Where did the damage come from?

I am starting to explore some of the turning points in my life that lead to the major self-esteem issues I had (and sometimes still wrestle with) and how those led to an inability to love myself.  I not only didn't love myself, but when I first started looking at the issue, I realized I loathed myself on a very deep level.  I have thought a little about the reasons why, but I find the writing of this memoir requires I look a little deeper.  In the end, I think this will be a further healing process. 

I am noticing there are some very specific points in time where major shifts in my self-esteem happened, and those will be easy to write about, but I think a huge lot of this stuff is much more subtle.  I moved a lot as a kid.  Most of the moving happened before I entered high school.  In fact, I moved about 20 times before the age of 16.  I attended 7 elementary schools (well, technically only 6, but I attended one twice, from different  homes with not much if any overlap in school friends.)  I attended two middle schools, and one high school.  I have lamented to my mother over the years on the irony that she married a military man and we finally stopped moving around so much. 

I seem to remember that I always felt really shy when I went to a new school, but I always seemed to find a friend fairly early on.  It was usually not the "popular" kid in class, but most often also not the "loser".  It was usually the "nice" girl.  The one that liked everyone, and most everyone liked but wasn't "popular" for whatever dumb reasons kids have for selecting who the cool kids are.  I always had one good friend, and a few acquaintances that accepted me, but I also always had those that didn't like me because I was an interloper.  Often it was one of the fringe of "hangers on" that the nice girl was friendly with (just because she's so nice) but didn't particularly like so much.  This is the pattern that repeated over and over throughout elementary school and into junior high. 

And then there was the "problem period" of my life.... here is a summary of events from those few years:

• I mentioned above that Mom married a military man.  I was about twelve, then.  It was her 3rd marriage.  He was a tough military man, and had two sons that visited every other weekend.  (I also have a half sister who is never "half" in my mind.)
• Also around that time my birth father had made a reappearance in my life, but mostly his crazy family arranged it, trying to get him released from the state hospital for the criminally insane he was in.  My father is schizophrenic and made poor choices based on delusions and fear.  It was clear he needed help, not jail.  But that means he had to go through a parole-like hearing in order to get released.  His family thought having his kid in his life looked good for that.  Of course they pretty much ignored my existence for about 10 years leading up to that time.  
• Around the same time my grandfather, the main male parental figure in my young life, and whom I was very close to, was diagnosed and died from lung cancer.  He was in his mid-50s when he died.  
• Also around the same time I was becoming estranged from my 1st step-dad.  He was the only real dad I had had in my life until that time; I even used his last name (though it wasn't legal/official.)  I had a difficult relationship with his new wife, and hated visiting because it was miserable.  I didn't want to visit anymore.   It seemed from then on I was never invited over again, going so far as having to invite myself to Christmas.  It took until just last year to begin to have a relationship again after many years of none.
• Oh, and let's not forget that that is the age of puberty onset and I was on the emotional roller coaster from hell.

So to say that my childhood was unstable would be accurate, if a bit of an understatement.  It was mostly a good life, in that I was loved and fed and clothed and housed.  Times were surely lean occasionally, but I never felt "poor".  I think I always thought it was just how life was.  I didn't understand families that had always lived in the same house.  That seemed weird.  Even as an adult I have moved a lot, getting restless being in one place too long.  I long for a family home that I have no desire what-so-ever to leave.  I am not sure such a place exists.  I also have direct opposite desires of maybe being a full time nomad, inspired by reading of others my age living that way (and envious of the wonderful adventures that presents to them.)

There were definitely a huge number of other factors that lead me to such a low self-worth and lack of self-love, but the utter chaos and instability of my childhood are definitely big factors.  I am doing some brainstorming and poking around the memories to find specific experiences that I can write into my story that illustrate those seeds of negativity being planted in my subconscious and conscious mind.  I don't think this listing of facts really gets to the depth of the kind of feelings such instability can bring up in a kid.  I think my "it was normal' assessment is more my grown-up mind talking, not the little girl that was actually living it.  I am working to get back more into her mindset and to re-live some of those feelings, so I can commit them to written words (and hopefully then more fully exorcise them.)