Posted by Racer on August 31, 2006, at 20:45:26
In reply to Self-Esteem suffering from depression recovery, posted by llrrrpp on August 30, 2006, at 17:08:57
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> Now my mood is pretty good. But I'm starting to notice all kinds of flaws. Things that haven't bothered me in a long time, because I was such a lump of moaning misery. I dont' like my body. I don't like my skin. I don't like my habits. I don't like... me? I feel like a waste of carbon. And I don't think that it's depression. I think that I have shifted my mind away from paying attention to inner misery so that now I have resources to pay attention to my outside. Not much liking what I see, either.Whoa! Lurpsie! You're starting to sound like me!
How on earth did you learn to be so hard on yourself? And do you notice that you're turning it into a character flaw, rather than a depressive disorder? Kewl, huh? You can make it even worse for yourself -- now it really is your fault! You can beat yourself up even more! Good plan.
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> The worst thing is that if I work on myself- exercise and eat healthier food- will I feel better about me, or will I just become obsessed with my number on the scale/pant size/# of visible ribs? I've been there in the past. Obsession, never disorder. I don't like it much. To think in units of body morphology. To evaluate people relative to my BMI, automatically. To judge my good days by the amount of exercise and self-improvment and diet I suffered?You know I don't know how to answer this one, right? Even if I could, you'd be crazy to take me seriously... I guess all I can say is be very careful about it becoming a disorder -- and remember that I *still* have a hard time taking in that I wasn't just "pretending" to have an eating disorder. I know that I do, I know that I'm still very distorted -- hell, I gained more than 20 pounds overnight, after those hard sessions yesterday. Even I can tell that's distortion...
I guess I would suggest, though, that you maybe think about what it is that you would do for yourself if you loved yourself? Would you paint your toenails? Soak in bubblebath? Pull a shoelace for your cat? Whatever it is, that's what you "should" be doing. (Yeah, I used a bad word, didn't I?)
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> I'm not sure what to do. The better I feel, the higher my expectations of myself. Ergo- no progress in the self-esteem dept.That's something I struggle with a lot, I think -- why do I need to be perfect? I guess I'm just not good enough as it is.
Are you good enough? You tell me I am, so what is it about me that makes me good enough when you aren't? (Or are you just saying that it's OK for me to be as awful as I am, simply because I'm not you? Hm...) What does good enough look like to llrrrpp? Exactly how perfect do you have to be, to satisfy yourself?
Eh, if you're anything at all like me, you don't know. But it's something to think about, isn't it?
For what it's worth, I think you're good enough. In fact, I think you're pretty darn good.
poster:Racer
thread:681528
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/esteem/20060827/msgs/681868.html