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Do you ever have those moments where, you are doing something completely ordinary and you have an epiphany about why you are the way you are? I was working for one of my clients today ( I am self-employed) and in the middle of my work, I suddenly realized that the reason I have so much trouble with men in my life is because I have never had a good relationship with my father. As dads go, mine is pretty nondescript: military man, provider, typical male. But the one thing that stands out is that he was absent most of my life, and that even now, as an adult, I have spent a lot of energy trying to win his attention and affection. How does that translate to other men? Well, oddly enough, I picked a spouse who most closely resembles my mom in personality and behavior. But this realization also helped me recognize why I have always been driven to be the best, to be first, why I am so 'type A'; because I never really felt as if the one man who should have loved me unconditionally cared much for me at all. Sure, he's done the obligatory parental things, but he's never really gone out of his way to make me feel special or important. My best memory with him is from my childhood, when I was about 10. I struggled with depression early on, and as a result, the counselor our family was seeing suggested that my dad take me out on a 'date' with him. He took me to dinner at a low-end restaurant and then we went to see 'Back to the Future', with Michael J. Fox. I'll never forget it: it was the one time in my entire life that I felt like he was really paying attention to me, and that we actually had a few things in common. To this day, that movie reminds me of my dad. I had this epiphany because I have developed a serious crush on someone I am around a lot; no worries of infidelity, my crush is secret and he is married and I respect that. But, when I started to think about why it was so important for this person to pay attention to me, I recognized that he is very similar to my father, and that what I was really longing for was the same thing I have always longed for: affirmation and appreciation from one of my parents. These type of things make it hard for me to create an amazing life for myself, if only because it makes me feel worthless and stupid, like I will never be worthy of anything, so why bother. All of my life, my relationship with my dad has ruled my feelings of self-worth. If he said I looked fat in something, I never wore it. If he liked my hair up, up it stayed. I never wore a lot of makeup or dressed in particularly fashionable clothing because to my dad, it made no sense for me to waste time in getting all 'gussied up'. My opinion of myself and my competitiveness for the attention of men has been rooted in my longing for a real relationship with someone who can never really give it to me. Sometimes, being enlightened just sucks. So, I cried today, and I felt weak today, and I realized that I will never be the 'perfect' daughter, or the perfect woman, for that matter. My body will always have flaws, I will never be smart enough or witty enough or talented enough to capture his attention; he will always pass me over. And I, I will just have to come to grips with the fact that who I am is who I am, and I can't change my appearance too much ( not without drastic and costly surgery ).
