And the day came ...

[sage]

What the hell did we women do to ourselves in the last gy enerations? Ok, now we can feel free to express the masculine aspects of our personalities and still struggle to suppress some of the female aspects to be able to survive in the workplace....

But when did we become afraid to be vulnerable? Why is it coming out sideways (in sarcasm and critisism, etc.) instead of outright and honest?

In my sitch, my career choice (totally male dominated) + a bitter, angry mother + a weak-willed father + my own relentless need to feel safe has resulted in my spending almost all of my time and energy creating an elaborate safety net for myself all the while communicating for h. a variety of things: you can't take care of me right, I won't let you take care of me, I won't let you take advantage of me, etc.

And what the heck have we done to our men? We've advanced in many ways, but they are lost...feeling like they don't know how to be men anymore.

"Men are from Mars..." was tremendous eye opener for me in terms of the things that I had done in my m. to essentially destroy my h's spirit.

We can't help them learn how to be intimate by demanding it or nagging them to do it. We sure can't show them how to be honestly vulnerable with us if we're showing bad examples of it ourselves.

So this is where I am right now...figuring out how to ask for reassurance w/o sending the message that he's doing it wrong + being vulnerable w/o being angry at him.

Sage