Why Dating Flawed Women Is The Best Thing That Can Happen To You

by Sejal Parikh · June 24, 2015

“There’s no right person, just different flavors of wrong. Why is this? Because you yourself are wrong in some way, and you seek out partners who are wrong in some complementary way. But it takes a lot of living to grow fully into your own wrongness. And it isn’t until you finally run up against your deepest demons, your unsolvable problems—the ones that make you truly who you are—that we’re ready
to find a lifelong mate. Only then do you finally know what you’re looking for. You’re looking for THE wrong person! But not just any wrong person: the right wrong person—someone you lovingly gaze upon and think, ‘This is the problem I want to have. I have found that special person who is wrong for me in just the right way. Let our scars fall in love.’” – Galway Kinnell

Part I

I look at myself in the mirror, noticing my crooked teeth, the line where my bra presses in, my goofy knees, and my large, large feet! Then, as I sit hogging on cupcakes, I think about not fitting into my old jeans anymore and almost put the cupcake down, but then, I don’t let go of my heart’s desires! Just as I am about to take a large bite, my phone buzzes and I take in the message:

I think it is…it really is…I don’t want to live my life like this, with what’s happening…and I don’t see any hope you will change…this is the end.

Suggested read: What is romance to a woman?

Image source: Pixabay, under Creative Commons License

A silent tear escapes from the corner of my eye and I fight the urge to reply. It is the end, I think, and replay the last three years with him in my mind – the moments when we’d laughed together until our stomachs hurt, those when we’d made sweet love, but mostly, the many others when he couldn’t stand ME.

Yes, I am not who HE wants. I am not the perfect woman. I am flawed and hate perfection with a passion – not out of spite or envy, but because just like the fairy tales I grew up listening to, perfection is a mythical creature one will never find. Perfect isn’t real, it will never be. So I wonder if waiting for the perfect woman will ever yield anything. Maybe, he hasn’t gotten around to understanding this yet. Maybe, some day he will. Maybe. Maybe not.

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

Either way, this is the end, I repeat, and finish my cupcake. I guess I haven’t learnt to crawl out of the space between wanting people who don’t want me and not wanting those who do. That’s a certain madness, and people blame me and I blame myself too. It is crazy, I know, but I am yet to taste the love when two people can want to be with each other in a particular place at a particular time, and want to keep wanting each other, in spite of each other. But I had made myself a promise to never stop believing in the existence of such a love. And I dare myself to fall in it. And I believe I am worthy of receiving it too.

Yet I am not naïve enough to think it will be easy; far from it. More so because of me, coz I am the only half of the WE-to-be that I know now. I am flawed. I am difficult. I bring every travesty that’s rocked me, with me to the table. I don’t pretend to be something I am not and nor do I expect the same. I have wondered if I can be loved. I have experienced the misery and suffering of heartache in my own company. I have cried and suffered and learnt to comfort myself in anguish. I have risen through the despair, my belief strong as ever in the wonders of love and life. My past means I’ve lived … I’ve prevailed. And my eyes and ears are open, my heart accepting – of all that is complex and baffling. Coz I know just how hard falling and staying in love can be – and to me, it is quite the task, just like styling my hair, even on a good hair day (which is as rare as love that endures!).

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

But through all of this, I wonder if anybody else finds ‘being flawed’ as the natural state of things, can give up on their ever-elusive search for the mythical creature- ‘the perfect woman’ and love a flawed woman as well as they do themselves.

Part II

Seven years later, as I rise from among the crumpled sheets between which I just made love to a man who not only loves me with my floppy arms, my wanky feet, and by the way, finds my crooked teeth cute – I smile. I look at the man, unsure why and how he could love me so much – in spite of my issues, traumas, dramas, and the deepest flaws! And I replay our years together as boyfriend/girlfriend, and now as husband/wife.

Suggested read: Are you dating a real man?

In doing so, I piece together how our flaws have fallen in love and why he has come to love me so, so much, in spite of my flawed nature. Here they are (now, they may not really seem like reasons why skipping the dream of the perfect woman and embracing a flawed one is the BEST thing to have happened, but bear with me and read it all the way):

1. I love too hard and care way too much

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

I wear my heart on my sleeve and might overwhelm you with my emotional flow. I will surprise you with such intense emotions you may worry the world will crack into half. I will frighten you in the ways I will want you, all of you and shall unabashedly, unashamedly declare so. I am an emotional pistol who can fire at any time and you may be worried the bullet will get you. But I do not know any other way to love, I do not know any other way to care. I cannot make do with anything less – I go all in or do not put my foot through the door at all. There is no lukewarm love for me. Mediocrity is all prevalent, and love, for me, shouldn’t be its victim. I will love you, like no another, making myself a home of a person, dousing every other name you have loved, and you shall only be gripped by the novelty of a love so terrifying in its capacity to be whole, that you will revel in its beauty and wonder.

2. I explode too often

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

That fight about your messy room or that innocent remark may not really be about it at all, but tied to something deeper. Yes, I am guilty of sweeping the real roots under the rug and allowing it to seep out in tiny, dirty swirls but I am as ashamed of as anyone else, and my guilt is punishment enough. When the swirls grate on my nerves too much, for you still refuse to address the ‘deeper’ thing (I sometimes wonder if I know what it is too), I pull the trigger and let myself go. To see it pouring out such, even when I had made a promise to myself ten times during the day to not allow it to happen, isn’t easy. And I know it’s hard on you too. But picking is ingrained in me. There’s some wire that God forgot to balance out when he made us and you’d know coz all women – mothers, grandmothers, sisters – everyone does it. The intensity varies. But we do it coz we care. Dear husband, thank you for forgiving me each time. I try to control it; I really do. And you have to admit, very often, we do get to the ‘root’ and change a li’l bit about US for the better. Truce.

3. I am pushy

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

I am a vessel of emotion and dating me is constant drama. Getting married to me – a reality series! No kidding. I will remind you ten times of the deck you are supposed to make, the excel that you left incomplete last night, the shoes that you wanted to order on Amazon (okay, that I’d do for you), and yes, the fact that you have to still call the plumber for the leaking tap. And no, I am not going to call the plumber coz you have been promising me for two weeks now! And that sure gives me the ‘late-fee’ pass to be extra pushy. With my husband and me, my pushy nature complements his laid-back one perfectly and I have saved his hide ever-so-often that all he feels about this is gratitude. <boy, am I blessed!> But as for the rest of the couples out there, pushiness is not a red flag. It is a symptom that there are things that need to be addressed – a gap between the partners’ expectation of what things should be like and the reality. The trick is to find the delicate balance, weed out unrealistic expectations and bridge the gap. Easy, breezy, and wonderful!

4. I believe in the ‘right way’ of doing things, my way of doing them

Image source: Shutterstock

Now, I am guilty of this – I like towels folded a certain way, dishes arranged a certain way, and even my cheese burgers made exactly the way I like them. But you know what, towels work all the same, even when folded the wrong way, dishes … well, the maid and I have a secret signal for this and I can make do with the shredded cheese and not so perfect onion rings. After all, marriage is about learning to give and take a little, adjust a little and let go of the compulsion that you cannot tolerate anything that disrupts your routine a little bit. I have learnt this. But you know what, my hubby is even sweeter. He agrees I am always right – every damn time – at least 99% of the time. And he hates it coz he loves arguing; but he loves it, coz I am on his team and win! 😉

5. I often force you to do YOU-work

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

I am not changing you, only pushing you to be the version of you I know you’d always wanted to be. So, when you are being a couch potato, flipping channels, and downing beer, I’d force you to get off your lazy ass and work on you. On your career, on your personal goals, and on your relationships too! And all of these need effort, baby!

6. I expect you to love me more than you’ve ever loved another being

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

I will not take second place under any circumstances. I want you – ALL of you – to be mine. Past, present, and future. I don’t need to be your everything but I must be the first part of everything in your life. And you know that I would do exactly the same for you … so …

7. My flaws bring out more flaws

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

Yes, that’s the bit about being so bad with painting nails or doing my hair or even nitpicking. You see I am a mess – you see I can dizzy you – that I am volatile and susceptible to all the wrecking surges of anger, nostalgia, grief or plain neurois. But that’s the thing, as much as I can make you worry about the things you should be giving more thought than the re-run of Breaking Bad, you do everything to soothe my frayed nerves. But you know, each time he looks at me, he makes me believe I am perfect for him – and I have begun to believe that for the perfect woman to be flawed is more than okay … coz …

8. That allows for some stirring in the pot, some shaking up, something new

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

In this process of allowing each other to be, in and with our flaws, we pave the path to a recognition, an understanding, and further growth and evolution. For what are we, if we refuse to learn and grow!

Suggested read: Are YOU your relationship’s worst enemy

9. We come to live REAL love

Image source: Shutterstock

Within the chaotic mess of our flaws, we begin to choose each other to brave the chaos, hand-in-hand, every day, moment after moment until we can taste the LOVE that endures – the love that stays. The love which is brave enough to muster that endless patience, the love that chooses and re-chooses to stay, to build, to sustain, and to survive. In a flawed existence, we have come closest to living the ‘perfect’ love that has taught us to be patient and understanding – to CHOOSE each other, for now and for always.

10. There’s nothing like being loved for yourself

Image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

And I can testify to that. As much as my husband can, for he is bringing the forest down right now with his snores! But I love him – so much!

And as I finish typing this, he has woken and looks at me with his sleepy eyes. I have an irresistible urge to kiss him, full on the mouth. And I will…

Featured image source: Google, copyright-free image under Creative Commons License

Summary