The Hard Questions

Well, I may sound crazy all excited about the things that are wrong or seeing them. But as one of the geeks said on Beauty and the Geek, you don't see your life until you're out of it. I just knew mine was not working for a very very long time. No matter how hard I tried and what I did. And relationships? Forget it. Well, this whole codependent thing makes sense. I kept picking men who would reject me and the more they rejected me, the harder I tried to get their approval. Logically a waste of time, unless that's all you know. And it's familiar and you have no self esteem or other esteem or all of the new and exciting ways I can label myself.

Both my mom and dad did the codependence creating stuff. Which I'm sure their parents did to them. Hence, no blame. I forgive. I do. Not to say I don't wish none of this stuff-- great stories -- bad life -- never happened. It is funny that every time my life hit rock rock bottom, (twice --so the two times) -- I called my dad -- after drinking too many glasses to prepare myself for what I knew would be a painful response. But which I somehow wanted to be different and have it magically fix me and make everything all right. The thing is, he doesn't even recognize himself as my dad - my sister and me as has kids and that he ever did anything wrong. He doesn't show accountability. But being told everything that's wrong with you all the time and being abandoned and seeing your dad living in a huge house with a new family while you're living on food stamps with a depressed mom really does a number on you. And it makes you feel less than. So that's me - responsible for being single - because I pick men who see me as less than. Who don't compliment me or take me to dinner or treat me like I'm special. So this am on the way to work, I cried. A lot. Which was good. It's a long commute. Why not take advantage of it? And I'm crying now. And I'll probably cry later.

Mom is being a good sport about this one. Sometimes the woman confuses me. She has a good heart. She just has a lot of fear and has had a lot of disappointment in her life. I think she thought my dad was her great love and he broke her heart - permanently.

Anyway, I finished the book -- "Facing Codependence" book by Pia Mellody - and it did show why I never had any answers to the hard questions people would ask-- like

-Why don't you think you're pretty? How can you not see that?
-You don't know how to ask. Why don't you just ask?
-You don't have anything to give - why do you keep taking care of other people?
-Why do you let other people's problems get to you?
-Why don't you say no? You can say no you know.

The list goes on. An on. And I feel a bit better knowing why I didn't have the answers and why I felt like Ifelt and did what I did under the circumstances. But I'm tired now. I felt drained today. In a good way. Like I can take the pain now. For awhile there, I didn't think I could take any more pain. I really felt I was done. And if it happened, that would be bad. Very bad. Now I feel like I released a lot. Ignorance may be bliss, but wisdom is power. And I'd rather be the smartest girl in the room than the best looking. No matter what my dad may think.