I’ve never met my birth father. My birth mother angrily refused to say much to her family about how I got here. I am not used to men being around and I think I have subconsciously gotten used to that state of affairs. I developed a great fear of men from the many, many scary and bad experiences I went through as a little girl with the few adult men who drifted in and out of my childhood residences.
I didn’t trust men to be kind, I learned later in therapy, nor did I expect them to care about others or capable of having tender feelings. Apparently, even when I was well over 16, I still saw men through my injured 6-year-old’s eyes: perverted, sex-crazed, un-empathetic and ready to cast you off as soon as you’ve outlived your usefulness to them. I suspected them all to have selfish ulterior motives, even when they were being kind. It’s hard to have a man around, even if you like him, if subconsciously, you believe all men to be horrible, selfish bullies who are out to take advantage of you.
I’ve not trusted myself to keep from dating such men, like the ones who my birth mother and aunt drew into their lives, that I’ve hardly dated or had relationships at all.