I want to preface this by saying that I truly, wholeheartedly LOVE and appreciate my Parents. They provided me with an amazing childhood, and tried their best; but today, I've finally realized something weird about their parenting style which has caused some major issues to arise in my adult life.

When I was born, we were poor; but by the time I was 7 or so, my Parents got their sh*t together and we found ourselves in the middle class. We had a house over our head, food to eat, the whole nine. But they were constantly working (Dad was a traveling sales rep, Mom was a ER Nurse) - so I spend a LOT of time alone; but that wasn't necessarily the problem, because when they were around, they were SO loving and spent so much time with me.

BUT - today I've realized that their love language to me was through words of affection, praise; compliments to the EXTREME. For example, I played a good baseball game: "you're a rockstar! you could probably go pro!". When they'd see me just merely treat another kid nicely: "OMG, you are SUCH an incredible person!", etc, etc, etc.

Seems like incredible support, right? But we all know, both as kids; and especially as teenagers and young adults - we fuck up. We keep things from our Parents, whether it was lying about staying out later than told to, or cheating on the test they praised you getting an "A" on.

And when you hear all of that praise, but know that you have your flaws, or downright didn't even deserve it - it can really f*ck with your self worth. I'm seeing this same thing happen a lot in my relationship (2 years, cohabiting) - where even the smallest of mistakes I'm criticized for - I feel like the biggest piece of sh*t in the world, and it makes me hard to believe the praise my GF gives me. I see it in my job - I overwork in work to try to live up to the praises my Parents gave me. The list goes on and on.

Even right here, right now - as I type this I keep thinking "well it could've been worse - they could've abused me, etc." - and that's true; but I also know that love-bombing isn't too great either. I will say, though, I feel like something has clicked, and at least this awareness can help me through both the praise, and criticism I get in the future now that I am at least AWARE that I shouldn't be praised even for bad things, and I DO deserve the praise for the good things that I DO do.