Freud believed we select someone like our oppositely sexed parent, but it has been updated to account for the theory that we select a partner similar to the parent (male or female) with which we have 'unfinished business'. That is the parent that resulted in any gaps in our childhood emotional development. In a nutshell, I selected someone like my mother, who was domineering, critical, perfectionistic, BPD/Narcissistic, self absorbed and co-dependent. I wish I hadn't, but then perhaps it's an opportunity to develop the bits which were underdeveloped in me as a child.
Oooh, that explains why I am a female and ended up with somebody that is more like my mother than my father. My mother has never been emotionally available and always makes everything about her. In all honesty, it took me a while to realize that my husband wasn't much different. I had been conditioned to accept that kind of behavior.
I hadn't talked to my dad in a long time. I found out that my mother wasn't home so I gave dad a quick call and we were comparing notes about my husband and my mother. When he saw her pulling down the street, he told me and I quickly got off the phone because I knew that she would give him hell if he caught him on the phone. She would make some snarky remark about him talking to his girlfriends.
