Perfectly Imperfect
People are crazy. And you know that point where you’ve absolutely had enough? I had more than enough because all my life, I've been a people pleaser. Since infancy, I had no choice but to believe that there wasn't a state of just being around others for me. No, being wasn't enough. I had to do something for people to love me. I had to give them a reason to stick around. And so, I did.
The first challenge, even though it left the deepest roots of trauma, came with an easy starting point. My father had to love me, considering I carried half of his DNA, even though my birth took away his greatest wish in life.
Born as an infant with the chubbiest cheeks one can have, I opened my eyes to a world where I didn't belong. I wasn’t accepted, just settled. The fact that the ultrasound had already shown my gender, revealing that I’d be born as a girl, didn't change much for my father's hopes. So, he didn’t bother coming up with a girl’s name because he wholeheartedly believed the machine was broken.
That's why I spent the first five months of my life nameless until my sisters got creative enough to come up with a name.
Imge. That's me. The irony is that ‘Imge’ stands for the dream everyone wants to have, yet no one gets to reach. That’s the opposite of what I've had up against me all my life.
I was born into a world where I wasn’t someone’s dream but the one who took it away. Of course, my father loved me and gave everything he could to offer me the perfect life, but that perfection worked reciprocally. For me to have it, I had to be perfect too. I had to be my father's perfect little girl to make him proud.
This still stands as my biggest wish in life.
It’s funny to think how childhood traumas have a way of haunting us throughout our entire lives. Having to prove to the first and biggest love of my life that I was worthy of his love turned into my biggest mental curse with every man I got romantically involved with.
Years after my birth, another competition started. I had to compete for my sisters’ love, and that taught me something different. My sisters had the same desire to be chosen, but they didn’t choose me when I didn’t reflect my choice on their terms. This often happened with my older sister. I had to always play my part properly by acting as if I never took sides while still showing up for both of them when they weren’t speaking. I still remember times when my older sister punished me with her cruelty because, to her, it looked like I was siding with my other sister.
This battle goes back to since I gained consciousness. I'd be lying if I said these experiences hadn’t given me anything. They gave me skills, skills of mediating and being political. I am now perfectly able to avoid conflict, which I can tell from experience hasn’t always worked in my best interest.
And there's a battle I’ve never had the chance to fight. I still struggle with anxious attachment patterns that started when my mother began leaving me at daycare when I was two years old. I still have vivid memories of our car rides there, where I screamed, cried, and begged her not to leave me. Now I know that her intention was never to abandon me. She was just trying to provide for her family. She had to work, but try explaining that to a two-year-old. I still smile, half-broken, when I remember the fluffy tire man she used to point out from the car window to distract me from crying.
Then came the time when she picked me up from daycare. Ironically, the same little girl who had screamed and cried in the morning wouldn’t even recognize her. I think that was my way of trying to punish her for leaving me. I knew she would feel bad, but I guess, as a kid, I hadn’t developed full empathy yet.
My mom, on the other hand, is the smartest person I’ve ever met. She would buy a Kinder Surprise chocolate and always hide it in the same spot in the car just to get me excited to see her. A simple but effective trick.
Today, at age 26, my favourite chocolate is still Kinder Surprise. I guess I’ve never gotten over the subtle feeling of being chosen by the person I love the most that came with that chocolate every time I saw it.
Home wasn’t the only place where I had to try my best. Things weren’t easy at daycare either. For a long time, I was the only girl there and wished for a friend I could truly relate to. Then came Maya. She was a big part of the first half of my life, and when she came, it felt like I had come back to life. I finally had a girlfriend. But her love wasn’t unconditional either. She knew how to play her cards, especially for a three-year-old. Since we were the only two girls in our school, she used that to her advantage by threatening not to be my friend if I didn’t do what she wanted.
That was a real challenge for me, and probably one of the strongest influences on my people-pleasing side. If you don’t give people what they expect, you end up alone.
These five people have had the biggest influence on my identity. They created what I both love and hate most about myself. The sixth critic came later: myself.
Until then, my idea of who I was had always been shaped by others. Then something happened that I’ll never forget. When I was around 23 years old, even basic movements became hard. What others could do easily, I couldn’t. I couldn’t walk. Literally. That brought the deepest shame and self-disgust I’ve ever felt.
The years that followed were harder. Eventually, I had to accept defeat. I paused my master’s in the UK and returned to Turkey to get treatment. I think the biggest grief I experienced was for the part of myself I thought I’d never have again. I felt hopeless and saw nothing but darkness when I looked at the future.
That’s when I hated myself the most. That’s when I wished I could die. Honestly, it didn’t feel scary. The fear I had wasn’t nearly as bad as the fear of living the way I was.
Yet, even then, at my worst, I was still too in love with life. So I didn’t give up.
I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease at 25. Even though it was devastating, I felt relieved. I finally had a diagnosis and a treatment plan. After a month on medication, I started getting better, and eventually, I felt better than I had before.
Still, the idea stayed with me, the idea that I was somehow deficient by nature. I’ve been through so many moments in my life where I felt unlovable. Those moments didn’t always come from something real. They were shaped by how I saw things back then, and they look different now when I view them from another perspective.
This was a fact, and still is. I’d be lying if I said I have everything figured out or that I’ve made peace with all my struggles. I haven’t. But I’m still trying, and I know I’m strong enough now to say these things to myself:
Don’t wait to be seen. See yourself. But don’t put your faith in people who refuse to really see you. They might act like they do, but they only notice what makes them comfortable. To them, you become the shape of whatever emptiness they want to fill. You can become anything for anyone, but not everyone is able to hold you.
Don’t twist yourself to fit. If your heart tells you the bond isn’t yours to carry, listen to it. Don’t keep going back to sleepless nights and clenched jaws. You are worthy of love. Don’t stay just because someone else stays. You’ll only come alive around the people you choose, not the ones who merely remain.
