My Inferiority Complex

And where it came from.

Beginning with a quote from daughter which she attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt, "no one can make you feel inferior without your consent" and proceeding to evaluate my feelings of inferiority, I have concluded:

If your parents feel that complimenting and approving of their children, even a little, will make them conceited, they do not compliment them. The children never get conceited.

I think it was a 1930's kind of puritanism. I know that my mother felt very strongly especially about not praising appearance or good fortune. She was inclined to praise educational accomplishments, slightly. She never did it or didn't do it in a mean spirited sense. She really believed that it was important not to feed any false senses of entitlement. Funny, too, because for her age and time she was a forward thinking woman. She had two college degrees and taught for ten years before falling for a handsome and somewhat dastardly riding instructor.

So, I was not praised. In fact, when I walked in the door after appearing for the first time on a local television station (mid 1950's), the only comment about my appearance was that I should have stood up straighter.

We were from very strained financial circumstances but lived in a seriously upper income suburb where a girl's value was mainly determined by how many cashmere sweaters, Pendleton skirts and Spaulding saddle shoes fit in her wardrobe. I had one hand me down rust colored cashmere sweater. I went to work as a record librarian in Milwaukee's first Top 40 radio station at the age of 15 not because I was dying to be in radio but because the job was offered and I was in dire need of a new winter coat. The Teamster's Union was on strike and except for Mother's income as a substitute teacher we were doing without a lot.

I was never ashamed of how I looked, once the braids were cut and I had regular hair like the other girls! My clothes did not look rag barrel. Frankly, my radio station job afforded me a little glamor as did my television appearances. I felt accepted albeit different at my fancy high school. Well, maybe I felt a little inferior.

But my sense of inferiority was born before I was old enough to consent to it. I guess that's my main objection to the Roosevelt quote or the applications to which Dr. Phil has tied it in recent years. When people my age were being encouraged and complimented, especially for shallow accomplishments, I was already convinced that I had made none.

I was flat chested, skinny, had straight hair and was not obviously talented. Sometimes the boys with whom I played baseball, ran races or "hung out" remarked on these obvious shortcomings.

When I was a 26 year old divorcee with three children a man with whom I worked and with whom I was quite smitten told me that I had "great legs." I thought he must be kidding. Now legs are not really a cash crop, not like bosoms or curls, but for a couple of months every summer in Wisconsin, and more months in Texas, one could showcase them . I don't think I took the compliment very seriously.

All of this is leading to a weird conclusion. After nearly seventy years on the planet and in spite of all my Mother's efforts to the contrary, I am suddenly becoming vain and conceited. I don't know why. No one, not my family, my religion and certainly not Dr. Phil, has given me permission. Its getting bad. When a young person is stunned that I am "so old" and look "so good" for someone that old, I'm believing them. I actually see and own photographs in which I think I look passing good. I even change out my profile picture on Facebook with several that I find quite pleasing.

How does one overcome so many years of "inferiority" ... and we're talking the truly superficial kind ... not some heavy psychological trauma, as one approaches one's golden years.

Maybe because there's nothing to be gained, no one keeping score any longer and damn few people even noticing.

But I do look in more mirrors than I used to and I am not always disappointed.