Blog

An episode of Sex and the City shows Carrie waking up from a nightmare as she lays sleeping next to her boyfriend Aiden. What is causing her distress she asks? Did she forget to pay her bills, did she miss an appointment, what? She then realizes that her anxiety is due to the fact that her relationship with Aiden is perfect. She’s not used to having a boyfriend who is honest, sensitive, loving, inclusive, appreciative, responsive, responsible and emotionally available. She’s used to dating the Mr. Bigs. Illusive, overly-confident, unavailable men. She is addicted to the constant drama provided by having to chase these men in her life.

This episode rang a bell for me. It rang LOUDLY because I’m finally in a relationship with an amazing guy who is honest, sensitive, loving, inclusive, responsive, appreciative, responsible and emotionally available. He’s all that plus more. I’m used to dating Mr. Bigs.

Why would I want to date men like Mr. Big? The answer…they remind me of my father. As a child, I was always trying to win my father’s approval and love. Affirmation is my first love language and my father was not one to complement or show his affection. Neither were my Mr. Bigs. The more illusive they were, the harder I would try to win their love. The perfect challenge for me was the guy I dated that lived 3,200 miles away. I call this my fairy tale relationship in the bad, make-believe kind of way with the ending “She lived sadly after all.”

Getting back to the episode of Sex and the City, Carrie decides she needs to create some space in her relationship with Aiden. It’s too perfect, she needs some drama. She tells Aiden he is too available. After not hearing from him for two days, she questions her actions, thinking she may have played her cards wrong. Carrie realizes that in her relationship with Aidan, she’s been behaving like Big, and Aiden has been acting like the sensitive and available guy she always wanted Big to be. In a rush to try and undue any damage done, Carrie shows up at breakfast with Aidan and the family.

I have another idea. What if Carrie is attracted to the drama because she doesn’t feel like she deserves to be loved? My girlfriends have tossed this analysis on me, but that never resonated with me. I honestly feel I deserve to be loved.

However, it now makes perfect sense! I’m thinking I deserve to be loved like my first male role model, my father. I now realize my love standard was too low. Aim high for men like Aiden, aim low and you get emotionally unavailable men.

Fortunately for me, I’ve broken my addiction to drama. No more fairy tales (Cinderella was never a favorite, I loved the story of Alice in Wonderland. I still have my Big Gold Book edition).

Wait…didn’t Alice spend the entire story chasing the White Rabbit who had his own agenda?!