I am so screwed up!

I had my bi-weekly therapy session yesterday. The topic of the hour: Why I was feeling such strong aprehension regarding an upcoming get-away with Prince Consort - completely free of the Goddesses in Training. Surprisingly enough, it had nothing to do with not knowing what to do alone as is the case with many couples when they are wtih out the kiddos after long periods of 'family-time'. No lack of ideas in that department! What it turns out to be is that I don't feel worthy of an honest, no-strings-attached gift. Something in my twisted past has lead me to believe that I A) Am not deserving of acts of kindness and B) That gifts always carry a price. How messed up is that? It has to be something pretty deep because I certainly have received kindness and gifts out of pure love and caring from friends and loved ones over the years. It isn't like I have been on the receiving end of any Trojan Horses that I can recall. But, regardless of its true root, the bottom line is that I have been feeling like I am not worthy of having a relaxing weekend away, and by accepting it I am committing myself to some sort of 'pay-back'. The example that we kept coming back to was corn. Yes, corn. Prince consort was cleaning up Goddess in Training #3 after she finished eating corn the other night. Being the 2 year old that she is, she had smeared butter all over her highchair tray and tossed several kernals on the floor. In cleaning up, PC rinsed the tray with water, put it back on the chair, and put the chair back in its corner. Done. The last time I checked water does absolutely nothing in terms of clearing away greasy,slimey butter off plastic. This being so, the tray remained covered in a nicely rinsed film of butter. eeewww. And the kernals that landed on the floor remained where they landed. Apparently Male Pattern Blindness strikes again and PC did not see them there or recognize the need to remove them. This situtaion irritated me beyond belief. One of those times when helping me out really wasn't helping me very much. But, because of the upcoming trip, I felt that somehow I had no right to complain about the corn. I told myself "pick up the damn corn for cripes sake! You are getting a fabulous weekend away for a birthday gift when there are lots of other women who are lucky to get a card and pizza, you ungrateful wench!" (ala' there are children starving in Africa so eat every bit on your plate) Fortunately for my sanity my anal retentive obsession with the corn on the floor won and I did point it out, but not without tons of guilt and feeling like a real bitch.

Thankfully my therapist was able to slap me into the right frame of mind. I am now looking forward to my wonderful weekend escape sans guilt or reluctance. And I can still bitch about corn as much as I want too!

posted by Unknown at 12:33 am