Personal Narrative: The Autonomy Of My Father

I believe I experienced emotional autonomy when I started to de-idealize my father. Prior to entering the adolescent period of my life, I already did not think very highly of my father. For as long as I can remember my father had been around physically, but he never he was never present and this made very unreliable. But, he was my dad and I guess I still thought that he could be better. However, as I reached adolescence and as my emotional autonomy started to develop, I started to see him not as my father, but as just a person with no connection to me. This allowed me to really reflect on our relationship and I realized that while I did love my dad, I did not like who he was a person. I believe that this eventually led me to experience detachment,

Growing up I was raised catholic and was raised to believe that to believe that in order to be a good catholic and person, I had to adhere to all the rules as well as attend church. However, since I was a child I never really felt any connection towards religion, and only participated in it because I didn’t really have much of a choice or say in the matter. But, as I entered adolescence I became more vocal about my displeasure in having to adhere to an organized religion. As I got older I realized that I could be good person and still have some spiritual beliefs without having to be a part of any organized religion or attend church. My mother and other adults seemed to humor me, and would always assure me I’d get over it and come back to the church. That of course did not end up happening. For a long time it was a real part of contention between my mother and I, as I felt disrespected whenever she tried to force it upon me. Eventually, my mother did come around to accepting my choices, and now I only attend church once a year as support for my mother, as service we attend is on the anniversary of my maternal great grandmother’s