Self-love and Self-Hatred

@Gazza75 Thankyou for your response. I do get some relief talking about my past here, I guess because I’m anonymous here and also because I can’t speak to my family and friends about this. I personally don’t know anyone in my life that has a history of CSA, but here on the forum there are many people just like me. By reading their stories makes me feel a little bit more “normal”, it’s not strange to feel like I do, others feel the same way.

Your path in life sounds very interesting, I’ll be very interested to read more of your posts throughout the forums.

@BryanaCamp I’m so sorry to hear of what you went through as a child. As a mother myself I can’t understand how a mother could treat her child like that. I can totally understand why you would feel so much rage now. It is so hard to leave those scars in the past, what was done to us as children does follow us into adulthood.

I’m so glad to hear you have some good friends supporting you. I’ve always struggled with adult friendships, I don’t have many friends, trust is one of the scars I’ve carried with me from childhood. It takes me a long time to trust someone, and by then I figure that person has lost interest in me as a friend anyway.

I admire you that you were able to do the self love online course, that must have been difficult. I hope it helped.

Thankyou for your support, I know there are a lot of people struggling with the whole idea of self love, so it’s nice to read that others have found ways to help themselves find it.

Hi @Razzle , @BryanaCamp and others.

Thanks for sharing your experiences and yourselves further. I think its great we can learn and support each other and feel safe doing so.

@Razzle, thankyou for your kind words. It's been a long time since anyone has said something so kind or nice to me and I really appreciate it.

@BryanaCamp, you should be so proud at how far you have come, it must have been a hard road to trek, even with the support you had around you. I sure wouldn't want to mess with you when you get upset LOL

I admire you both for your courage and resilience. I struggle to make lasting friendships and even relate to my family. I definitely concur, that what happens to us in childhood follows us into our adult lives. My father was an alcoholic and not much of a role model. My mum raised my brother and I really well given that she had very little support. All our family are based in the UK so she was very isolated. My brother was more of father figure to Me.

I hope we can find strength and courage from each other and hope that others here feel that to.

Thsnkyou @Owlunar for starting this interesting topic.

As you know I struggle a lot with self love. Snd I think it’s because of my childhood abuse, my mother’s controlling manipulative behaviour snd my parents abandoning me.

Its really difficult.

I would like to thank everyone for their replies here and also the encouragement you are offering to each other

It has opened my eyes a lot to Child Abuse - and yes - my mother had an acid tongue that was incredibly painful - it's a different story - and my brother and I were physically abused but maybe not as much as some people

So my eyes have been opened to different kinds of childhood anguish

Fridays are busy days for me and I have not finished yet but hopefully I can reply more later tonight - certainly tomorrow

You are such brave people

Dec

hello @Owlunar , @BlueBay , @Gazza75 , @Razzle , @BryanaCamp

@Owlunar, I don`t talk about mine much unless it pops it`s head in my life now and again

but I was mentally and emotionally abused by my father

even though mum and I left as I was getting thinner and sicker , the rejection from my father continued until he passed away in 2007

because we all live in the same town , he would hide when seeing me walking

I wondered why he did not love me

@Shaz51, I’m really sorry to hear that, I think most people just expect that our parents are going to be our biggest supporters and love us unconditionally. My dad was my greatest supporter, although he never knew any of the darkness that happened to me, I can’t even begin to imagine what it must have been like not to have that relationship with your father.

Wondering why isn’t productive in healing, I’ve tortured myself endlessly wondering why me - there is no answer. It wasn’t us, it never was, it never will be - it has and always will be them.

Thanks for sharing @Shaz51 ❤️❤️

Ooooh @Shaz51

That is so sad, because you could not even put him out of your mind, living in same town.

@Gazza75 There are great people posting her on the forum. It is a privilege to read and share all these experiences.

@Razzle Maybe this is part of your healing process. I can see why you separate her off. I hope you are able to bring her back into your inner fold and accept her. I hope it happens soon.

@BryanaCamp Your story is gut wrenching. I have seen women like your mother. I will say no more. It is interesting how you xompared some aspects of your experience to Razzle. I hope it was helpful. It showed me how many different ways we humans experience things.

I loved the way you made it practical about learning self love. I had a lot of neglect and struggle with those simple things. Am I allowed to turn on the heater for me, but first it took many years of processing to even be able to feel the temperature through all the other trauma I felt.

@Owlunar Lovely to still have you around and being able to share.

Love to all here, a lot of powerful sharing in this thread

hugs @Razzle it's so lovely you're a good mum, I enjoy being a good aunt. I never felt any reason to continue the cruelty into the next generation & have always been very sensitive to the needs of others so maybe in some way that makes me a good sister, aunt, neice, friend.

@Gazza75 thanks for your kind words and for the laugh & understanding - it's so nice to be able to talk candidly about rage without it frightening people off, it's an awkward topic.

Making friends & building bonds with family has been hard work but worth it. I'm very sensitive to the slightest hint of insult or disrepect so have had to learn how to work thru that kind of conflict with valuable friends. It's been hard to but I have chosen to distance myself from friends I felt were just using me & don't anything give back. Medication has helped me loads. I believe if I can make good friends anyone can, so if it's a goal for you you should be hopeful, you are both awesome people & have a lot to offer.