How a bumpy road turned into a smooth highway

In June 1969 only a few weeks prior to Neil Armstrongs first steps on the moon, a litle boy was born into a small apartment in the university city of Leiden in the Netherlands.

Mum and Dad, both medical Doctors who met during their study at one of the best universities in the country, where anxiously waiting for their son to arrive. But the little guy had kept them waiting for quite some time and two weeks had passed since the estimated delivery date.

When the exhausted mum finaly gave birth to a healthy but blue baby boy, his parents called him Mark.

That's when my journey began...

Unfortunately the lack of oxigen caused by the late birth, took its toll and I developed some deficiencies in the first years of my life.

Life doesn't always deal us the best cards but it's up to us how we cope with it.

Although overal healthy, I was diagnosed with pretty severe asthma at the age of four, including hayfever and allergies for just about everything. You can imagine that summer wasn't my favorite time of year so I spend most of them inside staying away from pollen and allergenes, which in turn made it hard to make friends.

Over the following years I had several asthma attacks, one time so severe an injection in the last minute saved my life.

In the early years in school I had trouble keeping up with the rest of the class and was always distracted by the smallest things, having a hard time to concentrate.

It didn't take long before my parents had me examined and i was diagnosed with dyslexia (a common learning difficulty that can cause problems with reading, writing and spelling) and on top of that ADHD (Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD is the most commonly diagnosed mental disorder of children. Children with ADHD may be hyperactive and unable control their impulses. Or they may have trouble paying attention).

To top it off, after going through a whole series of Doctors and tests, the list was completed with dyspraxia (a developmental disorder of the brain in childhood causing difficulty in activities requiring coordination and movement).

This of course made me very unpopular in school doing sports with the other kids because, quite frankly, i could't even catch a ball if they dropped it in my hands!

So it was no wonder no one wanted me in their team, making me the weird kid to avoid and because of it i was bullied a lot.

Only after years of intensive training by a remedial teacher was I able to beat the dyspraxia and regain full control over my movement and coordination, making my parents very proud as I finished a dancing course and took my first martial art lessons (talk about coordination!)

Luckely the asthma also got better and I started to really enjoy movement and sports.

You would think life could only get better at this point, but that was far from the truth.

Pretty soon life threw another right hook, flooring me again.

I had just turned 14 as my parents devorced and it left me emotionally wrecked. I could't understand why mom an dad didn't want to be together anymore and I blamed myself for their misfortune. I turned off all feelings and became a cold SOB kicking against anything that got in my way.

To make it even worse I was sexually assulted by the teacher at sail camp (I have never talked about this before and can only remember vaguely because I blocked what happend from my mind).

Because my parents couldn't handle me anymore and thought it would be good for me to spend a year abroad, they send me to the United States as an exchange student to live with a family in Colorado. I'm still gratefull for this unique life experience!

Back in the Netherlands I met my first big love. I went to the IVA business school in Driebergen where I graduated only a few points short of ''summa cume laude'' and started working as a car salesman. We got a nice appartment and lived a pretty good life.

After six years however, fait struck again.

When my girlfriend left me after cheating on me 6 times in six years, eventhough I took her back every single time (I know, I know but love had blinded me), I was devestated and not long after she had left, I got into some bad company and started drinking and using soft drugs. Neglecting my work as a car salesmen eventually led to loosing my job and getting evicted from the apartment me and my girlfriend had shared. After that, it didn't take long before I made the switch to hard drugs getting to a point where I wouldn't be sober for weeks.

I tried everything I could get my hands on, including cocaine, extacy, heroin, LSD and opium. I even started dealing to finance my addiction. Of course I am not proud of this, but it tought me some valuable lessons. One of them was realising how strong I really was mentally...

After some time getting closer and closer to the point of no return, noticing I no longer cared whether I would live or die, and became emotionally numb and dangerous to other people, I realised something had to change. I decided to turn my life around and stopped using drugs over night. I went ''cold turkey''.

To get away from the drugs and bad influences, I left my home town and moved to Germany. By that time I started working as a meatpacker at a slaughterhouse and within 2 years I moved up to managing the night shift with 35 employees.

I was back on track, or was I?

Fait certainly dind't think so! Inspite of making a nightly extra profit of $4500 for my employer by reorganising the production process, he wouldn't pay me more than I had earned as a deboner before. So I quit the job.

The same day I got another job working at a slaughterhouse as a deboner. During that time I went to evening school for two years and after finishing the course I started my own business as a financial advisor.

But after 8 months I had to give up my business because I didn't get enough clients. Now I could blame this on another recession but I just wasn't passionate enough about it to make it work. So I had to go back to working at the slaughterhouse to be able to pay the bills. When after 3 weeks we where told to work at another slaughterhouse and had to drive 3 additional hours daily but wouldn't be compensated for the comute, again I decided to quit my job.

As I got home and told my present girlfriend about what happened, she cried wondering how I could have done that and how we would be able to pay the bills. But confident as I am about getting a new job, only three days later I started working at a construction firm building slaughterhouses (the irony!) with higher pay and more free time to spend with my family. 

But then fait struck again.

The world slipped into a resession and I lost the job after working there for 1,5 years. We where back at start.

But giving up isn't one of my characteristics, so i asked around and found another job. I started working as a help at my current job with no experience and worked myself up to the position of project leader managing a team of coding technicians within 3,5 years.

But even after working there for over 8 years, I still didn't feel like this was what I wanted to do with my life. Eventhough I like the job and company a lot, something still was missing. I still didn't know what I am passionate about. I knew I liked working with people but felt like I could do so much more to help them.

Only after investing in my coach, Fraser Cameron, did I find my passion in coaching people myself. So to aquire the necessary skills to coach people on their health and how to live a happy and fulfilled life, I enroled in the Become a Health Coach program of the Health Coach Institute in Boise Idaho in the USA in June 2018, and in January 2019 I officialy got certified as a Health Coach.

Anything is possible when you work hard enough for it.

Your mindset determines if you succeed or fail in life. To many people give up after they have been knocked down by life but life will knock you down many times, and it's all about getting back up and starting over. Never stay down!

When you think you're a winner, you will be. But if you think you're a looser that too will be your reality.

''Defeat is a state of mind; no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted as a reality'' ~Bruce Lee

I've never lost my smile, even after going trough my share of adversity. And I am very gratefull for everything I had to go through, because it tought me how to handle life and how to teach others to do the same.

Remember, whatever happens, when you have faith in the positive outcome, you will be able to conquer anything life throws at you.

To your health,

SmilingDutchy