I am a child of the 60’s. I grew up thinking I was going to get married, and become June Cleaver wearing my white pearls and an apron. Wow, was I ever surprised when adulthood smacked me in the face. I was wholly unprepared for what was about to come. Never did I think for a moment when I played dress up with my siblings, my favorite one being the bride, using a half slip on my head for the veil, that I would be married and divorced three times. So how did this happen….
As a child I was emotionally, verbally, and physically abused by my mother. My father, whom I adored, worked very long hours and was not home much to stop her from doing what she did. Through all of this trauma, any self love and self value I was born with, was taken away, blow by blow for almost 17 years. I left home, with my mother’s words ringing in my ears….”No one will ever love you; you will die alone, and never amount to anything.”
Being too young to understand what price I would pay in my life for this dysfunctional beginning; I set up to prove her wrong. I built a successful career, (it’s amazing how much you can get done when you are perpetually angry.) Relationships though were quite another story.
We all wear an invisible sign on our head that tells the world what we think and how we feel about ourselves. I am sure you have met people who love themselves in a good healthy way. Their lives may not be perfect, but they seem to have better relationships with their spouses, kids, parents, and friends. Their sign clearly shows they love and respect themselves, so this is the way they will expect others to treat them. Good boundaries.
The adults that were raised by dysfunctional parents, in dysfunctional homes, also have a sign on their head. It may say, I have low self esteem; or I do not value myself; or I do not love myself. These people, from which I hail, have a very hard time establishing good healthy boundaries. We are so happy to receive any scrap of love and affection because we have been starved for it for years; so that when the narcissist or emotional vampire (no disrespect to vampires!) comes along, we fall fast and we fall hard.
So now you understand how I came to be married and divorced three times. The last divorce damn near killed me. It was fly or die time for me, and since I am not ready to give up on this life, it was time to learn how to love me.
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