i feel inadequate

[i don't know why]

I feel really cheeky being here doing this. but i am at my wits end and needed someone to talk too. It all started when I was 15, i slept with a girl who was a friends ex. I knew I shouldn't have but I was young and stupid.

All of a sudden everyone at school despised me, I got attacked and went a full year with no-one in my year talking to me ever. I did my highers at school monday to friday and worked saturday and sunday in a nursing home, i literally had no life. I admit that i used to cut myself and contemplated suicide once or twice but those were fleeting moments.

But the real reason I feel cheeky is that I got through it physically...just not mentally. I went to uni, made new friends, got a degree, did 4 years in the TA and won awards, now have a great group of mates, an amazing gf and just found out today i passed my exams.........

yet i am still sitting here tonight in tears. I feel inadquate, dumb, useless. i argued with my gf over nothing and it was all about me being an idiot. she remarked (innoncently) that i left stuff get ontop of me and let it build up....but i don't know what else to do.

I have never recovered from what happened years ago. I get paranoid over everything, i remember all the bad things i have done. even now I can't sleep because I know i was a tube tonight. I can remember everything negative i have done.

i feel worthless all the time, a fraud, like i don't deserve anything. I just...don't know how to break this. but then i read the other things here and think that I don't deserve to post here, like nothing is wrong, people put up with worse than you.

but i felt the need to as i don't want to chuck things away. people say talking about things helps...how do people feel about that? what other things do people try? sorry if i have wasted peoples time.

[Obayan]

When something happens to us that breaks down our self esteem, we have to work hard to build it back up again. Talking about it to a counselor might help. What I do is make a list. Everything I want to accomplish. I mark off those things i have no control over. Then i start with the smallest of items to tackle and i don't stop until it's finished. As the list shortens i feel my confidence grow again. It also helps to realise and to remind myself that needing help is not a sign of failure or weakness. It's a sign of being alive and human. Everyone needs help at some point or another. The most responsible thing we can ever do is seek out that help when we need it.

[balcony]

Hi I don't know why, thank you for sharing your thoughts. I guess if we all "knew why" things happen as they do, life would be far simpler. I would take comfort in the fact that you ask questions. People that ask, generally seek solutions or atleast a means to find some peace with the questions. It sounds as if you have accomplished a lot in a short period of time, congratulations. I would also suggest you consider talking to someone about the past and its effects. Sometimes, we push aside painful periods and we think they have passed and then they resurface in the most unexpected ways. Best of luck to you and take care.