Case in point: Several months ago, I had been having a hard time. Life, in general, was the pits. I was feeling pretty sorry for myself, which, I’m sorry to say, is kind of a normal reaction for me.
A friend of mine, who lives out of state, reached out to me via text and asked me how I was doing. I can’t remember exactly what I texted back, but it was something like a passive-aggressive “I’m horrible, but don’t worry about it…” kind of reply. A day or two later, while I was in church, I sat pondering why I responded that way to a friend who was only reaching out to see how I was doing. Essentially, I was trying to make him feel bad for expressing concern for me. Even I realized how f*cked up that was.
Why? Would I try to hurt someone who was only trying to help me? The answer came in a flash of insight that only made me feel more guilty for my behavior, but also explained a lot of my own resentment/behavior towards my parents for so many years.
The insight was this: I was angry at my friend for reaching out and expressing concern because he wasn’t loving me the way I wanted to be loved.
What I wanted was for someone to throw their arms around me and tell me everything was going to be okay, that I was okay. But this friend doesn’t like hugs. Even if he were here in the state, he still wouldn’t have expressed his concern the way I would have wanted him to (or anyone for that matter) – and that made me feel immediately resentful. So I lashed out in my passive-aggressive way and, essentially, rejected his love/concern; all because it didn’t come the way I wanted it to.
(I might put a plug in here for the “Five Love Languages,” which definitely has some application to this situation, although I won’t go into detail about it here.)
I felt like such a childish jerk, but as I pondered it even more, I realized that this a huge part of why I sometimes have a strained relationship with my mom - and before my dad died, with him too. I realized that so much of why I was angry and resentful was because they didn’t love me the way I wanted to be loved.
I mean, it’s documented in psychological circles that children see their parents as god-like and we attribute bad things that happen to ourselves, i.e., we caused it, because that preserves the omnipotent/omniscient qualities of our parents. We damage ourselves to preserve their god-like status so that we feel safe by being able to rely on them for support. (When we can’t rely on our parents, it feels like death because we have nothing to rely on, making us vulnerable and unsafe.)
So what happens when you want to be held, but your “omniscient” parent doesn’t hold you? You feel like you aren’t worth being loved. Because even your god-like parent – who knows how you want to be loved due to their omniscience – won’t love you that way. So you must not be worth it.
I know every situation is different, but I think for me, this explains the huge discrepancy between what I experienced as a child and what my parents experienced. I have always maintained that I knew that my parents loved me – and I still do. I always knew that my parents loved me, but I also felt that I didn’t measure up somehow. [What I’m about to say next is a huge oversimplification, but it helps me wrap my head around what I experienced.] My parents showed love by providing physical support, but made me feel inferior by not showing me emotional support. And when I say “not showing me emotional support”, what I mean is, not loving me the way I wanted to be loved.
As a child I knew that I needed shelter, clothing, food, etc., and I knew that my parents loved me because they provided that. But people also provide those things for their pets, so how was I supposed to know that my parents loved me any more than people love their pets? For me, the difference was in emotional support, i.e., the way I wanted to be loved.
What I wanted was for my dad to want to spend more time with me, to talk with me and to put his arms around me and tell me how much he loved me. I wanted him to be interested in me and I so desperately wanted his approval. What I wanted was for my mom to validate me by giving me complements, or to acknowledge my efforts/hard work and encouraging me to express myself. I wanted my parents to accept me for me and not tell me who they wanted me to be or make me feel like I had to change who I was in order to be acceptable.
The bottom line is that, because it’s based on my perception, I did not receive love the way I wanted to be loved, but I also acknowledge that my parents loved me. They loved me the only way they knew how, and even though it wasn’t the way I wanted, I can’t deny that they did the best they could do. People are different. People aren’t going to love you the way you want to be loved, but does that mean they don’t love you? Of course not!
When I had this realization, it softened my heart and removed so much resentment. It helped me change my definitions of what love is or what love should look like. Yes, there is still a way that I want to be loved (hugs are awesome!), but I shouldn’t reject all the other forms of love simply because it’s not how I would define it. Besides, I’m quite sure that I’ve offered love that has been rejected because it wasn’t they way that person wanted to be loved. Rejected love, in any form, hurts. I don’t want to be guilty anymore for rejecting love when it’s offered differently than I might want.
I’ve spent so much time wanting my parents to see how they hurt me by not loving me the way I wanted that I mired myself in the sludge of staying a victim and expecting everyone around me to pay for how I’ve been hurt. When in reality, I could have used that time to express gratitude for the love they did provide and spent more time trying to actually improve myself rather than spend my life trying to prove to everyone how worthless I am.
So, I apologize. First, to my friend who reached out to me and simply tried to express his concern for me. I’m sorry I “rejected” that and I’m sorry I didn’t appreciate what a good friend you were being. Second, I apologize to my parents. I’m sorry that I’ve been resentful. I’m sorry that there were times I wanted you to hurt as much as I was hurting. I’m sorry I rejected the love you did show me and I’m sorry I didn’t express more gratitude for that love. I know I can’t change the past; I would if I could. I know I can’t go back and undo the perceptions I had or the meaning/interpretation I gave to my circumstances – mostly because they were dependent on physiological brain development, but I can change how I see love now. And I can be grateful for all the love I’m shown now, no matter how it’s expressed.
I guess what it boils down to is this: even if it’s not always the way I want to be loved, I would rather be loved “differently,” than not loved at all.
