This is not coherent at all but I need it to not be in my head so here you go. I apologise to anyone attempting to reply. Godspeed. For reference, if it helps, I am diagnosed with autism (I think I've been a Professionally Certified Autist for nearly a month now!), generalised anxiety disorder (except I think that's just a cover for my autism so my therapist didn't have to disclose that when I wanted accommodations at uni), OCD that is kinda on and off based on my stress levels, and generally every professional says I have "mild social anxiety" uh yeah. Let's just get into my bullshit. I am the world's biggest weenie. I am practically an attraction on the side of the road except no one comes to visit me because all that attention makes me cry and run away. I am terrible at standing up for myself because I can't be confrontational or deal with conflict without my mind running out of words, at which point I start crying because what else can I do?! Hurting people is bad. Making people angry is bad. I can't hurt people. I can't make them angry. I have to make people happy all the time always. Doing anything other than that makes me a bad person who wants people to be hurt. So I can't do it. Any hint of, "I have upset this person," makes me start crying while repeating, "I'm sorry," over and over again which is the least helpful thing ever, I know. It just makes people more annoyed. And I can't stop fucking doing it because I need to apologise for my existence impeding upon their happiness. I need to keep saying sorry until they forgive me for what I've done. I am also terrified employment, because I always hit a point where I become exhausted and can't do it anymore, so I aggressively avoid making job ties because I know I'll fail. I'm babysitting for a lady for 2 hours on Friday mornings and even that's making me anxious as fuck because I'm afraid that one day I won't be able to handle it any more and she'll hate me and I'll disappoint everyone and no one will hire me to babysit ever again. (Also I am aware that is splitting. Being aware of splitting is not as useful as you would think because I'm like, "Cool I'm splitting. I'm STILL THE WORST PERSON IN EXISTENCE AND SHOULD DIE, REGARDLESS.") The longest job I've had right now is my notetaking job at my uni, and I suspect this is because it ticks the boxes of being a job that helps people (by taking notes for disabled students), but I don't actually have to interact with anyone. I communicate with my students by e-mail. I communicate with my manager by e-mail. All my payslips are submitted electronically. The lecturers and tutors mostly just ignore me. I just turn up, type, and leave. I get the satisfaction of knowing I'm helping people without actually having to have social contact with anyone. I can wear what I want, I don't have to fake constant happiness or fake that I give a shit about every single person who looks at me sideways. It's the best fucking job, even if when I'm having a Sensory Hell day and I kind of regret everything. But it helps that I don't actually need to understand the meaning of the words the lecturer is saying, I just need to type them down. It's pretty great tbh. And I'm scared I'm going to lose that job because I'm a fucking moron and registered myself with the special needs department to have permission to wear earplugs in class and to leave class if I get overwhelmed without being penalised, and they were like, "Uh we've never had a student that works for us also register with us, and we don't really know what to do," and now I'm worried that they won't renew my contract and if they do that I'm fucked for employment unless I can get a similar job, I guess. But all my students give me really good feedback! They even gave me d/Deaf/HoH students and a vision impaired student this year! They only assign really good notetakers to students with those kinds of disabilities! I am hoping this is a sign. But everything I just said about why I like notetaking is now making me go, "YOU'RE STUDYING TO BE A TEACHER YOU DUMB FUCK WHAT ARE YOU DOING?????????? THAT IS ONE OF THE MOST SOCIAL JOBS OUT THERE HOLY HELL. YOU ARE GOING TO BE SURROUNDED BY ADULTS AND SMALL CHILDREN FOR LIKE AT LEAST 8 HOURS A DAY. WHAT THE FUCK." But again, see: satisfaction from helping people. Seeing a kid understand something is the most amazing thing in the world. I am possibly going to regret this after I graduate but here I am. Teaching tires me out in a good way, but I only have experience on teaching pracs, and they are not anything like full time classroom teaching. Sighs loudly. (Also how am I going to deal with conflict if my first reaction is PANIC CRY???? Jesus what am I doing.) ANYWAY. About me being a weenie. So tonight I ordered a thing from my local Thai restaurant and I was expecting noodles with tofu and pork. What I got was a GIANT PILE OF FRIED NOODLES that tasted like styrofoam with like. Maybe 5 pork and 0 tofu and some spring onion sprinkled in for good measure. And I was like, "This is bullshit," and my mum was like, "Ring them and tell them it's bullshit," but because I am a weenie I made her do it. And I have worked in retail and my least favourite thing is customers yelling at me for things I didn't do. And my mum... okay, she wasn't yelling. But my mum is very blunt and speaks her mind, which is the total opposite of me. And I was thinking, "I would sobbing and hiding in the back room by now if I was the front counter guy," so I kept telling my mum to stop being mean and she ended up hanging up and screaming at me because she didn't like me saying she was being mean when she was trying to stick up for me. Anyway we ended up apologising to each other and it's all okay now. But I just??? I can't be blunt. I can't speak my mind. I just do everything in my power to keep people from hating me, from finding me annoying, from making them disappointed in me. And I know that's an impossible task. I have been told so many times that you can't make everyone like you. And I don't want everyone to like me! That's not my goal! I don't care if people aren't my friends or are indifferent towards me. I just don't want them to hate me. I don't need people to like me. I just need them to not be inconvenienced by my existence. Which is maybe why I have such a high drive to do jobs that help people. I think I need to justify why I deserve to exist by helping as many people as possible, because I feel like all I am is a nuisance and a burden and that no one would ever tolerate me if I didn't put all my effort into being someone that people like. Committing myself to jobs that help people and make life easier for them is the only way I can atone of the sin of ever potentially making life slightly inconvenient for anyone ever. My thought processes and self-esteem are fucked up, man. It doesn't even make sense for me to think these things. I have wonderful, loving parents. I was given the best childhood they could give me. I mean no one is perfect, but compared to what some of y'all here have been through, I'm living in fucking heaven. And yet, my brain. Uh so. How??? Do I not do this??? How do I stop being a weenie? How to people like Luka and Seebs just thoroughly not give a shit about what people think and live their lives being awesome? How do you not feel like you need to justify your existence? How do you just??? Not be terrified all the time??? (I am 99% sure the answer is going to be therapy. Therapy is fun because they teach me breathing techniques and tell me to remember that my thoughts are irrational. Except I am very good at going, "This is irrational," while continuing to be convinced that it is the truth. Whee!) If you got anything from this, please help??? If you like???
Hi. I feel you. On like 99% of this. Especially the panic crying and the 'Therapy is fun because they teach me breathing techniques and tell me to remember that my thoughts are irrational. Except I am very good at going, "This is irrational," while continuing to be convinced that it is the truth' bit. Sadly I don't think I really have any advice, because while I'm pretty sure this has become slightly less of an issue for me recently I think that's mostly because I have become so fucking tired and so fucking fed up with everything that I've just stopped caring/lost the ability to care or panic about it for longer than about a minute before I run out of energy. And, well, 0/10 do not recommend this method do not attempt I might say that if you're still going to therapy but you don't think it's really helping then you tell them that. Yes, I know that's going to trigger all the 'oh god I'm disappointing this nice therapist person who is giving me their time and energy' things, so I suggest writing it down so you can just hand it over and then hug yourself and stare at your feet while they read it. And also try and remember that they probably got into therapy in the first place because they have a similar drive to help people, but they can't help you if they don't know that what they're trying isn't working. That was not intended to be a guilt trip, just an attempt at showing that, generally speaking, honesty works out the best in these kinds of situations, because hiding things to prevent hurting people doesn't help them and it doesn't help you and things get muddled and augh. Honestly, once I drilled it through my head that getting things out in the open usually leads to them being cleared up much quicker and easier (usually. As with most things, not a hard and fast rule. if people aren't listening or are misinterpreting you, you can be as honest as you like and nothing will happen. but therapists shouldn't be like that, and if they are, it's time to get a new therapist) i think it really has helped with the anxiety, because quite often things are not going to go as badly as you think they are (sometimes they will. but i guess that's kind of just life, and you're definitely not going to avoid it by pretending it isn't happening). Meds, if you're not already on them, may also help, but really I think you're looking at trying to change your thought patterns, and that's hard as shit and DOES requite therapy, and also honesty, and effort, and all of those things suck balls but I hear they're worth it, from people who have had better luck than me.
I haven't been seeing my therapist for about 6 months, since my mental health plan ran out. I could see her again, though. I was seeing her for OCD but I have been managing it pretty well lately, so I felt okay not seeing her. But maybe it could be good to go back and see her? Idk. It would be nice to not feel like this. I just don't understand why I feel this way about myself??? That is probably also a thing to see a therapist for. Thank you for your advice!
It certainly sounds like trying out therapy again might be a good idea, even if your OCD is under control. Good on ya for getting a handle on that, by the way!
Hehe, thanks! I think... What I have is not kinda like traditional OCD, but OCD is the closest thing to what is probably is. I mostly resist the compulsions, and then do breathing and relaxation exercises to overcome the anxiety associated with not doing them. But I think I get OCD compulsions and autistic routines/rituals mixed up sometimes. The relaxation stuff still works on autistic stuff, though. If I can't complete a routine, I can try to use the same techniques to stop myself from flipping the fuck out over it. So it's pretty useful.
I also deal with intrusive thoughts in kinda the same way. I need to remind myself that I'm not magic and it doesn't make sense for my actions/inactions to have cosmic consequences for everyone who has ever been unfortunate enough to know me. Mental illnesses are fun.
