TW: a brief mention of sh, no details, one mention of ideations, no details, self loathing thoughts discussed in detail.

I have actively hated myself for decades.

I am talking, most of my life.

Active self hating thoughts of “you’re a dumb bitch”.

“You’re a piece of shit”.

“You can’t do fucking anythin right”.

Depression, self loathing and even sh’ing behaviors have been a huge part of me for a very long time.

Since before puberty.

I’ve been living as a miserable person internally, for forever.

And I used to take it out on myself every single day.

With automatic thoughts of just horrible, terrible, self deprecating things.

And don’t get me wrong, they still pop up.

They’re not completely gone, and I don’t think they ever will be.

“I’m a fucking failure.”

“I’m a stupid fucking cunt.”

“I don’t deserve to live.”

“I don’t deserve to be happy.”

“I don’t deserve _____.”

“I’m a _____.”

I’ve had ideations for that whole time too.

I’ve acted on them a few times throughout life.

But nothing ever worked, obviously, I’m still here.

Sometimes I’m grateful for that, sometimes I wish one of em would’ve stuck.

I’m just sad all the time.

Like, constantly.

I know that’s technically depression.

When it lasts so long, and comes with all of these other symptoms of hopelessness.

But lately I’ve learned to accept it as part of my personality.

It’s just a part of me.

I’m just sad.

I don’t act like it.

I mask like a motherfucker.

Except for when I cry.

Because I cry so fucking easy nowadays.

I never used to be like this either.

Like I said in another entry a while back, I didn’t cry for three years once, and I thought that was a bragging right.

I thought that made me stronger, and better than other people.

I thought that I was in control of my emotions so well, that I didn’t have to cry at things, I didn’t even want to cry at things.

Man, was that toxic as fuck.

Talk about piss poor coping mechanisms.

And today, I either cry at everything, or I can’t cry for the life of me.

I know that the not being able to cry is my negative symptoms popping up.

But with the crying at everything, it’s not like I just cry at like, movies, and tv shows, and things like that.

I’m talking about I cry when people are talking to me about anything.

First off, my eyes are usually pretty dry, but they’ll water a lot when I’m in front of someone sometimes, just trying to have a conversation, so it looks like I’m fucking crying.

It’s super annoying.
Then when I actually cry, which is a lot of the time… it’s a lot of the time…it’s when I’m really actually trying to get a serious fucking point across.

Which makes important things even more difficult.

And makes me come off as weak to other people.

Overly emotional.

Like I can’t handle things.

When I’m actually just emoting.

That’s just how I emote.

My emotions just have nowhere else to go at the time, so they come out of my eyeballs.

That’s literally it.

It’s like I’m trying to get a point across, and the point is important to me, but I have trouble finding my words, so I start crying because I know what I want to say, but I’m having a hard time getting my point across.

And then I cry when I’m frustrated.

And then I cry when I’m sad (of course).

And then I cry when I’m annoyed.

And then I cry when I’m angry.

And then I cry when I’m stressed.

And then I cry when I’m feeling rejected or put down.

And then I cry when any-fucking-thing happens.

It’s like, after my big break… really, after I got put on antipsychotics, I started crying a lot.

But I really blame my big break more than anything.

I just emote differently now.

I’m a different person.

And it doesn’t help that parts of me feel permanently broken too.

So, that encourages the crying too.

Anyway, all of that to say that the depression, and my big emotions, run deep inside of me.

My darkness is almost always in my passenger seat.

Ready to grab the wheel and try to take over.

And with all of these big emotions, and with all of this darkness sitting close by, I’m told by all of the self-help books, that I just need to look in the mirror every morning, and tell myself that I love myself, and I’ll love myself.

That all will miraculously change.

(Look at yourself in a mirror and reflect on what needs to change and what is going great or deserves praise.) 

That I should “simply, adjust your body to positive emotions by finding as many things to love and appreciate as possible.” 

That getting outside is the solution: “Even a brief walk around the block or taking a few minutes to stretch is a beautiful way to practice self-love and gratitude.”

That I need to “fake it till I make it”.

(I fucking hate that phrase)

That I just need to write positive phrases on sticky notes, and put them around my apartment, and read them everyday.

(“One of my favorite tips to start building more self-love and confidence is doing daily affirmations … Place the affirmations somewhere you will see them throughout the day—like your laptop, water bottle, or bathroom mirror.”)

(I wrote these down, and then found the proof that all of these things are self-help bullshit) 

The mirror is a big one.

Just look in the mirror, make eye contact with yourself.

Tell yourself all the things you love about yourself.

Tell yourself all the things other people love about you.

Tell yourself you love yourself.

Man, I can’t even look in mirrors since psychosis.

I glance, and that’s about it.

They make me paranoid.

I used to think they were all two-way mirrors, and had cameras and people on the other side.

And that delusion has “faded”, but it’s still in the back of my mind, ya know?

I can’t let it fully go yet.

So there’s no fucking way I could stare into a mirror, let alone stare at myself in a mirror, let alone tell myself that I love myself?!?

Fuck that.

Another big self-help teaching is just accept yourself.

Just let yourself love yourself for everything that you are, flaws and all.

Just do it.

Just accept it.

Just love yourself.

Just love all of you.

Just love you.

Just embrace yourself.

Just do it.

How about fuck you?

How about that?

I can’t love myself.

I can’t even stand myself.

I have so many problems with the self-help category for this very issue.

I can’t “just love myself”.

It’s not that easy.

I’ve hated myself for my entire life.

How in the fuck am I supposed to go from hate to love just like that *snaps fingers*?

I’ve rejected this concept for so long, I’ve actually learned to hate myself more because of this shit.

It’s like I’m hating myself more out of spite, because they want me to love myself so fuckin much.

It’s like I’ve dug into the self loathing even more.

Who does that hurt?

Me.

I know.

But it’s just a rejection of the ease of how they put the concept out there – hate to love.

Boom.

Just like that.

Bam.

What about like?

And even that’s a stretch – that’s even too far into the “love” spectrum.

That’s been way too “loving” for me, especially when I first started in on my therapy journey.

I was a mess when I first started therapy again about four and a half years ago.

And at that time, and even still, to like myself is being too nice to myself.

That’s how much I hate myself.

So how in the fuck am I supposed to read these books, read the articles on these sites, and just jump to “loving” myself like that?

Just *poof* hate to love.

It honestly makes me want to puke.

I hated it.

I still hate it.

They make it sound so fucking easy.

Just do it.

Just look in a fucking mirror.

Just write yourself a fucking note.

Just do this.

Just do that.

Fuck you.

How about that.

How about you write a book about actual self loathing?

The actual depths of it and what it entails?

Not this, I had a bad day and was hard on myself for a few hours type bullshit.

Fuck outta here with that shit.

There has to be a fucking middle step beyond “like”.

There has to be.

And there is.

Don’t worry, there is, because I found it.

And it’s called neutrality.

Did you know you can be neutral about yourself in your head?

I had no idea that this existed.

I don’t know how I thought of it, maybe I saw it somewhere or something, but one day, it just clicked.

Neutrality.

That’s the fucking middle step.

Self loathing to neutrality to liking yourself to loving yourself.

Point blank, period.

It doesn’t have to be so rigid.

It doesn’t have to be hate to love.

It doesn’t have to be so fucking drastic.

You can go way slower than that.

I have to.

I am going slower than that.

And because of neutrality, and staying in neutrality for a few years, I’m on the brink of almost being able to like myself in some areas now.

The trick is changing the automatic thoughts.

And yes, it is possible to switch up your automatic thoughts.

Not all of them.
But the bulk of them, yes, it’s possible.

I know it’s daunting.

I know it seems impossible.

I know it seems debilitating.

And believe you me, it took me years to do.

I mean, a solid four years.

And I still struggle with them.

And I know I always will.

They’ll never all be gone.
It’s the bulk of them that need to be changed.

Because I still have periods of time where all I hear in my head is me calling myself a fat, stupid bitch.

But those times have substantially lessened over the last four years or so.

It took forever for them to not be my automatic go-to.

This is how I started…

I started by catching myself.

It was so fucking hard when I first started.

And I was literally doing this about a hundred times a day at first.

But when I catch myself – and that’s the critical part right there, when I catch myself calling myself a stupid cunt, or whatever, I stop.

Right there, I stop what I am doing.

Literally stop.

It only takes a second, a split second to do this.

And I tell myself “No. I am tired, and I made a mistake. Anyone could’ve done that.”

Or I tell myself “No. I am sad today, and I am anxious, I’m rushing and that caused me to overlook _______.”

Or whatever the situation called for.

But I always start the sentence out with “No.” 

That’s an important part.

Because it’s not true.

Whatever I just fucking spouted at myself in my head is not true.

I’m not a stupid fucking bitch.

Well, sometimes I’m a bitch, but that’s not what we’re talking about here, ha!

And it’s not like I’m meeting it with some stupid fucking platitude.

I’m meeting it with a simple no.

And then the rest of the sentence is the truth of what’s happening in the current situation that made my automatic thought bring up that “fact” of me being a dumb fucking fat cunt or whatever.

It’s not positive.

It’s not negative.

It’s the truth.

It’s a real fact.

It’s what’s actually happening.

Not what my brain is telling me.

Let’s say I spill my coffee on my computer keyboard.

What’s the first thing that’s gonna pop into my head?

“I’m a dumb fucking bitch and I ruin everything I touch.”

What am I going to do about that?

I’m going to stop – like I said, this takes a split second, and I’m going to correct my brain.

And I may say this to myself ten times before I catch myself.

But the second I catch myself, I’m going to say to myself, either in my head, or fuck it, even outloud, “No. I’m in bad mood, I was rushing and I spilled my coffee. I might need a new fucking keyboard.”

What did I do?

I stopped that self loathing.

I didn’t turn it positive.

But I wasn’t negative about it at all.

I kept the anger towards the keyboard.

I can be mad about shit still, that’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about those instant self hatred words that pop into the brain after I do something, or hell, after I don’t even do anything.

It’s all about neutralizing the negative self-talk.

Turning it into an actual fact.

Stopping it first, then correcting the train of thought so I don’t spiral.

Because otherwise, that “dumb bitch” will turn into a thousand “dumb bitches” in my head.

My brain will turn into a fucking corkscrew and the next thing I know i’m having ideations over a fucking spilled coffee.

I’ll lose my shit over it.

If I don’t catch myself, I’ll obsess over that negative thought and it’ll take over my mind because more and more follow and they just get worse and even more awful than the insult before.

The neutrality trick has helped me curb them.

Not completely.

But a lot.

Let’s do some other examples…

I’m sitting in my apartment, and just start having self loathing thoughts – they start to take over.

a) “I’m a fucking failure who can’t do anything right.”

b) “I’m a loser who’s behind in life, and I’ll never be good at anything.”

c) “I’m a stupid fucking cunt.”

d) “I’m never going to succeed.”

With neutrality, these could be, and it depends on the situation, but some examples are…

a) “No. I’m feeling anxious right now, and it seems like I have butterfingers today OR I am feeling mad today because someone rear-ended me…” something like that, whatever the situation is, make sure to state the fact of what’s happening.

b) “No. I’m feeling depressed today. I feel sad because I feel behind. Maybe I should take a nap/shower/eat.” (something that’s basic self care – I find that when I’m mad at the world, one of my basic self care issues aren’t being met 9 times outta 10)

c) “No. I’m having a hard time today. I’m just not in a good mood/I’m still upset over what ______ said to me/I’m having a hard time at work right now, etc…” again, state the fact of the situation.

d) “No. I’m struggling with _____ right now and it’s making me feel doomy and dark.” it’s okay to feel sad/doomy/depressed, just take the self loathing out of the sentence.

I’m not gonna lie, this exercise took me a hot minute to do!

It didn’t take me long at all to do the negative sentences, but took me easily ten or twenty times as long to do the neutrality sentences.

It’s tough to do.

It’s not an easy task, even after years of practice.

But the thing is, it’s worth it in the long run.

I notice that the more I keep doing it, the more I continue to catch myself, and look at the facts of the situation, not my initial self loathing thoughts that pop up, the more the automatic self-talk, that automatic self loathing, actually changes.

And like I said, it took years of me doing this to notice a difference.

Years.

Because one time, about six months ago or so… I’m 99% sure I wrote about it.. that terrible rheumatologist appointment?

Yeah, I did.. It’s this entry here where I talk about that appointment if you’d like to read the details about it.

But it was fucking terrible.

I mean terrible.

I was crying, I wanted to cuss and storm out, the whole thing.

But I didn’t – I remained, on the outside (besides the initial crying) cool, calm and collected.

I didn’t storm out.

I didn’t cause a scene. 

I didn’t cuss anyone out.

And the biggest part was – I didn’t really have any automatic, self loathing thoughts while I was leaving the office, or on the way home.

Granted, I did have some auto self loathing thoughts while I was IN the exam room.

They were very few, but they were there.

And honestly, they were more directed at the doctor and the PA than anything.

But, I didn’t get in my car and sh.

I cried about it, sure, that’s normal.

And I feel like that’s justified after such a shitty encounter with a doctor.

But I didn’t realize till my therapy session the following week how huge that appointment was.

I remember I wrote about that too.

Hannah, my therapist, was mindblown.

She was telling me how fucking huge it is that I didn’t automatically go into that horrible, self loathing, self deprecating place.

And the thing is, I hadn’t even noticed.

She noticed that I didn’t sh that day.

That I didn’t spiral that day.

That I didn’t sit there and talk to myself like I’m a piece of shit.

That I had subdued my big emotions not only in public, but in private too.

And that didn’t mean that I didn’t deal with them, because I did.

I cried on the way home.

I talked to myself, outloud, in my car on the way home, unpacking what just happened.

I wrote about it the second I got home, got it all out of my head.

But what’s incredible, is that I barely had a self loathing thought pop into my head during the entire ordeal.

I wasn’t hard on myself about it.

I was hard on the doctor.

I had turned, automatically, to the facts of the situation.

It wasn’t me who had done anything wrong.

I wasn’t the issue or problem.

I had explained myself well and was in the right.

The doctor was the one who was wrong here.

The doctor wasn’t listening, and he was the problem.

And because I’ve been using my neutrality trick the past four years, and because I’ve been turning negative thoughts into the facts of the current situation, I had finally automatically used my neutrality trick.

It fucking worked.

And the thing is, I hadn’t even noticed.

I didn’t realize until Hannah said something about it, and said she was proud of me for not sh’ing, and for not blowing up at the doctor’s office.

Then I had the realization, and told her that my automatic thoughts didn’t go to my darkness in that super stressful, shitty time.

And that’s not saying that they never will again.

Because I’ve had shituations since then, where my automatic thoughts haven’t been as nice to me, and my neutrality trick hasn’t been automatic like that.

But that time was very fucking cool.

It was so cool to know that all of my hard work is starting to pay off.

That outside shituations maybe don’t have the control over me and my emotions like they used to.

I used to let things like that office visit get to me for days.

I would re-tell the story to anyone who’d listen.

I’d be traumatized from not being heard, and would take it out on myself.

Even though it was the doctor’s fault.

It was the doctor who wasn’t listening to me.

It was the doctor who was giving bad advice.

It was the doctor who was being dismissive.

Normally, in and after a visit like that, I would’ve called myself a “dumb fucking bitch” someone who “can’t fucking do anything right” someone that’s “a fucking failure” someone who “deserves the physical and emotional pain I’m in” and it would go on and on and get doomier and darker as I’d spiral.

But none of that is the truth.

It was the doctor’s fault.

It was the doctor who wasn’t listening to me.

It was the doctor who was giving bad advice.

It was the doctor who was being dismissive.

And my brain and auto-talk picked up on that subconsciously.

That’s fucking astronomical.

To have that change, for the first time, made me cry in session with Hannah when we realized.

I hate giving myself any type of credit still (I’m working on it), but I’ve been working really hard on this concept, and it’s finally been paying off.

I’ve been doing a good job.

And it feels so weird to tell myself that, and mean it.

But, I’m telling you, if you work at this idea and really try to catch yourself when you’re being terrible to yourself, and look at the facts of the situation, you’re gonna see results eventually.

It’s gonna take a lot of time.

So, be patient with it and yourself.

I know that’s hard to do too.

And I hate giving myself grace.

I feel as though I don’t deserve it.

I always just wanna give up, and just let the terrible thoughts and things take back over and say fuck it, it is what it is, and just let them consume me because that’s what I deserve, and that’s the way it’s always been and that’s the way it always will be and that’s what’s comfortable.

And if you feel that way, I get it.

Maybe this isn’t for you – maybe you’re not ready – maybe you’re not there yet – maybe you need to work on yourself a bit more and get to the point where you’re able to do the neutrality trick/hack/step.

When I first started therapy, there’s no way I could’ve done this.

Fuck outta here.

I couldn’t even be neutral with myself, I hated myself so much.

It wasn’t even a concept I could wrap my head around yet.

So I get it.

Keep working, keep going to therapy and you’ll get to this point.

Because a lifetime of hating yourself can’t be fixed in a couple of days or weeks.

It takes years to come out of that pit.

You gotta climb out, and I’m still not out yet.

I’m gripping onto the side, a few feet down still.

I’ll lose my grip every once in a while, and have to climb back up a foot or two to get back to where I am today…

I’ve lost my grip a lot of times, it’s not easy to climb back up, it takes a ton of work.

And you have to be willing to do it.

You have to want it.

That’s probably the most critical part – wanting it.

When I came out of my big break, I had nothing left but my parents and some family members in far away places.

No apartment, no friends, no job, no nothing.

I had hit rock bottom afuckingain.

I had no one to turn to.

Nothing to show up for.

I was lost and still coming in and out of psychosis (which is still a struggle).

I knew my behaviors were shit, because I had no one left around me.

I knew it was me who had to change.

III was the common denominator in every situation in my life.

And I knew I had to start back up with a therapist again, and really try this time, really do it different than I had in the past.

I knew I had been running from my true feelings my entire life.

I knew I had to open up like I hadn’t done before.

And I know I was incredibly lucky to find Hannah.

She was the first therapist I went to down here, and I’ve been seeing her the bulk of the time, for over the last four years. 

I didn’t have to fire her right away and switch it up.

I didn’t have to go through multiple people until I found the right fit.

I know I am so lucky for that.

Even when she went on maternity leave a couple of years ago, she put me with Sean, and he was good too.

Then Sean, when he left, put me with Jessi, who was a disaster at the end, and I told her so, so I was lucky enough to go back to Hannah.

We hadn’t seen each other for about 10, 11 months during that time.

And everyone was at the same office, so I didn’t have to bounce around town either, and I know I was lucky that way too.

But when Hannah and I started having sessions again, we got right back into the flow, like no time had passed.

And I am incredibly grateful for that.

I guess what I’m trying to say is, having the right therapist during this time (and in general), and leading up to being able to do the neutrality trick is critical too.

I didn’t think therapy really did anything until I met Hannah.

I just gave it another shot because I was hopeless, at my wits end, didn’t know what else to do, and that’s what you’re supposed to do, right?

Go to therapy when you have a mental illness?

But I honestly had no idea it was so life changing when you had the right therapist, and were willing to work on yourself and change.

The combination is what does it.

Trust in therapy is priceless too.

You have to trust your therapist.

I tell Hannah everything.

I don’t lie to her.

I don’t stretch the truth.

I don’t omit things.

I tell her things I wouldn’t and won’t tell anyone else.

And that’s the difference between a therapist and a friend.

Everyone who says they’ll just “talk to a friend” about their issues is basically just trauma dumping on them, i know they don’t mean to, but that’s basically what’s happening.

And besides, they’re not going to get a healthy, objective, mindful, truthful or educated response back, like they would with a therapist.

And don’t even get me started on folks who talk to AI for “therapy”.

That’s a terrible idea in my opinion.

It’s an echo chamber and can induce psychosis in vulnerable folks.

But what I’m saying is that a professional therapist is the only one that’s actually helped me work through my core issues and maladaptive behaviors.

Everything else, in my little subjective opinion, is completely surface level.

To do the hard work, I had to get into sessions and really open up about everything.

All of my dirty little secrets.

All of my faults and behaviors.

All of my everything.

And I was scared about her responses.

I still am sometimes when I have big things to talk to her about that rip open my maladaptive issues.

It’s raw.

It’s not always what I want to hear, a lot of times it’s not.

She’s kind, but firm, and her objective responses and outlook are usually exactly what I need to hear, but don’t want to.

And it’s usually something I hadn’t even thought about.

And it’s usually something I’ll reflect upon for days afterward.

And I just don’t feel that you can get that type of deep conversation many places other than in a professional therapy session.

Anyway, I sorta got off track…

My main point is, if you’re not ready for the neutrality trick/hack/step yet, and you’re dealing with some hardcore self loathing automatic thoughts, and this is out of reach for you still, you may want to think about taking the step into talk therapy, that’s all.

I’m obviously a huge advocate for therapy, if you couldn’t tell.

I’ve really been able to curb a lot of my automatic self loathing talk using this trick.

I hope this entry finds someone that can find this trick useful.

I hope someone out there is able to quiet their mind a bit.

I hope that neutrality catches on, and becomes that middle step that’s so desperately needed.

– Keren