…and staying for the whole weekend? My dad. I live here in the Midwest, where I’ve settled post-graduate school, and he lives in Colorado, in the same house where I grew up from the age of 10 on. Those 1200 miles between us feel about right to me. I get home to visit about twice a year, once over the winter holidays and once for his birthday in mid-summer. I often try to combine my visit with that of one or both of my brothers, one of whom lives part of the year in Colorado as well and part of the year in Italy, and the other of whom lives in Tanzania. So I’m rarely there alone with my father, which works well for me.
When I’m with him, I feel uglier, fatter, more ashamed, less competent and less confident than at any other time in my life. His heart would break to hear this, but it’s true. He was the one that first delivered the news to me that I was fat, 35 years ago now, and he’s never let up. He’s never bothered to hide the fact that he finds me…well, lacking in some ways that he deems critical for the females in his family. In particular, he is distressed by my weight, but also by my general lack of feminine pizzazz.
This is the man who once suggested, in all sincerity, that perhaps I ought to check with some women to see if they can teach me how to wear scarves and jewelry and things, so that I could maybe snazzy up my look a little. This is the man who has been so ashamed of my looks in the past that he felt the need to prepare some old family friends in advance for my appearance when we went to see them for a visit after many years. I never would have known but for the wife of the couple, who told me that my father had taken pains to tell them how big I’d gotten so that they would not be surprised (I weighed around 200 at that point). She said “I was ready for you to weigh 400 lbs from the way he was describing you.” This is the man who would talk rapturously about the handsomeness of my brothers (which they are—no argument there) and then say “And you, Luna…(long significant pause while he fishes for something not-too-brutal to say), you could be as attractive as you’ve a mind to be.” Good catch, Pop. All of this is just a willful rejection of societal beauty ideals. I just FEEL like being overweight and soul-crushingly self-conscious.
This is the man who taught me that I just wasn’t good enough. He was my first mirror, and I learned from him that mirrors were never going to deliver good news.
I was once at a birthday sleepover when I was about eight. The birthday girl’s grandfather was there, and he took a liking to me. Not in a creepy way, at least not that I remember. He made some mention in passing of my pretty chestnut hair. I was over the moon that someone (and a MAN!) saw something of beauty in me. I came home the next day and, desperate for some little crumb of the same experience from my father, I said something about my hair and its chestnut color. He looked up and said “It’s really more walnut,” and went back to whatever he was doing. Color me crushed. I mean, he’s right. It is more walnut. Actually, it’s the color of espresso beans, should we wish to be precise about this. But I felt like a beggar who held out my tin cup for a donation and got a rock in it.
Guilt compels me to say that he is a generous and loving man as well. He is proud of my accomplishments and proud of what he perceives my personality to be. He loves all three of his children fiercely, and we doubt this not at all. I feel that I should be more able to embrace the good in him. Well, no, that’s not exactly it. I can embrace the good. There is much about him I admire and there’s much that he has done for me and my brothers that I deeply appreciate. I love him.
But the truth remains that my stomach will be in knots and my psyche will be on lockdown until he leaves.
4 comments:
I think your dad went to the same school of parenting mine did, vis a vis me. Some questions - why does he view you as an extension of himself and why does he find it difficult to empathize with you? And what the hell skin was it off his nose if your hair was chestnut or walnut? Did he have to always be right and/or have the last word on anything? Is he, by chance, either a surgeon or architect?
I also see my dad about twice a year, although we talk more on the phone. And that is plenty. Although I deal with him very well face-to-face, having learned early on how to make sure that he ultimately does listen, what I have had to put myself through to not internalize what he says gave me an ulcer by 18.
Sometimes it's the way he says it, rather than the message. For example, trying to encourage me to take a lower-stress position in the first year after my doctorate, rather than going for another leadership position, he said, "You have to look for something menial."
Um, thanks for the support? Sometimes I really resent having to do the translation to sane, respectful conversation, and it doesn't always help that he loves me and that his heart is in the right place.
*S*
Oh Luna! *hugs you tight*. You know (and it would kill her if she heard me say this) but I have the same kind of 'thing' going on with my mother. So I spent my whole life over-achieving (I also have a PhD and various career 'successes')to try and rectify the situation. Meanwhile, I suffered from eating disorders and drank and smoked and pretty much did anything to escape myself.
One day I had a huge fight with my mother. Really big and really really really bad. I was willing to disown her because I just couldn't deal with her negativity towards me and my lifes choices any more. I wanted her to understand how much some of her behaviour affected me and when she wouldn't even try I was ready to walk.
Then, suddenly, she did try. Just a very little. And it was a start.
Now I am not going to try and tell you that I was suddenly cured of a lifetime of parental conditioning, but a little goes a long way. The very fact that I finally stood up for myself opened the doors to a much more honest relationship with both myself and my mother. The air changed and I could breathe a bit better.
Be strong and stand up for yourself this time, Luna. I have no doubt that your Dad loves you. Perhaps during his stay he could be the first one that you explain that to about your new lifestyle. Maybe he could prove to be an unexpected source of support? But even if not, stay true to you. You don't have to explain yourself to anyone.
I really think you are great and am cheering you all the way. XXXXX
*S* and Squilla--
Thank you both for your sweet words. It so helps to know that other smart, accomplished women have the same issues with parents.
*S*--good questions you pose. And he is neither a surgeon nor an architect, but a psychiatrist. A child psychiatrist, at that. The burden of translation into sane, respectful conversation, as you so rightly worded it, makes me nuts sometimes. And the good intentions thing? Feh. Not always enough.
Squilla--I think you are on to something important. The 'standing up for myself' thing has been difficult for me in the past, but there have been moments of progresss that surprised and gratified me when I did approach him assertively. I need to remember that. My strategy with him all too often has been to be avoidant and just smile and nod while I'm seething inside, which works for me not at all.
Thanks again! I'm going to carry your words in my head next weekend. Strength in numbers and all. :)
Oh crap! It's next weekend. So you still have a week to dread. Ugh! I've at least gotten better on the phone with mine. When he starts getting too wound up, and I'm not in the mood to hold the phone out from my head and wait till it blows over, I say, "Dad, I can hear that you are upset. I'll talk with you another time when you're calmed down." Works for me most of the time. It's harder when we're at his place for a few days.
Post a Comment