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Ihtoiltm posted 11/19/2013 18:18 PM

This is a slight follow up to my post "My horrible actions" on Nov 8th but I felt like it should be turned into another post of it's own.
My BH was always doing his job, even when I was 200+ pounds but I could not let myself believe the good that he and others were saying, WHY?
I never doubted that he loved me but I couldn't believe that I was beautiful or much less that he was sexually attracted to me anymore. This was not his fault and I have never once thought that it was. I am not blaming him for anything these problems and issues are mine and I must deal with them and work through them to solve them. Finding the way to let go of my insecurities and be happy and believe in myself mentally, emotionally and physically is a challenge especially now after everything that I have done but I will achieve this!
I feel that I have always fallen short of expectations that mostly my parents put on me but I am starting to realize that it's the expectations I have put on myself that I have fallen short of. I have always compared myself to my mom whom it seemed everyone thought was "perfect" for lack of a better word. As a child and teenager I was led to believe that life was full of sunshine and rainbows and it was extremely rare that I was exposed to anything negative. My husband and I were talking the other night and discovered a few things that never had much weight before but might need some. I was the youngest of two, I have one sister that is three years older. I had horrible separation anxiety as a child. I remember my sister going to spend the night with our grandma or our cousins and I would cry to stay home with my mom because I was petrified of being away from her. I was a thumbsucker from hell, it started as an infant and I did not fully stop until I was probably 10 or older. It seems that my mom needed to feel the need from me as well because she allow it to continue. It seems as though she saw nothing wrong with my separation anxiety at the time and maybe she still doesn't. As I got older and the natural pull to become your own person started occurring with me it was excruciating because I was so conditioned by this point to need my mom for everything. I almost feel as though they raised us to be dependent on them instead of letting us make the mistakes that kids/teenagers make and learning from them and more importantly learning how to deal with things on my own. I was so sheltered and protected that I wasn't allowed to drive to the movie theater which was less than 10 miles from our house even at 18 years old. The break from them never occurred, I lived at home even during college and the first few years of dating my husband. We got together when I was almost 19. I have felt many times that I was almost caught in the middle so to speak between my husband whom I wanted to be with and make happy and my parents who had given me everything up to that point. The word obedient comes to mind when I'm talking with my husband about this now. I feel as though they raised us to be so obedient to them, not by physical force but by persuasion maybe? It's difficult to explain and I hope I'm making at least some sense. I felt conditioned and so highly influenced to be obedient to them and to do exactly as they said and exactly as they would want me to do that I was never allowed to develop my own sense of self and therefore I was constantly trying to make myself like them and live up to their high standards, more so my mom's. I felt like a failure in their eyes and more importantly my own eyes because instead of doing my best and being happy with myself I was constantly judging myself for falling short. I'll give a couple of examples so hopefully it will help makes more sense. My BH and I live in the house I grew up in and anytime my parents would visit I would always want our house cleaned to my mom's standards, at any given moment you could eat off of any surface in their house. I would also want the yard mowed and looking just as good as my perfectionist dad always had it looking and if I could not achieve these things I felt like a failure. The list would be a mile-long of those type of examples and how I have felt failure over and over but here's a big one. When I was about to have our first little boy I was nine days past my due date and miserable so my doctor induced labor. I went through hours of contractions and extremely slow progress until finally my doctor said I wasn't progressing and she was going to deliver the baby C-section. I was devastated. I laid there crying that I had failed, it's like I told myself okay so I don't keep an immaculate house, I went to college for a few years but didn't graduate, I worked a few bullshit jobs but this, this I can do, I can carry a baby and deliver him healthy and happy just as a woman (like mom) should. But nope, I failed at that too.
I am not trying to have a pity party by any means. I own my mistakes that I have made. I know I must be painting a horrible picture of my parents and that is not my intentions, neither is blaming them, they did the best they knew how to do as all of us parents do. I am trying to open up and give some background on me and my life so that all of you might give me some beneficial feedback. My mind is a mangled mess as I am sure you all can tell but the one thing I am focused on is sorting through all of this, identifying my issues and solving them because my recent behavior is not who I am nor will I allow it to be who I become.
I love my husband and children more than anything and I want to reconcile. My husband is a great man who is still here and trying to work through this with me. Some days are good, some aren't but we are still together and doing our best.

trying2live posted 11/19/2013 20:28 PM

Ihtoiltm, as I am reading your post, I am in tears because I know how you feel. I have issues with my family as well. It is very exhausting to change how we see ourselves. I have the worst self esteem and I when my husband would compliment me, I felt he was just saying it. I hate how my actions have hurt him and I struggle with my guilt. I am trying to just take things one day at a time. There are times when I can only do one hour at a time. Just know you are not alone.

SandAway posted 11/20/2013 15:02 PM

It's interesting when we really take the time to look at our lives growing up. I would always say that I had a great childhood because I really did. But when you break it all down and look at it in pieces, you can see how certain thought patters have evolved into our adult life.

It is time to break away from that old thought process of pleasing others and begin to love yourself.