Loving Myself

Love.

For a lot of years I hated myself. I hated my height - 5ft 10. I hated my natural hair color - mouse brown. I hated that my best was never good enough. I had a good life, a husband that spoils me, a roof over my head, no need of a full time job because of hubby's disability pay. But I still hated everything.

Then I realized it wasn't my hair - I could color it. It wasn't my height I like being tall. It was that I hated myself.

Self-harming is a symptom of depression. Though I didn't know it when I was a kid. It made the emotional pain stop, for me at any rate. I've learned now to talk to someone or try and ride out the numbness until it tips to anger or crying. It will always be a part of me. But mostly I cut because I hated myself.

My BFF of 12 years has been someone that I could count on for help. Even if it was just keeping me from hurting myself. I was a cutter, well I guess I'll always be one. If the emotional pain gets to bad I go numb. Physical pain I can deal with. Not so much the emotional. I cut to deal with the numbness. I got that way about 2 years ago. Totally numb and wanted to cut. I told her and she stayed up late for her and talked me through until I came out of the numbness. My husband has also helped me through a desire to cut myself. He was the one that insisted if I ever felt like doing it again I had to talk to someone until it passed.

My being true to myself journey is helping me learn to love myself. I've discovered that the truer I am to myself the more I love myself. Maybe I've always hated myself because I was being true to everyone else's idea of who and what I should be.

Society tells us to love ourselves, but they never manage to tell us how to do that. Have you noticed that? Most young children know this instinctively. Maybe it's because we tell them how cute they are, how much we love them. Why do we stop giving people compliments? Why do we stop believing compliments we are given?

Here's a story.  Hubby and I were in a jewelry store to get a ring resized. The sales clerk noticed I didn't have a diamond ring. I don't like diamonds - to me they are cold, hard, judging and have nothing to do with love. Now you may like them, I'm just talking about me. She said hubby needed to buy me one. He told her "I'll get her something for her computer, she'll like that more." My response "He knows me so well!" Her response - "Every woman needs a diamond."  Why when I don't like them, don't want them and don't care about them do I need one?

The reason was simple and complex. Society deems that a woman should love jewelry. I don't never have. I do have a few pieces I adore but I wear them rarely and only on special occasions. This clerk determined that because I was female I had to have a diamond because I was female. What she did was make me feel less like a woman, less lovable because I didn't want a diamond.

I'm still learning to love myself. But I know the benefits of it - happiness.