I hesitate to write this as it may seem that I hate my family or others but it isn't true. I love everyone. (Well, not that crazy bitch...some of you know who I mean.)
In all seriousness, no one is really at fault for how I feel. We cannot change the past but we can have an understanding of how things were and how we now deal with feelings and situations.
And with that being said....
I've been in therapy for awhile before I had a full understanding of why I choose men who abandoned me. My therapist was very good at asking the right questions and interpreting my answers in order to help me stop the cycle.
After my last break up I was deeply hurt. I thought everything was good and never thought that he would do what he did to me. But he did.
I sought out help.
What I learned is why I am still single.
My choices in relationships all stemmed from my relationship with my parents. I had learned that my mother was extremely narcissistic and controlling. I was conditioned to understand that receiving her love was more like a transaction. If I didn't conform to her wishes, her love was taken from me. I saw her do it repeatedly to others and my biggest fear was losing her love for me.
It was such a fucked up way to grow up. I thought that if I was a certain way, I would be loved, not just by my mom, but by everyone.
I had met my aunt and uncle for lunch once and my aunt told my kids that I was such a loving child. Every time that they would come to visit, I would run to them for hugs and kisses. Tears stung my eyes. Thinking back to those times I realized that I was such a love starved child, I just wanted to be hugged and feel unconditional love from someone.
I never was hugged by my mother. Her hugs were always cheek to cheek. I never heard praise. It was usually a comment that "you could have done better" or she would make it a point to tell me that she always did it better.
At the time I never thought it was a wrong way to be loved. For me, it was normal.
When I became the age for dating and boyfriends, it became a nightmare.
I was in the mindset that love came with conditions and expectations and if those weren't met, then it wasn't love. Being in relationships was always incredibly stressful for me.
My father was pretty stand-offish. I do think my mom had some contribution to the relationship I have with my father. She demanded that she came first and if I didn't chose her, there was always mental hell to pay.
I wish that my father was more caring. It seems that he wanted perfect kids, correcting our English, no laughing at the table, no asking how our day was. (At least that is what I remember.) He never hugged us or tucked us in at night.
My father always seemed to love everyone else. He was always good to others, willing to help them and even hug them. I held in so much anger because these people got the attention from my father that I had wished he had given me.
My parents fought verbally and sometimes physically.
Not only did I have a fucked up view of love, my view of relationships was even more fucked up.
Again, at the time, it was my normal. I figured that the Brady family was abnormal and no one really lived like that.
I cannot go back and redo my choices in relationships. I am sad that I gave two men two very beautiful children and those men were incapable to see me needing their love.
I am thankful that my children didn't grow up not getting hugs and goodnight kisses. I did make it a point to never let my kids grow up like I did.
I am also sad that I didn't get help sooner.
The difficult thing now is learning to accept love from others. I cannot even explain how hard it is to allow people to love me without thinking that there is a condition attached to it.
I had been getting better. I tell friends that I love them and I feel them love me. I am even learning to love myself for the shit show I think that I am.
There was a huge set back recently that sent me into a tailspin.
My father was visiting. I have always looked forward to seeing him as I thought we were working on the relationship that we have. We have had talks about the past but I don't think he really understands the toxic environment that we were all in.
He had a little too many spirits and told some of my new friends that I was not a good person and that I was a "jerk". That was so hurtful as I didn't want them thinking that I was just putting a fake side forward.
Someone walked in the club and he wrapped his arms around her and said how good it was to see her. I held back tears.
He told people that I hadn't seen in 30 years that I didn't deserve the car that my son bought me.
I probably will never understand why he feels the way he does or why he doesn't see the hurt he caused me. I also don't understand why he never took what we talked about to heart.
I love my dad but at the same time I don't want to let him hurt me anymore.
It's hard.
For most of my life I have feel like a very unlovable little girl just desperate for someone to love me.
As the same time, I have walls up so high because I don't want to keep being hurt.
I've been keeping to myself and licking my wounds as I have been doing for many years.
Someday I hope that someone will see me though a little hole in my wall and just love me unconditionally. Because if they can do that, they would have all the love that I've been holding back.
