Glue

The glue, maybe the strongest glue that has kept the whole thing together for so many years, has been the need to win my parents (and in particular my father's) love and approval.

It must be very difficult for most people to comprehend the need to win a parent's approval or love.    Human beings DNA is hard wired to, in most cases, take care of this on its own.  Most parents can see their children's faults but still provide sufficient critically need approval and love.

The message "you're not good enough" is always concealed and delivered stealthily.   If I ever questioned it, I was told "you're too sensitive" or "that isn't what I meant, why do you take it like that?" or "that is NOT what I said", in a reprimanding and yet additional putdown for having so grossly misinterpreted the message.

But the flow of putdowns never cease.   Like water running down, they are inevitable and constant.  Subtle, concealed and stealthily delivered.   An endless message that "you are bad, you are not good, you are not good enough."

All this was going on my whole life with me getting very limited conscious peaks of it.  Mostly it happens below the surface.  And the quest to be worthy, the fight, the inbred need to "win" my parents' approval and prove that I am good enough, also unconsciously being fought without ever being able to formulate it in either word or thought.

Can you imagine always feeling not good enough?    If I am not good enough to my parents, how could I be good enough to anyone else?  How can I feel good about myself?

There is a sinking, catch yourself from falling feeling that accompanies many of the putdowns.   An internal feeling of being ashamed for not being good enough.  A feeling of humiliation.  Trauma.

There is also a feeling of constantly being paranoid for the next onslaught of stealth criticism.  What will it be and where will it come from?

Being able to recognize it and say it is, I believe, a first step in dealing with it.  There has been a realization that I have been chasing my own tail.  That I have been participating in a cycle that can't get better.     I am not sure it can ever be 100% resolved.  But, wow, bringing it to the conscious level and being able to say what has happened and how I have been conditioned my whole life, is very powerful, and I hope critical step in healing.