Depression Understood Forums

I'm a 19-year-old male. For me, sadness is a relief from the pain I experience when I think about myself. I feel slightly better when I cry, but this never makes the underlying pain go away—in fact, it usually makes things worse in the long run. I think that most of my problems stem rather from shame and self-hatred, not sadness. It's been very difficult to overcome these feelings because I'm too ashamed to even talk about them in detail. I'm only really comfortable talking about my insecurities in a vague way. But some recent events--concerning changes in the way I act and think--have made me want to try to talk more about the causes of my self-hatred. I've tried with my psychiatrist, my family, and some other online resources, but every time I get close to revealing something important, I become overwhelmed with self-hatred and can't continue. Also, I think that my hopelessness makes it difficult to talk. Even when I think that talking could make me feel better, I can't help believing that it won't ever permanently solve anything and that concrete changes need to take place in my life for me to feel better.

I've been more concerned about my mental health recently because of intense mood swings. I've been switching between wanting to do absolutely nothing--not even moving--and feeling extreme frustration with myself and the way the world seems to work. Sometimes, I get stuck in cognitive loops. I won't be able to stop obsessing over how horrible I am, and I sort of lose control of what I do--I shake, twitch, scream, pull my hair, etc. Sometimes, I feel like I'm going insane, and I'm worried that this might be the beginnings of schizophrenia.
What improvement I have made seems to have come from thinking about myself and the world in less absolute terms—trying to see that things don’t have to be this way—but I think that the acceptance of other people would do more to help me realize that I can feel good about myself and that I don’t have to be upset all the time. (Moments of happiness—if only temporary—can make me feel better overall just by showing me that it’s possible for me to feel better.) It seems to me, in fact, that most of my self-hatred comes from a very general notion that people dislike me. My belief in this idea has been absolute, and I’ve been able to convince myself of its truth by inventing—with some help from others—specific reasons for why other people hate me.

I can remember that at one time, I felt only the indifference of others. It might be too much (or unreasonable, impractical, whatever) to ask, but I do want other people to care about me. And it hurts to think that they are merely indifferent. I started worrying more about my relationships with other people when I got to college. Before college, I hadn’t been involved in any kind of serious relationship, but when I got there, I met someone who seemed to appreciate and care about me. When I was around her, I felt like an entirely different person. All of my insecurities disappeared. I felt very calm and comfortable with myself and my feelings, as though I was experiencing the opposite of shame—a desire to celebrate everything I felt. Long story short: I expressed my feelings for her, eventually causing her to stop speaking to me. Although my emotional episodes no longer focus on this event, I think it made me hate myself a lot. Thinking about it still makes me feel disgusting, pathetic, unattractive, etc. And it seems like a part of me that no one will ever accept. It’s difficult not to feel ashamed about my feelings for other people now. In part, because it seems there is something horribly unattractive to women about emotional honesty. I resent that. But it still makes me feel ridiculous, like everyone is laughing at me and my hideousness—my obvious lack of experience in certain social situations and my virginity. It seems absurd to me that these things--together with emotional dishonesty--should be used as a measure of one's attractiveness, but that's how most people I know think.

I tried to kill myself a few months later by cutting my arms with a hunting knife. I survived, obviously, but now, I have some serious scars along my forearms as well as the latent conviction that death is the only way out of my suffering (I think that I had to tell myself this a lot in order to go through with the suicide attempt, and now, I still have the urge to end my life in a very violent way--some kind of cutting). This is another thing that I’m very ashamed of. I know that other people will be afraid of becoming close to me when they discover these things about me. I also think that the experience of trying to kill myself gave me the idea that my life couldn't proceed in any healthy way, that I had reached some kind of end, and that my life would end soon--not necessarily by suicide, just in a general sort of way. (I did pass out at one moment and woke up with the feeling that I was stuck in a dark tunnel.) This is a very vague feeling, I know, and it's hard to see what its realization in the world would look like. That's partly why it's difficult to dismiss, I think--because it's hard to refute something so vague. Fortunately, I don't think this feeling affects me as much as it used to.

I'm writing this with the hope of finding that I don't have to feel this way and that other people can accept me. At the same time, I'm worried that there's something wrong with this approach to feeling better. It takes my happiness out of my control and makes it depend on other people. That said, I would appreciate constructive advice and/or reassurance that things can get better. And although I appreciate all well-meaning responses, I'd just like to point out that honest posts offering suggestions on how I could improve would help me out most (I think).

Hello,

I've been in some pretty bad situations myself and I'm sorry to hear how much you hate yourself and your life. I know you say death is the only way out, but I don't think it is really. What if you did die and found out that things were even worse after death? How is that an escape?

I think the person you told your feelings to was just not the right kind of person for you. The fact that she didn't want much to do with you after you told her how you felt, well it seems to me that her reaction was strange.

People that genuinely care about a person are not going to act that way when someone tells them how they feel. Even if they don't return the feelings they would be more likely to talk respectfully with the other person and work it out.

The only helpful thing I can really say here though, is that you will be accepted here. Everyone I've met so far seems nice and caring. So, welcome to the forum and I hope we all hear more from you.

Thanks for the response, Destination. I like the Shaw quote that you have. I'm sorry if my problems seem immature and ridiculous.
I should also clarify that I don't think that suicide is the only option--I just have a sort of unconscious belief, which sometimes turns into an urge to destroy myself.
I know I shouldn't be upset by anything you said, but some of the things in your response make me feel like I will never understand relationships and that I'm ridiculous and hideous as a result. It's obviously my own fault that I feel this way, and I don't mean to make you feel bad. But I do want to be honest about my feelings and try to articulate what seems to be upsetting me.

Thanks for the compliment on the quote. I really like it.

I don't think you're ridiculous or anything like that. I'm sorry what I said hurt your feelings. I don't think you did anything wrong at all. What I meant about the girl was that she was the one with the problem, not you. (( huggle )) Don't worry about hurting my feelings, if I say something annoying or hurtful please do let me know! The last thing I want to do is hurt someone even inadvertently. Sorry again

Thanks for the reassurance. Like some other people on this forum, I think I'm going to try to update this thread every once in a while just with thoughts, so what follows is partially a response but also kind of open-ended. I tend to infer too much from what other people say. Maybe this is because of my poor self-image, but I also suspect that it's a response to a general lack of emotion in my life--like I just want some kind of feeling, even if it's normally thought of as negative. Fortunately, I'm able to enjoy life by myself sometimes--in other words, I'm not trying to say that I can't find emotion by myself--but it's difficult for me to feel satisfied with just that. I also want to make meaningful connections with other people.

Maybe, this desire is unhealthy, though. I know that I need to become less emotionally dependent on other people to feel better. Sometimes, I try to forget about people by not talking to anyone for a few days. I'm considering doing this for more substantial amounts of time--weeks, maybe months depending on how it goes--but I'm not sure whether this is a good idea, especially given the fact that I would have to break the rules from time to time out of necessity, making it difficult to maintain the peaceful mental state that sometimes accompanies complete seclusion.