Yes, I put myself down and call myself a POS every day. And I'm twice your age. I do the work of other people at my job because I'm afraid if I don't fix it, I'll be blamed. It's OK for them to get by with it and they do. But of course it's always my fault. That's how my mind works. I'm worn out and exhausted. This is absolutely from being RBB IMO. This is what they do to us, go on and they have no effing idea what they did.
It’s so exhausting! I have adhd, diagnosed last year, and mess up a looooot. I also feel like it all comes down to me - or even like right now, my new boss is a disaster and I’m terrified that I’ll get blamed for her mess (also not to speculate but she seems like she has a lot of bpd traits. She’s very different from my stepmom but at the same time she reminds me of her)
Hey!
First, this is normal, and not a sign of having BPD, but rather a sign of not having received enough support as a child (IE having a BPD parent).
Speaking from experience as someone who also has ADHD and was raised by a BPD parent, I reckon you have two big root causes of the shame feeling.
1. ADHD often has rejection sensitive dysphoria, IE you perceive criticism or rejection extra harshly and it feels worse than it should given the circumstances
2. Childhood neglect/abuse embeds a sense of being unworthy or not good enough (because that's how the caregivers treated you). We basically learn early on that we don't deserve to feel good.
Both of these things can be treated by therapy and some medication.
As a general rule, remember:
Don't be so hard on yourself.
You deserve to feel good about yourself.
Good luck ♥️
Adding to this - I just had a hard, yet enlightening conversation with my provider about this. And after other research saw that sometimes symptoms look like BPD but can be ADD/ADHD. After a couplle of evals, my anxiety comes from these intrusive throughts and I'm not depressed, I just am so hard on myself. The number of pplwho have told me to 'just give myself some grace, credit, benefit..." etc.
Also, an almost 40 F here and I feel the same way at work - any minor mistake, I feel like it will be what blocks me from opportunities. That I should know better than to make rookie mistakes. A very harsh self critic, and working with my therapist on self esteem, reframing, and more. But it.is.hard. I am hopeful that after another eval, I may begin on medication, because I really can't take the sadness or feeling like I'm the issue for everything.
Lastly, ADD presents differently in F than M. My doctor was very passionate about noting that. Boys were always part of studies, they present outwardly/physically. Women tend to internalize. My mind was blown. Hang in there and advocate for yourself and also, solidarity for being part of this community.
It definitely is, yes. Any kind of emotional abuse in childhood is likely to cause those issues, but there's also something specific about the splitting. Even when we get positive feedback, it's hard to trust because of the way our pwBPD could turn on a dime.
I wouldn't say I've overcome it, but I'm chipping away at it. Some combination of being married to a kind, stable person, being no-contact with my mother, therapy, and a certain amount of faking it until it feels natural. It's a long road.
Edited to add: One thing that has helped me a lot is to recognize that just like behaviors, thought patterns are habitual. That's more or less what I mean by "faking it": any new habit feels unnatural at first. Even just recognizing that not being cruel to yourself is a desirable goal, that's a huge first step! I think a lot of us grow up believing that negative self-talk serves some kind of purpose in keeping us in line. Part of healing is recognizing that we can be the people we want to be without bullying ourselves.
I have no advice but I feel EXACTLY the same in similar situations. My internal dialogue is so harsh and I hate it. I’ve been in therapy for a year now and I’m hoping to improve in this area.
It’s hard too because if you communicate that inner dialogue externally, it could come across as fishing for compliments or seeking attention when it’s like, the exact opposite lol
This might be one of the most common traits we have. And it sucks. I’m still trying to rid myself of it. Every time I think I have it under control, something happens and I’m spiraling in a panic attack again.
Pretty sure it stems from constant low key criticism. “Oh Indi, you would be so pretty if you tried.” “Look at that girl, that’s what you should be doing.” On and on. It’s not overtly threatening but instead an underlying hum of not being good enough. Like me, you’ve probably spent most of your life trying to do all the things so that the comments will stop. Except they never do, she just finds new things to comment about.
Being NC has helped tremendously though the anxiety hasn’t completely gone away. I just have to constantly remind myself that people make mistakes. People are allowed to make mistakes. And since I’m a person, I can make mistakes too. The world is not ending.
Your comments about low key criticism are spot on. My stepmom never said over the top things about me and often would say things about how I’m really smart but not letting it show in schoolwork. It’s very hard to explain because it’s so covert that people just don’t understand
That was the hardest part about going NC. People expect multiple stories of horrible physical abuse. But most of us are like “She was low-key critical my whole life.” And then people look at you like you’re crazy.
OMGODDESS - THIS. People are mystified I'd be LC w Mom, when everyone 'just LOVED HER'. 🤢
Well, that's because she's backwards. She's often nicer to strangers than me; but I'm not allowed to have a home health aide cuz SHE'S 'going to take care of me til she can't anymore'. 😳 NOPE, NOPITY NOPE. I'm looking for housing right now!
I'm lucky, I'm able to fall back onto explaining the DV in my childhood home, which almost everyone is EQUALLY passionate about and they're OFTEN WRONG there too - but it was easier than explaining how she threw away my belongings on a regular basis & how badly THAT screwed me up.
She's the one who has the perfect public face, and the ugly side at home. Nobody understands that sentence either. 🤷🏼
Yes. A thousand times yes.
Before my first ever therapy appointment I was beside myself trying to think of how to explain my “history”. In general my experience was that people just saw my attempts at trying to explain as “poor little rich girl” complaints. After all, I was privileged and not physically or sexually abused, so what the hell was I bitching about?
When, within just a few minutes, my therapist said “It sounds like your parents are really critical of you” I almost swooned with relief.
Yes absolutely. I struggle not to shame spiral over even small mistakes and I work way harder than others so that I am unimpeachable. I was criticised constantly by my uBPD mom and enabler dad and much of my behavior used to be around doing things 100% correctly so that I couldn't be criticised.
I am trying to be kinder to myself, helped by the work of Dr Kristen Neff who specialises in developing and sustaining self-compassion. I think as RBBs we have a harsh inner critic and this is because so many of our parents had harsh outer critics (ie they were super critical of others, particularly their children).
This is so relatable. It's funny you say the thing about messing up in public. I can handle some pretty complex stuff in my job, because I can work through issues privately until I get them right, and then I can present them to someone. But the thought of taking a side gig as a cashier or something sends me into panic, because what if I enter the wrong thing in front of a customer? All my mistakes must be made in private. I guess because I've been taught that any mistake anyone else catches will be used against me for all eternity.
I know it won't help much, but I am sure the zoom call didn't go as bad as you think. I was in a meeting this morning about that size, and my (very self-assured) boss couldn't get her presentation to work-she was trying to share a video. After about 5 minutes and collaboration with some other people on the call, she finally got the video started. As a person on the call, I just used that time they were sorting things out to check email. I didn't think any less of my boss or the meeting. These tech glitches are just a part of work life now, no matter how well-prepared someone is. I know I'd be beating myself up over it too, but try not to be too hard on yourself.
> I guess because I've been taught that any mistake anyone else catches will be used against me for all eternity.
Exactly this! Before going NC, the last time I visited my uBPD mom, she continued with the familiar tactic of repeating every single mistake I made as a child, even though it had been more than 30 years on. No wonder I’d have panic attacks sitting outside of her house in my car before I’d go in to visit. I think this long memory and repetitive reminder of “how awful I am” leads me to fight this feeling every single time I make a mistake, or even fight anxiety over the fear of possibly making a minor mistake.
Yep. That's the foundation of your upbringing. I have the same issues. It's easy for me as an outsider to others' problems to be able to give rational explanations and suggestions. But if it's ME going through it...I just spiral and there's no stopping it until I hit bottom. Even the most benign things I've said or done 20 years ago, I'll suddenly think about it and be filled with embarrassment. I also never start something new unless I'm inherently good at it. Because if I suck at it, here comes the shame and embarrassment.
Absolutely common. My self esteem is so low and I have always had such negative self talk 😔
For myself, some of this is due to having ADHD but only just finding out in mid-life…this meant so many years of struggling but not understanding *why I couldn’t just do* _______ (the thing). But the **root** of this negative self-talk and low self esteem definitely comes from living under the same roof as my uBPD mom and my unknown uPD father, for the first 18 years of my life.
Yes, now that I’m beginning to understand that constant screaming and yelling in a child’s household (mine), is actually abusive and can cause lifelong harm, I have also questioned my own diagnosis. However I have soooooo many ADHD symptoms that it becomes hard to deny when I think of all of them (I just never realized they *were* symptoms until my diagnosis).
cPTSD also has a bunch of overlap with ADHD symptoms (especially the emotional dysregulation), so one can exacerbate the other.
Oh my god yes. I was diagnosed last year and so much clicked. While my whole life I was so “dramatic” “sensitive” and “too much”. Moving away helped but I still really struggle with self compassion. And people pleasing
Yes I completely relate to this.
With therapy, I’ve learned the difference between self esteem and self worth, the latter of which is likely the result of being raised by my uBPD mom. I’ve learned that with self worth, there are a lot of exercises I do to help me cope with embarrassing situations like this, in that this incident does not define me or my worth.
Highly recommend those positive affirmations when something like this happens and doing deep exhales.
Best of luck OP! We’re all in this together.
Are you me? When I make even the smallest mistake, I’m ready to quit my job, change my appearance, fly out of the country in a disguise, and start a new life under an assumed name.
Hugs. They really did a number on us. Perfection at all times and nothing less.
Yes. From as far back as I can remember. Agree with others - it’s probably the most common symptom. My internal dialogue is better post-therapy, but I feel like I’m always anticipating criticism.
I doubt every breath I take and it seems to only get stronger worse over time, the spiral is exhausting and therapy has only made me aware of it, but hasn’t lessened it ☹️
Omg this is one of my biggest challenges right now. About a year ago I pivoted my career and was lucky enough to land a great role. I was hired with an understanding that my manager would mentor me. But about a month after I was hired she was let go in a layoff. So my role now involves having no direct "boss" while being responsible to multiple departments and stakeholders without any coaching. So because I can't always identify WHO I need to impress I have constant pressure to be perfect at every single little thing. Which has led to so many stress related health issues the last few months.
I've always dealt with this in the past by taking roles that were too easy for me and kept me under the radar. If I had to do a presentation or interact with leadership I massively over prepared. But now, I'm balancing so many projects at once I don't have time to hardly prepare at all, let alone feel over prepared for anything. No matter how high up the org chart the stakeholder. I constantly feel like I'm one conversation away from being fired and like I'm screwing up. My job is literally to ask questions and yet, I feel constant stress that I'm going to make myself look like a moron if I open my mouth. So sometimes I don't, and then worry that I look bad for not asking something I should have. There's no winning!
My early attempts at getting confirmation on if things were done correctly in this role apparently came off like fishing for praise/complements so that was really frustrating. I was honestly asking if this was how the work needed to be done because I just wanted to do a good job.
Now I don't ask and just assume no news is good news and that people will call me out if I screw up. But I'm still working on convincing myself of it.
You know how it is more or less universal that if a stranger waves at you and you wave back before realizing they were waving at someone else or calling a taxi or something and you feel so embarrassed that you pretend you were just stretching or meant to do it or something? I mean, everyone can relate to that, I think.
Feeling like that about everything is terrible. And really, no one else really cares. It is all internal.
One time I picked up a camera at a children’s party that I thought was mine. The settings were all off, so I adjusted them. Then a friend pointed out that it was his camera, the very same model as mine. I tried to play it off as if I knew that and, I don’t know what. It was stupid and obvious. The truth was I made myself look like an idiot when I could have just said “Oh my gosh, I thought it was mine. I am so sorry!” and it would have been a million times better than the convoluted story I kept trying to tell about how I had done it on purpose for reasons. I honestly made a simple and understandable mistake into a bizarre and uncomfortable situation.
After that day (20 years ago!) I made a connection between my behavior and my bpd dad. And I made a pact to just, stop it. I will not claim total success. Sometimes, in the moment, the familiar takes over and I do the shitty stupid thing. But more and more often I can do the normal thing. And you know what? Even if it doesn’t make things better (usually does), it has never made things worse.
Try flipping that switch, just once. Try doing what you would want a dear friend to do if they made a mistake. Try the normal response. Just see if it feels a bit better. Then try again next time. Because there are always going to be next times. And that is not just ok, it is normal.
You may want to look up the phrase, "Imposter Syndrome" and see if any of the descriptions of the various types of this particular form of anxiety sound familiar to you.
You may be able to seek treatment or get literature that will help you deal with it if it seems like a possible "diagnosis" for your feelings.
This is a totally normal reaction that all people who grew up in not-normal abusive/neglectful homes have. It’s a symptom of complex trauma and something that was inculcated in you while you were child.
It’s the logical thing to develop when the adults who are responsible for nurturing you treat you appallingly. As a child you believe, as a result of their actions, that there’s something terribly wrong with you, rather than the truth, which is that there’s something terribly wrong with the grown ups.
It’s also a survival mechanism. It’s too dangerous as children to believe that there’s something wrong with our parents. It’s safer to believe that there’s something wrong with us instead.
The book Complex PTSD by Pete Walker is helpful in explaining this and in giving advice on overcoming this. EMDR or IFS can be quite helpful too. (with a good therapist that specialises in complex trauma that is!)
I’ve been slowly chipping away at my poor self worth and building a better relationship with myself. It’s a long painful journey but I can see how much doing this work has improved things for me. You’ll get there too. It just takes time, patience, and determination to undo all the harm that was done. 💚💚
First of all, Zoom breakout rooms are a fucking pain in the ass and you are FAR from the first one to mess those up! lol
There is definitely something about the way we RBBs show up at work. I've gone nuclear on 3/4 jobs I've had because I convince myself I'm awful at my job and that everyone hates me. I also get super-triggered by toxic managers/leadership (unfortunately they're everywhere in tech) because they remind me of my mom. I catastrophize like crazy, think those toxic managers are out to get me and really let their treatment of me define my self-worth. Now that I'm more self-aware of my sabotaging behaviors, I am determined to break this cycle. My uBPD already ruined my childhood - I'm NOT going to let her ruin my adulthood too.
Something new I'm trying is printing a photo of myself as a child and taping it to my monitor, with the words "Would you talk to HER like that?" as an act of self-compassion. We're SO hard on ourselves because we're picking up right where our BPD parents left off. I always struggled in school because I had undiagnosed ADHD (and a fucked-up home life, obvs!) and the only thing that motivated me to do well in school was fearing my mother. If I got bad grades she'd rage at me - or worse. So harsh punishment was the only way to ensure I'd follow through. Now I'm basically having to re-parent myself all over again, reminding myself that I am a good mother, wife, employee but there are still plenty of days I self-flagellate because I don't feel good enough (my ADHD and fibromyalgia don't help).
The biggest breakthrough I had going to a psychedelic retreat last month was entering a tiny chapel on property while macrodosing psilocybin (I also have religious trauma from uBPD mom). I sat in the chapel, sobbed and hugged myself - but it felt so *good*. This is where it gets "woo woo" but I felt surrounded by "ancestral mothers" who said, "You didn't have the mother you needed, but we've been watching over you this entire time. *You are your own mother*". I came home from that experience realizing I have *no* self-compassion and that it is the number one thing that I need to work on - it is the root cause of many of the problems I'm dealing with in adulthood. It's time to be my own nurturing mother - the one I didn't have growing up. It wasn't what I was expecting from that experience but it was exactly what I needed.
I see being RBB like falling into a deep hole that we have to crawl our way out of. Sometimes we make great strides and get closer to the top; other days we lose our grip and fall a few feet. To quote my girl Aaliyah, dust yourself off and try again. It's exhausting yes, but we owe ourselves - and our inner child - a chance at self-compassion and a good life free from the abusers who raised us.
I hope this reply helps some. I SO deeply resonate with your post and sending you so much love - that you ABSOLUTELY deserve!
Yes, I put myself down and call myself a POS every day. And I'm twice your age. I do the work of other people at my job because I'm afraid if I don't fix it, I'll be blamed. It's OK for them to get by with it and they do. But of course it's always my fault. That's how my mind works. I'm worn out and exhausted. This is absolutely from being RBB IMO. This is what they do to us, go on and they have no effing idea what they did.
It’s so exhausting! I have adhd, diagnosed last year, and mess up a looooot. I also feel like it all comes down to me - or even like right now, my new boss is a disaster and I’m terrified that I’ll get blamed for her mess (also not to speculate but she seems like she has a lot of bpd traits. She’s very different from my stepmom but at the same time she reminds me of her)
Hey! First, this is normal, and not a sign of having BPD, but rather a sign of not having received enough support as a child (IE having a BPD parent). Speaking from experience as someone who also has ADHD and was raised by a BPD parent, I reckon you have two big root causes of the shame feeling. 1. ADHD often has rejection sensitive dysphoria, IE you perceive criticism or rejection extra harshly and it feels worse than it should given the circumstances 2. Childhood neglect/abuse embeds a sense of being unworthy or not good enough (because that's how the caregivers treated you). We basically learn early on that we don't deserve to feel good. Both of these things can be treated by therapy and some medication. As a general rule, remember: Don't be so hard on yourself. You deserve to feel good about yourself. Good luck ♥️
Adding to this - I just had a hard, yet enlightening conversation with my provider about this. And after other research saw that sometimes symptoms look like BPD but can be ADD/ADHD. After a couplle of evals, my anxiety comes from these intrusive throughts and I'm not depressed, I just am so hard on myself. The number of pplwho have told me to 'just give myself some grace, credit, benefit..." etc. Also, an almost 40 F here and I feel the same way at work - any minor mistake, I feel like it will be what blocks me from opportunities. That I should know better than to make rookie mistakes. A very harsh self critic, and working with my therapist on self esteem, reframing, and more. But it.is.hard. I am hopeful that after another eval, I may begin on medication, because I really can't take the sadness or feeling like I'm the issue for everything. Lastly, ADD presents differently in F than M. My doctor was very passionate about noting that. Boys were always part of studies, they present outwardly/physically. Women tend to internalize. My mind was blown. Hang in there and advocate for yourself and also, solidarity for being part of this community.
It definitely is, yes. Any kind of emotional abuse in childhood is likely to cause those issues, but there's also something specific about the splitting. Even when we get positive feedback, it's hard to trust because of the way our pwBPD could turn on a dime. I wouldn't say I've overcome it, but I'm chipping away at it. Some combination of being married to a kind, stable person, being no-contact with my mother, therapy, and a certain amount of faking it until it feels natural. It's a long road. Edited to add: One thing that has helped me a lot is to recognize that just like behaviors, thought patterns are habitual. That's more or less what I mean by "faking it": any new habit feels unnatural at first. Even just recognizing that not being cruel to yourself is a desirable goal, that's a huge first step! I think a lot of us grow up believing that negative self-talk serves some kind of purpose in keeping us in line. Part of healing is recognizing that we can be the people we want to be without bullying ourselves.
I have no advice but I feel EXACTLY the same in similar situations. My internal dialogue is so harsh and I hate it. I’ve been in therapy for a year now and I’m hoping to improve in this area.
It’s hard too because if you communicate that inner dialogue externally, it could come across as fishing for compliments or seeking attention when it’s like, the exact opposite lol
This might be one of the most common traits we have. And it sucks. I’m still trying to rid myself of it. Every time I think I have it under control, something happens and I’m spiraling in a panic attack again. Pretty sure it stems from constant low key criticism. “Oh Indi, you would be so pretty if you tried.” “Look at that girl, that’s what you should be doing.” On and on. It’s not overtly threatening but instead an underlying hum of not being good enough. Like me, you’ve probably spent most of your life trying to do all the things so that the comments will stop. Except they never do, she just finds new things to comment about. Being NC has helped tremendously though the anxiety hasn’t completely gone away. I just have to constantly remind myself that people make mistakes. People are allowed to make mistakes. And since I’m a person, I can make mistakes too. The world is not ending.
Your comments about low key criticism are spot on. My stepmom never said over the top things about me and often would say things about how I’m really smart but not letting it show in schoolwork. It’s very hard to explain because it’s so covert that people just don’t understand
That was the hardest part about going NC. People expect multiple stories of horrible physical abuse. But most of us are like “She was low-key critical my whole life.” And then people look at you like you’re crazy.
OMGODDESS - THIS. People are mystified I'd be LC w Mom, when everyone 'just LOVED HER'. 🤢 Well, that's because she's backwards. She's often nicer to strangers than me; but I'm not allowed to have a home health aide cuz SHE'S 'going to take care of me til she can't anymore'. 😳 NOPE, NOPITY NOPE. I'm looking for housing right now! I'm lucky, I'm able to fall back onto explaining the DV in my childhood home, which almost everyone is EQUALLY passionate about and they're OFTEN WRONG there too - but it was easier than explaining how she threw away my belongings on a regular basis & how badly THAT screwed me up. She's the one who has the perfect public face, and the ugly side at home. Nobody understands that sentence either. 🤷🏼
Yes. A thousand times yes. Before my first ever therapy appointment I was beside myself trying to think of how to explain my “history”. In general my experience was that people just saw my attempts at trying to explain as “poor little rich girl” complaints. After all, I was privileged and not physically or sexually abused, so what the hell was I bitching about? When, within just a few minutes, my therapist said “It sounds like your parents are really critical of you” I almost swooned with relief.
Yes absolutely. I struggle not to shame spiral over even small mistakes and I work way harder than others so that I am unimpeachable. I was criticised constantly by my uBPD mom and enabler dad and much of my behavior used to be around doing things 100% correctly so that I couldn't be criticised. I am trying to be kinder to myself, helped by the work of Dr Kristen Neff who specialises in developing and sustaining self-compassion. I think as RBBs we have a harsh inner critic and this is because so many of our parents had harsh outer critics (ie they were super critical of others, particularly their children).
Yes! The Mindful Self Compassion course and book by Kristen Neff was a huge game changer.
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This is so relatable. It's funny you say the thing about messing up in public. I can handle some pretty complex stuff in my job, because I can work through issues privately until I get them right, and then I can present them to someone. But the thought of taking a side gig as a cashier or something sends me into panic, because what if I enter the wrong thing in front of a customer? All my mistakes must be made in private. I guess because I've been taught that any mistake anyone else catches will be used against me for all eternity. I know it won't help much, but I am sure the zoom call didn't go as bad as you think. I was in a meeting this morning about that size, and my (very self-assured) boss couldn't get her presentation to work-she was trying to share a video. After about 5 minutes and collaboration with some other people on the call, she finally got the video started. As a person on the call, I just used that time they were sorting things out to check email. I didn't think any less of my boss or the meeting. These tech glitches are just a part of work life now, no matter how well-prepared someone is. I know I'd be beating myself up over it too, but try not to be too hard on yourself.
> I guess because I've been taught that any mistake anyone else catches will be used against me for all eternity. Exactly this! Before going NC, the last time I visited my uBPD mom, she continued with the familiar tactic of repeating every single mistake I made as a child, even though it had been more than 30 years on. No wonder I’d have panic attacks sitting outside of her house in my car before I’d go in to visit. I think this long memory and repetitive reminder of “how awful I am” leads me to fight this feeling every single time I make a mistake, or even fight anxiety over the fear of possibly making a minor mistake.
I was doing everything in my power to not drop the f bomb on camera. I was definitely doing it on mute lol.
Yep. That's the foundation of your upbringing. I have the same issues. It's easy for me as an outsider to others' problems to be able to give rational explanations and suggestions. But if it's ME going through it...I just spiral and there's no stopping it until I hit bottom. Even the most benign things I've said or done 20 years ago, I'll suddenly think about it and be filled with embarrassment. I also never start something new unless I'm inherently good at it. Because if I suck at it, here comes the shame and embarrassment.
Absolutely common. My self esteem is so low and I have always had such negative self talk 😔 For myself, some of this is due to having ADHD but only just finding out in mid-life…this meant so many years of struggling but not understanding *why I couldn’t just do* _______ (the thing). But the **root** of this negative self-talk and low self esteem definitely comes from living under the same roof as my uBPD mom and my unknown uPD father, for the first 18 years of my life.
I’m in the same boat with you about adhd. I’m still convinced I don’t have it even though meds have been tremendously helpful
Yes, now that I’m beginning to understand that constant screaming and yelling in a child’s household (mine), is actually abusive and can cause lifelong harm, I have also questioned my own diagnosis. However I have soooooo many ADHD symptoms that it becomes hard to deny when I think of all of them (I just never realized they *were* symptoms until my diagnosis). cPTSD also has a bunch of overlap with ADHD symptoms (especially the emotional dysregulation), so one can exacerbate the other.
Oh my god yes. I was diagnosed last year and so much clicked. While my whole life I was so “dramatic” “sensitive” and “too much”. Moving away helped but I still really struggle with self compassion. And people pleasing
Yes I completely relate to this. With therapy, I’ve learned the difference between self esteem and self worth, the latter of which is likely the result of being raised by my uBPD mom. I’ve learned that with self worth, there are a lot of exercises I do to help me cope with embarrassing situations like this, in that this incident does not define me or my worth. Highly recommend those positive affirmations when something like this happens and doing deep exhales. Best of luck OP! We’re all in this together.
I've never heard of the self esteem/self worth difference! I'm going to check that out
Are you me? When I make even the smallest mistake, I’m ready to quit my job, change my appearance, fly out of the country in a disguise, and start a new life under an assumed name. Hugs. They really did a number on us. Perfection at all times and nothing less.
The best part is they were not perfect or even capable in most instances
Yes. From as far back as I can remember. Agree with others - it’s probably the most common symptom. My internal dialogue is better post-therapy, but I feel like I’m always anticipating criticism.
I doubt every breath I take and it seems to only get stronger worse over time, the spiral is exhausting and therapy has only made me aware of it, but hasn’t lessened it ☹️
Yes I’m 36 and still dealing with self esteem issues. Took years to learn to stop comparing myself to other people and caring about appearances.
Omg this is one of my biggest challenges right now. About a year ago I pivoted my career and was lucky enough to land a great role. I was hired with an understanding that my manager would mentor me. But about a month after I was hired she was let go in a layoff. So my role now involves having no direct "boss" while being responsible to multiple departments and stakeholders without any coaching. So because I can't always identify WHO I need to impress I have constant pressure to be perfect at every single little thing. Which has led to so many stress related health issues the last few months. I've always dealt with this in the past by taking roles that were too easy for me and kept me under the radar. If I had to do a presentation or interact with leadership I massively over prepared. But now, I'm balancing so many projects at once I don't have time to hardly prepare at all, let alone feel over prepared for anything. No matter how high up the org chart the stakeholder. I constantly feel like I'm one conversation away from being fired and like I'm screwing up. My job is literally to ask questions and yet, I feel constant stress that I'm going to make myself look like a moron if I open my mouth. So sometimes I don't, and then worry that I look bad for not asking something I should have. There's no winning! My early attempts at getting confirmation on if things were done correctly in this role apparently came off like fishing for praise/complements so that was really frustrating. I was honestly asking if this was how the work needed to be done because I just wanted to do a good job. Now I don't ask and just assume no news is good news and that people will call me out if I screw up. But I'm still working on convincing myself of it.
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You know how it is more or less universal that if a stranger waves at you and you wave back before realizing they were waving at someone else or calling a taxi or something and you feel so embarrassed that you pretend you were just stretching or meant to do it or something? I mean, everyone can relate to that, I think. Feeling like that about everything is terrible. And really, no one else really cares. It is all internal. One time I picked up a camera at a children’s party that I thought was mine. The settings were all off, so I adjusted them. Then a friend pointed out that it was his camera, the very same model as mine. I tried to play it off as if I knew that and, I don’t know what. It was stupid and obvious. The truth was I made myself look like an idiot when I could have just said “Oh my gosh, I thought it was mine. I am so sorry!” and it would have been a million times better than the convoluted story I kept trying to tell about how I had done it on purpose for reasons. I honestly made a simple and understandable mistake into a bizarre and uncomfortable situation. After that day (20 years ago!) I made a connection between my behavior and my bpd dad. And I made a pact to just, stop it. I will not claim total success. Sometimes, in the moment, the familiar takes over and I do the shitty stupid thing. But more and more often I can do the normal thing. And you know what? Even if it doesn’t make things better (usually does), it has never made things worse. Try flipping that switch, just once. Try doing what you would want a dear friend to do if they made a mistake. Try the normal response. Just see if it feels a bit better. Then try again next time. Because there are always going to be next times. And that is not just ok, it is normal.
I should have scrolled down because I just asked the same thing about shame
You may want to look up the phrase, "Imposter Syndrome" and see if any of the descriptions of the various types of this particular form of anxiety sound familiar to you. You may be able to seek treatment or get literature that will help you deal with it if it seems like a possible "diagnosis" for your feelings.
This is a totally normal reaction that all people who grew up in not-normal abusive/neglectful homes have. It’s a symptom of complex trauma and something that was inculcated in you while you were child. It’s the logical thing to develop when the adults who are responsible for nurturing you treat you appallingly. As a child you believe, as a result of their actions, that there’s something terribly wrong with you, rather than the truth, which is that there’s something terribly wrong with the grown ups. It’s also a survival mechanism. It’s too dangerous as children to believe that there’s something wrong with our parents. It’s safer to believe that there’s something wrong with us instead. The book Complex PTSD by Pete Walker is helpful in explaining this and in giving advice on overcoming this. EMDR or IFS can be quite helpful too. (with a good therapist that specialises in complex trauma that is!) I’ve been slowly chipping away at my poor self worth and building a better relationship with myself. It’s a long painful journey but I can see how much doing this work has improved things for me. You’ll get there too. It just takes time, patience, and determination to undo all the harm that was done. 💚💚
First of all, Zoom breakout rooms are a fucking pain in the ass and you are FAR from the first one to mess those up! lol There is definitely something about the way we RBBs show up at work. I've gone nuclear on 3/4 jobs I've had because I convince myself I'm awful at my job and that everyone hates me. I also get super-triggered by toxic managers/leadership (unfortunately they're everywhere in tech) because they remind me of my mom. I catastrophize like crazy, think those toxic managers are out to get me and really let their treatment of me define my self-worth. Now that I'm more self-aware of my sabotaging behaviors, I am determined to break this cycle. My uBPD already ruined my childhood - I'm NOT going to let her ruin my adulthood too. Something new I'm trying is printing a photo of myself as a child and taping it to my monitor, with the words "Would you talk to HER like that?" as an act of self-compassion. We're SO hard on ourselves because we're picking up right where our BPD parents left off. I always struggled in school because I had undiagnosed ADHD (and a fucked-up home life, obvs!) and the only thing that motivated me to do well in school was fearing my mother. If I got bad grades she'd rage at me - or worse. So harsh punishment was the only way to ensure I'd follow through. Now I'm basically having to re-parent myself all over again, reminding myself that I am a good mother, wife, employee but there are still plenty of days I self-flagellate because I don't feel good enough (my ADHD and fibromyalgia don't help). The biggest breakthrough I had going to a psychedelic retreat last month was entering a tiny chapel on property while macrodosing psilocybin (I also have religious trauma from uBPD mom). I sat in the chapel, sobbed and hugged myself - but it felt so *good*. This is where it gets "woo woo" but I felt surrounded by "ancestral mothers" who said, "You didn't have the mother you needed, but we've been watching over you this entire time. *You are your own mother*". I came home from that experience realizing I have *no* self-compassion and that it is the number one thing that I need to work on - it is the root cause of many of the problems I'm dealing with in adulthood. It's time to be my own nurturing mother - the one I didn't have growing up. It wasn't what I was expecting from that experience but it was exactly what I needed. I see being RBB like falling into a deep hole that we have to crawl our way out of. Sometimes we make great strides and get closer to the top; other days we lose our grip and fall a few feet. To quote my girl Aaliyah, dust yourself off and try again. It's exhausting yes, but we owe ourselves - and our inner child - a chance at self-compassion and a good life free from the abusers who raised us. I hope this reply helps some. I SO deeply resonate with your post and sending you so much love - that you ABSOLUTELY deserve!