YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

How do you stop feeling sorry for yourself? What's the first step? What's the next step? I'm not sure if I'm feeling sorry for myself or just finally seeing my past life for what it is. The reality of it all. I get pissed off at it and then I look at my life now and feel stuck. I'm very much in my head and want to get out of it. But every morning when I wake up, which is early, I start off telling me what a loser I am. Has anyone gone through this and then changed themselves?

JT, while I'm still working on changing my own-self, one thing that's helped is keeping in mind that those negative thoughts are just that, thoughts. You can challenge negative thoughts!

One way I've done that is with "thought records". A therapist introduced me to thought records a few years back. Google "thought record" and you'll get a lot of results that will look like work sheets. There are different ones out there, but for the most part they all help you analyze your negative thoughts in a more level-headed way. The sheet will take you through the steps, like, first, identifying the negative thought. Then, maybe, listing evidence that supports the negative thought. Then, listing evidence that counters the negative thought. It progresses like that.

Practicing gratitude also helps, and you're already doing that!

Oh! There's also M.I.H.H. episode number 165, if you haven't gotten to that one, yet. It's about low self-esteem, and the psychologist who Gilmartin talks to, Dr. Guy Winch, is very good at giving practical advice.

I've been through the process, actually I'm still in the process.

When you realize the kind of life you have and the loss of the life you could have had, there is a mourning, pitying and angry period you have to go through. For me CBT and exercise has been a turning point. But turning your life around and turning your mind round takes effort and time. What was eyeopening to me was discovering, that you're more than your thoughts and that your thoughts and intellect aren't always correct and cannot purely be relied on to solve your situation.

I learned from a very young age to think of myself as a loser, because then I could better scale my expectations and protect myself from devastating disappointments and humiliation. Because I believe at my very core, that I'm worthless, my own thoughts are designed to support that world view. A bit like you read one news paper if you're liberal and another if you're conservative. I also learned that emotions has a use, they are used to express yourself and to provoke you into action. So it made sense, that if I was both constantly stuck in my negative thoughts and avoiding my emotions, I was unable to act and was stuck repeating the same thoughts over and over. I got aware of this in CBT, I'm still stuck and still struggling, but the increased awareness allows me to easier get unstuck and get things done a little faster.

For me acceptance has been a key.

I accept that I feel like a loser.
I accept that I was made to feel like a loser.
I accept that these are my feelings and thoughts.
I accept that I have to change these thoughts.
I accept that making that change is a giant task.
I also accept money donations

I still struggle, but I've begun being in the present and try to look more forwards, than backwards.

It's hard to rush the process, but at some point feeling pity and angry loses it's entertainment value and you have to ask yourself what's next.

I can tell you the exact moment when I did....

I was laying in a jail cell. Suicide watch and facing several felonies. I was freezing cold and naked. I had spent days listening to aman and woman argue. I later realized the man and woman were one and the same. I folded the piss stained mattress in half and found a hole in it. I stuck my leg in it to try and get warm.

Just at that moment, a big Tongan jail guard grabbed the mattress and flipped me with it. He removed the mattress from the cell, and I was left with six squares of toilet paper. He started taunting me. I told him "At least I never worked as a jail guard." He really got mad. I explained he was on camera, and to please hit me as I really did not give a shit if he did. It did prove, in my mind that I was better than he is as I'd never do that to a fellow human.

He left, and I sat at my iron table and thought about things. I was in hell. I had nothing (except the toilet paper) and that was it.

But, he could not take my thoughts. He could not take what I was learning about multiple personality disease. I was at a point where it was ok if I lived.

I decided if I chose to life, after release, things were going to change. My parents were fuck ups, and really went out of their way to be miserable to me. Still, that was over. Anything from here was up.

Mostly, I learned not to piss away another second feeling sorry for myself. Its such a wasted feeling.

In jail, I started seeing people who would never have the chance in life that I did. I started doing their homework packets so they could graduate from High School. I would have graduated seven times had my name been attached to the work.

In the past, I've found it helpful to consciously look in the mirror in the morning and talk positively to myself. It's fucking really hard to start doing. When every ounce of my soul was screaming, 'You suck, you're a loser', I had to force myself to say, out loud, 'I'm an awesome person'. I didn't believe it, but that wasn't the point. I had to force myself to actually smile at myself in the mirror and hold it for 30 seconds. After a while, the evil voice calling me a loser didn't bother anymore. Anyway, just a tip. Like I said, it's really hard to start doing, and to keep doing. But I think it's worth a try.

Self pity comes from unmet expectations. Easiest way to get rid of self pity is to get rid of expectations.