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SEARCH FOR VALIDATION
What do we do when as adult men, we discover that we have been wounded by our dads?
When I made this discovery many years ago, I had to work through a whole range of emotions. I was angry that my dad missed my heart, and that I did not get the things that I needed from him, or certainly not enough. Before I get to the “what to do” part, I need to talk about why so many of us feel such a loss when talking about our dads.
Every boy seeks validation and we seek it first from our fathers. When we are young, we all have a question…Am I good enough? Do I have what it takes? Am I worthy of love? Am I enough?
The definition of validation is the recognition or affirmation that a person or their feelings or opinions are valid or worthwhile.
The problem is that most of us did not get the validation we needed from our fathers, or not enough. If those questions were not answered, we will spend our whole life seeking the answer from everything, and everyone that we think we can get it from. We seek it from our job, our diploma, or our 401K. When those things are going well and we are getting the validation we seek it feels great, but we all know that those things are fleeting, and just as quickly as we felt validated, we are back on the prowl for more.
Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash
I am the youngest in my family by 6, 8, and 10 years. I spent the majority of my childhood feeling alone, and most of the time invisible in my family. My dad was a good man, and he worked hard to provide for his family. Even though I knew that my dad loved me, I also never felt like he had time for me, like I wasn’t enough to get his love and validation. I have no memories of my dad playing catch with me, or taking me fishing. He was always doing projects around the house, but I was never invited to do any of it with him. As I have said in other writings, my dad had a short fuse and so the emotion that I was most familiar with was his anger. As I write about validation I am painfully aware that for the most part my dad did not answer my question.
Throughout my whole life I would run toward anyone, and anything that I thought would validate me, and I would run away from everyone and everything that I thought would invalidate me.
No matter how hard I tried, the message that I heard was that I was unwanted, that I was not enough, and that quickly turned into a deep self-hatred.
Fifteen years ago I heard for the first time that through the work of Jesus Christ I am a Beloved son of God. I knew that I was saved, and that God loved me enough that He sent His only son to prove that love. However, I never embraced the truth that:
I am enough! All of my striving for validation could be brought to the foot of the cross, and that Jesus took all of my pain, insecurity, and self-hatred on Himself. He is my validation. He has answered my question that no one else could. It is transforming the way that I see myself.
Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash
Even with this knowledge, we still have a hole in our stories that feels like it needs to be filled by our dads. So what do we do when we discover that dad never validated us? In my case my dad died nearly 30 years ago and so I needed to forgive him, and eventually come the place where I can say that he did the best that he could with what he had to work with. But what if your dad is still here? What do we do?
Here is my best shot at answering that question. If you have an opportunity to have a conversation with your dad, make sure that your motive is right. This will no doubt need to be something that you need to walk with God in. Ask him to open the door for conversation, and to prepare your heart to go back to your dad, and to prepare your dad’s heart to receive what you have to say. Try not to go back to him angry, that will cloud your judgement, and derail your intent. Also, don’t go back to him for healing and validation…go back to him for reconciliation. After all, that is what we long for isn’t it? Abba is your true Father and He validates you as His Beloved son…you are enough, and in His eyes, you have what it takes.
And the work that Jesus has done is all you need to receive the healing that we want and need. I believe that more than anything else, Jesus wants to heal our broken hearts, and restore our relationships.
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