Advice??

[Midnightwolf1]

I hate this feeling. I hate that I feed the bad part of me. The self doubt, the self hate, all of it. I feel as my friends and family doesn't love me, they just tolerate me. I feel like anytime I'm around someone who is my friend they fake everything. But I know my friends love me and are not fake people, they have always been there for me when I needed them the most. I couldn't ask for better people in my life but the other part of me denies that and I want to stop myself from doing that but its hard when you've done that all ur life. I just need some advice that could help me with that....

~Sky

[bridder01]

Howdy Sky! Let me ask a question. We've all seen that you're this amazing person. So, why are you so hard on yourself? You have so much going for you! When you hear those voices in your mind putting you down and telling you you're not worth it, tell them to take a hike! Those voices are not who you are. Believe me when I say we all have those voices that try to fill us with self-doubt, self-hate and self-loathing. But, you are the master (or is it mistress?) of your mind! Mind over matter. If you don't mind, it don't matter All it takes is one positive thought. If I can begin to overcome those voices in my head, and I'm 43, then you can too! We've all got your back, Sky! Tell those negative voices where to get off! I've got faith in ya!

Your ol' pal (creaking knees and all),

Brian

[Midnightwolf1 in reply to bridder01]

Just a lot has happened over the past few months and I feel like it's my fault. I know isn't, but I blame myself for a lot of it. I always have, no one has ever really tried to help me in the past and now I do everything (blame, and everything else the voice says) naturaly but this time I have people helping through it and I feel like I don't deserve it... But I'll try my best to overcovercome my thoughts 😊

~Sky

[OFC-04]

Hi MW1! I hate that you feel that way about yourself. It's a terrible way to live within your own skin. I understand what bridder is trying to convey when he refers to "look what you have going for you...how smart you are...mind over matter...think positively" That is the same thing I have heard for years by many well-meaning optimists (usually ones who have never been depressed a day in their lives or someone in a behavioral health hospital with me in the middle of a manic high) *I am NOT at all insinuating that is bridder, all that he advised does indeed work for some* But it never has for me and I am so tired of telling the do-gooders, "Oh-gee, why didn't I think of that 10 years, 4 hospitals, 3 attempts, 287 stitches, and feeling like a lifetime of Hell-ago"? I've never had a good self-image. Ever, even when I was a child and in pageants. My entire family was attractive and popular. I'm not kidding. EVERY-ONE. You couldn't go anywhere in town without someone knowing my family's name. They would look at me and say, "Oh - you are a O'xxxx? Hmmmm. You don't look quite like them..." Ugh. So, my gorgeous mother (who had me at 16 and doesn't look much older than that even now) entered me in beauty pageants to help me become more confident. I was about 10 when I started and 12 when my mother finally gave up on my winning anything. I did win 10th place one season. Texas Spring Beauty! There were 12 girls in my age division and there was a talent portion and I could sing! That pushed me ahead of the other two and got me a 1st place in that portion. But I was short, unsure of myself, and I had an overbite so no matter how many curlers my mother put in my hair - or how adorable she thought I was - all that project did was solidify my self-hatred and teach me how to bow to rows of judging eyes. What's even worse is that by the time I was 14, I looked back at those pictures and wished I was still that cute. I had gained some weight by then and really despised who I was so I focused on my grades and my voice. The only things I felt I had any control over. But those two things had to be perfect. I was bullied relentlessly. I did manage to always have someone everyone liked sign up for the yearly talent show with me!. I thought I had a friend for two weeks while we were practicing our song and routine, then we would win and I couldn't get them to talk to me anymore. Finally, I tried out for and made dance team my freshman year of high school. All of those dance lessons from my pageant days paid off! Even a chubby, short, kid with an over-bite, glasses, bad haircut (thank goodness Mom had someone do my ponytail, make-up and made me take off my glasses for the try-outs), with absolutely no fashion sense was able to get on the snooty, and very exclusive high school dance team known as the best not only Regionally, but Nationally as well. Did I mention that 3 'friends' and I got together to practice everyday after school to practice the routine to assure we wouldn't forget the dance on try-out day? Yup. They all pretended not to know me after try-outs and even took turns making fun of me at new members camp because I assumed we were still friends as if I was stalking and following them around uninvited. If not for me, they may not have even made the team. They would say things like 'they didn't understand how I could have possibly made the team'. My family - still The Beautiful People. My younger cousin started his freshman year the following school year - and he WAS Mr. popularity. The seniors knew who he was. He played every sport, on Varsity. He didn't even say hello to me in the hallways. I worked hard that summer. Grew my hair out, got contacts, got taller, went to the beach with my new best friend from dance team and had a tan, and also lost that baby weight. Some of the weight shifted into places that got nicer attention than I was used to! Even my over-bite seemed to disappear like my body adapted to it. I didn't think much of any of it until we came back for dance team camp. The band was also back for marching camp. SO superficial... and the fact that a couple of cute band boys paid attention to me didn't help my self-esteem or cure my self-loathing at all. My cousin did talk to me - to ask me to pick him up for school everyday until he got his own car the moment he turned 16. I only realized that attractiveness didn't help me feel better. People were still human; and mean. I still didn't really belong in my own family. My younger sister is the brooding artist type. She looks just like my mother, but is the type that should have married someone very rich so she would never have to work, if you know what I mean... My parents have bought her two houses that she ruined, every vehicle she's ever owned, and a few chances at a college degree that she has either flunked out and walked out on (as opposed to dropping a tough class and taking a light load later and trying the class again), or the professor just drops her for no showing, too late to get my parent's money back for them. SHE tells me I am so lucky because I was popular in school and I have my degree (I earned an MPA with scholarships, grants and hard work), had executive positions (now my own business), and my children are no trouble (I have a daughter with Bipolar II at 15 yrs old). Her father is homeless in the city insisting he is keeping evil demons away from us. He's been diagnosed with Bipolar I. 6 months later he was diagnosed with Schizoaffective Disorder with Bipolar I. I left him when she was 3 because he was continuously choosing drugs over his family even after I spent our savings and the equity in our home to send him to rehab twice. I wonder now if his illness was starting and he was trying to quiet the voices. Self-Medicating. The person I chose to marry and have a baby with never would have taken drugs. He wasn't even a smoker. He was a health freak. We met when he was hired to be a personal trainer at the gym in the Health Spa that I was over as Recreation Director at a Resort. Or maybe I saw signs sooner and was choosing what I thought I deserved? This post has gotten way too long and def too much about me, but I wanted you to know I may 'get' what you were referring to. I always assume I am not liked and that no one likes me. At work, social groups (my former running club), even within my family where I am always the one they always 'forget' to invite, sometimes even my own kids and stepchildren. I rarely feel validated. I'm never good enough. They all deserve better. I volunteer for both AFSP and NAMI because helping other people helps me some, but now I have trouble leaving the house. (PTSD and agoraphobia after an attack I feel responsible for - the police aren't doing anything) So I found this group... trying to hate myself less. Maybe try volunteering? Helping other people because YOU DO get it. Many of the people who volunteer are older people or students who need the hours for their degree - Some have had issues; most minor but a few serious in the past. But it is so much more helpful when a desperate person calls, or comes by, or just walks down the sidewalk checking things out (no one would notice but someone who has felt that much pain; I see at least one every time I go and I make myself go outside and give them a cookie or something). There may be something else that makes you feel valued. You absolutely have value and it IS your job to find it. No medication or therapist can do that (but I know I still need those also - it takes a corporation to run this machine haha). I know when/if I stop keeping this brain and these hands busy I will die. Hating myself isn't the worst thing. Being the ugliest person in a beautiful family certainly is not the hardest a human being has suffered. My brain suffers. I feel unimaginable pain and I do not understand why. But I am doing everything I can - I could write a book and I am sure you could, too. I won't waste anymore of your space here. I wish you much luck and happy brain connections. <3 C