One. Gorgeous. Redhead.

“Once in his life every man is entitled to fall madly in love with a gorgeous red head.” Lucille Ball

One day, one lucky man will fall madly in love with this gorgeous red head:

I am beautiful. 

It took me 24 ½ years of life before I was able to even say that, let alone believe it. And I am only able to do both now thanks to the Doc. 

I struggled for 24 ½ years of life with self esteem. I would go through stages here and there of having less and more self esteem. I would go through periods of having or faking confidence. But deep down, I was convinced I was ugly. Deep down, I was convinced I was fat. Deep down, I was convinced I was completely undesirable to boys of all shapes, sizes, and ages. Deep down, I could NEVER even fathom the idea that someone besides my family (who are morally obligated) could possibly love me. It was tough.

Then I found the Doc. The Doc, over the course of about a year taught me how to love myself. She taught me where my identity and self worth needed to come from. She taught me where I ought to find my sense of well being and sense of value. Up until that point I had always thought I would find it in the amount that other people loved and cared about me.

It was from her I best learned that a tremendous amount of insecurities often come when there is insufficient bonding between a parent and child. The first place we get a sense of value is a parent’s love. There were some dynamics in my early life, including the breaking down of my beloved home due to divorce, which I can now see lead to low self esteem as a pre-teen to teenage life, and well into my young adulthood. I was looking any place I could to be filled up with love. Friends, family, boyfriends, acquaintances, you name it. Everyone else had control of my self worth. I found it absolutely impossible to love myself.

It seemed to just click one day listening to the Doc, although I am certain that it was over the course of at least 9 months of solid listening and pondering. The only place where my identity, self worth, wellbeing and sense of self could now come from was within myself, and it had to be earned.

My whole life I had been measuring my self worth by the type of people that really loved me. From the Doc I learned what a mistake that had been. The hardest I’d ever fallen, the one time where every ounce of my identity and self worth had been given to another was with the ex. I have mentioned him before, and I will likely mention him again. (I only have one real EX that I will ever refer to on the blog) when this man broke up with me, (I feel juvenile admitting this) it was the single most traumatic experience I had ever experienced in my life. I was 23. We had dated for about a year and deep down I was miserable with him. He treated me bad. He took advantage of my kindness and willingness to be a good girlfriend. He took me for granted. He never chose me over his friends (even though I chose him over my friends all too frequently). All in all, he was not a good boyfriend. Everyone who saw us interact was wondering what in the hell I was thinking. I will tell you what I was thinking. I was thinking that I finally found someone who loved me. I thought that for sure if I could get this man to love me than I was in fact lovable. I was trying to prove to myself that someone in the universe was capable of saying “I love you” to me—something that I had previously thought was completely impossible. I also was thinking that because I was so unlovable, he was the best I could ever dream of being with and I’d had better appreciate those words while I had them, because I may never hear them again. It was as though I was feasting on my last meal. You would think that as miserable as I was with him I would have been happy to break up and be freed from him. I wasn’t. I was devastated. I was holding on to him as my last shred of human worth, and when he looped me off, I felt as though my very existence could be looped off without a single person taking notice.

 It was a tough time in my life, but I don't want anyone to think that it is how I still feel. I don't want anyone to feel sorry for this period of time in my life. I look at it as one of the most valuable learning experiences in my life. It's like those cliché sayings about having to see how dark things can really get before being able to appreciate the light. Well my friends, I can finally say I know and appreciate what it feels like to love yourself, because I truly know what it is like to loathe yourself.

I now understand the light and life that comes from truly and sincerely loving oneself. The Doc was the only person who has been successful in my life at teaching me to love myself. For this, I will love her forever. She has made my life bright and enjoyable. I know the title of my blog sounds uber cheesy, but I kid you not, I had NO CLUE what life could be like until I started seeing it through her eyes. I was alive (breathing in and out) but I was not alive (finding joy in the journey) until I found her. That is what I mean by living half alive.

So, I am sure those of you who find yourself to be difficult to love are dying to know just what it is she said that made it click with me… Here is one of my favorite paraphrased explanations on self esteem from the Doc:

Self esteem is a person’s awareness of their value. That’s earned. If no matter what you do, there is no judgment towards you, everything you do us just all wonderful then you have an inflated notion about yourself not built on earning it. And its ephemeral (short lived). Our self esteem comes from our efforts. Self esteem comes from impressing the self, and you impress the self with hard work and tenacity. Once you learn that you can accomplish a frustrating or a difficult task because there is deeper in you, you will find self esteem. That truly impresses the self. When you come to know that by your own efforts you are ok… that is the solid stuff. Getting hurt and surviving it will also make you solid.

A selfish man “loving me” never taught me any self esteem. Working hard and sacrificing myself to serve others-- did. Working hard to look honestly at my weaknesses and putting forth real effort to improve on those weaknesses-- did. Coming to learn what a real woman looks like and acts like and putting forth great effort to become just that-- did. Putting forth hard work in school and in my job--did. Learning how to become a better friend-- did. Owning up, swallowing my pride, apologizing for my wrongdoings and taking responsibility for my actions-- did. Looking in the mirror, and telling that tough critic in my head to shut the hell up-- did. Finally believing that I am beautiful, inside and out--did. Finally understanding that I do have something amazing to offer a man in a relationship-- did.  

I used to think that I would be lucky to have any crumb bum who would take someone as unimpressive as me. I no longer think that. Now I know that whoever chooses me, will be the luckiest man in the world. I now know that I have the world to offer someone. I now know that I deserve the best and will hold out till I find nothing less. One day, one lucky man will fall madly in love with this gorgeous red head.