When reading Mercy, I found myself feeling such sympathy for Andrea.
She barely had a childhood. She spent most of her life being taken
advantage of, abused, and not valued at all. Andrea expresses her
emotions in such a way that it seems as though she has no self worth.
She does not value herself because no one else ever has. I think the
saddest part of that is that it most likely fed into the vicious cycle
of being sexually assaulted and treated in a demeaning manor. She has
low self esteem so she puts herself in situations where she can receive
any kind of validation, no matter how momentary, so she can feel better
about herself. Also, she does not seem to feel like she is good enough
to deserve any better.
It is so sad to read this because I find that in real life there are
many similar situations. Women with low self esteems use sex to fill the
void. They want to feel desirable and will do whatever (or whoever) it
takes so they can feel that way. So many women think that their bodies
are their only assets and that they are not worth anything more. I think
this is such a travesty and it was definitely hard to read Andrea's
tales of emotional distress.
It's true and it's sad that women, espeically those with low self esteem, often resort to using their bodies in an effort to get the attention they crave because they feel they have no other reason or way to get it. I'm sure it's been happening since the dawn of time.
ReplyDeleteMy concern is, how are we ever going to get these women to gain their self-esteem? I feel as though By the time you get to the point where you act like this, every time you have sex with someone only to be loved, you create more emptiness inside and make your self-esteem even worse, it's a snowball effect.