Needless to say, things were not all bad in my family. We had our share of laughs and good times. I fear many may think I have savaged my family with a vengeance.

Not so. I have learnt much in the last few years. Much that was hidden or disguised. It needed to be uncovered. Hard to admit, but my family were my unwitting mentors.

It is not for me to malign or badmouth anyone. But I needed to go deep. My story is ultimately one of redemption, but it has been a rocky road getting there.

Growing up, we did not have a voice. Feelings were stifled. We were often criticized. Some have it worse than others, but no one is spared – we all carry scars.

I was never exposed to a healthy relationship. Instead, my repertoire displayed what was lacking – esteem, confidence, worth, as well as fear and distrust.

Hardly descriptive of emotional health.

But my big takeaway? I have no real sense of self. That was wrested away from me at an early age without my knowledge and/or consent.

I envy the girls with a positive sense of self. You know the ones. They walk upright, gaze forward, fearless. They exude an easy confidence which is quite something to behold.

I do not have that same sense of ease. Unlike those girls, I am self-conscious and on guard at all times, trying my utmost to stack up. I clearly have much to learn.

Not that the responsibility lies with my parents. I am flawed, broken even. Damaged good, in other words. I don’t think I was in denial, I just had no clue.

I was, in fact, utterly ignorant of the state of my emotional health. And what I didn’t understand is that I would only ever attract someone equally as damaged.

It was irresponsible for me to expect more than I could give to a partner. But expect I did. Blinded as I was to what I brought to the equation. Or more precisely, didn’t bring.

The hollow feeling that was my default should have indicated something was off. It just didn’t register. Even when it did, it never revealed the extent of the problem.

As they say, hindsight is twenty/twenty. I can now see why I had the relationships I did. It is uncanny how things have played out. The universe is definitely no fool.

I was in no position to expect the emotional closeness I always desired. Not, that is, until I recognized that I was in a spiral to the death with an ironical twist of fate.

We want what was missing from our lives. Yet we are drawn to what we experienced. It is imperative to disrupt this destructive cycle if we are ever to be free.

Our past will continue to haunt us until we are ready to confront it and make the conscious choice to say enough. Until then, we are more or less doomed.

Given all that, is there any wonder what came next?