Please write another comment and let us know how you are. We care. Be well and happy.
Chris,
I hope today you are feeling better. I'm just an ordinary person(not a doctor,graduate or anything) and I have also been bullied at school, and rejected by my peer group and also by my sister, (but not as strongly as you) and it s taking me years to get over it.I m originally french,and what did it for me was to flee to England,which i did when I was 18, and try to forget about the people who hurt me in the past.Since 3 years(Im 25 now) I ve seen a psychotherapist who also does healing, and slowly things have started feeling better. Everytime i go and see her is a marvellous experience about understanding more about where my inhibitions come from, and the problems with my familly,which are now getting better.I though spent about 3 years when I first came to England with no friend, going out with guys and breaking up as soon as I could, beeing scared of them catching me to marry me and not let me go (or something like that) so I never had any proper relation ship neither (also sexual insecurity coming from a sexual abuse from my brother when I was 7) and I tell you what, I don't regreet being alone: when i look around me, the people I know are all splitting up, stopping their carrers for their companion (so many bands I met which splet up because of jealous boyfriends or girlfriends) unhappy because they can't communicate...But somehow it seems more easy to just chat with normal people for a while(like a bus driver) and then let them go. Or befriend the local newagent keeper. Or just chat with someone in a library, go for drinks, and just be easy.
Good luck, you can email me if you want(even though I dont like being attached to things,so don't email too often ;-) ***@****
I 'd like to know how you get on, and I wish you get better.There are quite a few loners in our world...actually,seems like a good 40% of people I ve met...So you are not alone.
Dear Chris,
I am crying while I am reading your story - so lonely with not a single friend, depreciated by various figures all your life, so sad with suicidal idea, abused physically by your own brother.
I am most relieved that you have braved yourself to express your feelings and ask for help. The more you ventilate your feelings the more people understand your life and situation in order to offer you help. The more your ask for help from all sources or resources, i.e. doctors, psychiatrists, psychotherapists, and your ability surf the web to join mental forums the more people are more than willing to provide assistance.
You must remember what Dr Roger Gould has said: For all these years, your past experiences have reinforced in you a rigid reflex feeling that others are jeering at you. But now in reality, people are treating you with no prejudice unless your old rigid reflex feeling invites them to treat you otherwise. When you understand yourself as such and others in reality, you will begin to win friends. The reason is once your rigid negative feeling begins to pop up you realize it is your maladaptive old conditioned reflex at work. Interrupt such destructive reflex immediately. Then as you react normally, people will treat you as normal, hence you overcome your social phobia. Once you have such insight, you are relaxed and well prepared to intercept your historic and pervasive reflex.
To complicate the matter, in order to deal with such maladaptive reflex, one may have to develop a counter-maladaptive-reflex. As Dr Gould says that there is no magic/instant cure, one has to train oneself to launch such intercepting reflex. Practice the positive reflexes in different social situations in ascending order of difficulties to make them perfect. It well runs that one act and then another a habit is formed; one habit and then another a character is formed. When your adaptive character is formed, you have your battle won. NO MORE you are then shy away from social situations.
Be tough and mobilize all your resourses
From Try_to_be_social
This is a sad story so far, but you are still young and in a good time of life to start making some very important changes. You don't have to be damaged by your history of abuse...you can make your own future. The very best place to start is with psychotherapy. There are directories online to help you find a therapist, and one of the best is psychologytoday.com. If that doesn't work, ask your doctor, or call the department of psychiatry at your nearest medical school and ask for a referral. also, on the internet, look up information about social anxiety...there are many programs to help you.
Chris i have been a member of AA for 19+ years and in that fellowship we talk about one alcoholic helping another as
the key to the whole deal... currently i am suffering from
a major depression the 4th in my life:
1st at 25 years old
2nd at 27 years old
3rd at 51 years old
4th at 52 years old
i am looking to connect with a support group of people suffering from depression -- let me know if you are aware of
any -- and if not if you would be interested in getting an
e-mail meeting going between you and i to help us make some progress towards a more joy filled life??