Perfection

I am the first born child of the first born son of a first born daughter of a first born son.

Yeah.

I’ve read articles that are for and against the whole birth order thing, but for me and what I’ve observed in my life, it rings pretty true.

I’m also married to a first born child. No WONDER my life’s a mess! Just kidding, I love my husband.

I am a perfectionist. I have always been a perfectionist. I accept imperfectness in others, but it is ABSOLUTELY unacceptable for me to be imperfect, however, I expect others to accept my imperfectness.

Make sense? I know, not so much.

Talk to my husband and he would laugh in your face about me being a perfectionist because NOTHING in my life is perfect. What does he know? He’s the type of perfectionist that does not accept imperfection whatsoever. That’s a whole other issue and I don’t want to get off topic. This is MY forum, so it gets to be about me.

My dad is a real perfectionist. So much so that it paralyzes him. He’s so concerned about being perfect that he’s incapable of doing anything for fear that it won’t be perfect. He blames his mother.

He asked me one time if I ever felt the pressures I do to be perfect from him. Nope. Never ever once. The only thing I ever felt from my dad while growing up was love and acceptance for being so awesome. He explained to me that he was pressured so much to be perfect from his mother that he was determined to not burden me with that issue.

Too late, Dad, sorry, I was born this way.

It seems to be ingrained in me to be the most perfect that I can be to the point that I am afraid to start things or attempt things because I’m so afraid of failing. Failing is not acceptable.

The very very worst thing I could do in this world would be to disappoint someone or let them down. It started out with fear of disappointing my parents, and it continues with the terror of letting my boys down. It’s the reason that I can never say no.

I did something (only once) that let my parents down in the worst way possible and I didn’t die and the world didn’t end, so I’m slowly getting over my fear of disappointing people. I still never ever want to let my boys down, though. I think that has more to do with being a mother than with my in-born perfectionism complex.