipline both physically and mentally. They knew what was right for me, or so they thought.

I spent my teenage years learning different arts, from drawing, painting, singing, and playing musical instruments. At one point I was working for a TV station in their Art Design Department, then I was an art teacher at a school and even got to become a fashion designer for Miss Dominican Republic and a singer from Argentina.  

This delighted my parents, but I was truly, deeply unhappy. All I wanted at that point was to find my prince in shining armor, the kind that only exist in old black and white movies.

I’m sure many 18 year old girls had the same dream such as mine, instead I got pregnant from the first guy I ever dated, the very same guy that after hearing the news of an incoming child fled and left me to fend for myself. I carried the guilt, the shame, and the pain for many years, because having a bastard child in that time was heavily frowned upon. I was alone and scared even though my family was physically there. 

My future was uncertain for me and the child, it didn’t help that my mother told me to get an abortion. All I thought of was the hole I had fallen into, watching my hopes and dreams fall and shatter alongside me. I fell into a deep depression, panic attacks became part of my day, and gossip of my unfortunate situation became part of my neighborhood’s daily talks, even the people I called friends banished alongside the world I had known. The weight of it all got to me and I decided to call it quits. I grabbed a bottle of sleeping pills and for once felt in control of my fate. In a rather odd change of events my parents walked in on me in the act of ending my living nightmare. From that day on my parents became my biggest help in overcoming my situation.

A year passed and my baby boy was a few months old. During this time I was asked to sing at a friends birthday party and so I did. After I was done performing the music director who had attended the party asked me to be the lead singer of his band and I gladly accepted even though at that point in time I was still a shy girl. I became a professional singer and was in the music business for 14 years. 

In 1991 on a summer afternoon in an old and charming bohemian district the band and I were expecting to be interviewed after a show, my father who had become my manager had asked me to meet some of his new Belgium friends, that is when I first met Willy. The bluest of eyes that matched his blue shirt, his eyes reminded me of our ocean, I felt like if I could swim in them. When I was on my way home I couldn’t forget his face nor the music that emanated from within me a song that only played when I lived a moment that involved him. My first letter from him was written on a blue piece of paper, I will never forget that.

The man I met that day helped me create a song, my first song. Willy was a man that got to work on the things I had always desired to, I didn’t envy him, I looked up to him.

In the following years we shared many letters, wonderful letters that brought me back to reality. I thought all good men were but gone from this good earth, he proved that notion wrong. 

I still keep the letters to this day. Willy’s letters arrived when I needed him the most, he showed me light where there was none and for that he has a very special place in my heart. 

Thanks to Wifty and the kind author Hélène, which I stumbled on by accident, I was lucky enough to reconnect with him (we had lost contact years ago). 

Through some e-mails I found that Willy had gotten married, which brings nothing but joy to me. I as well got married, 15 years now, got a kid and my son which I couldn’t be more proud is turning 24 in the next few days, I love them to the stars and back.  

I currently reside in California and work independently in Ebay as a seller. I will soon be retaking my piano lessons, which is what I truly want to do after 35 years, it never is too late if you really put your mind to it. I will also continue on a project that I’m currently working on, a cartoon story book based on my life, but with a comic twist for children and young adults. 

There’s so much more to tell aside from the stories I have shared with you some good some bad, but I truly feel blessed today.  

So, my friends, let’s all live well, love, cry, because to ignore those emotions is to ignore the very things that make us human; above all laugh again and again, louder, louder, and louder. 

Love, Gisella

Thank you Gisella, I’m so glad that we inspire & connect people all over the world. Enjoy your life! x x x Hélène

Here with the members of the band the year I met Willy. I am the one in the center.

My children Wesley (24) and Gidhana (13).

With my mother in Peru last January.