Shame

The fist time that I felt this was when my initial therapist turned me away…claiming she couldn’t help me until I dealt with my anorexia, my most plaguing issue. I felt baffled and dumb founded. How could she see inside me so clearly. She was the first person that not only SAW my secret, but had the nerve to call me out on it. And the hardest part was that she was a professional. Even in my denial, a mental professional is someone who is hard to ignore.

I was called out again yesterday….by someone more significant than my therapist.
At my doctor’s appointment I heard the word shame used in reference to how I feel about myself. The hardest part to accept was that it was true.

I’ve looked very hard at myself in the last month. Anorexic people don’t deprive themselves for fun….they learn it as a coping mechanism. I was coping for something…some hole in my life.

I think that I have finally put my finger on what that hole is. I have come to the detrimental conclusion that I am a person who is constantly striving for acceptance and approval. This is something I have consciously chosen to ignore about myself. I strongly believe that all people hide truths from the world….and often times even from themselves. The scariest truths are the ones that you hide from yourself. My truth is that I need acceptance from the world. Every aspect of my life is something that I need people to accept and love about me. I need that external validation because I’m the only one who doesn’t accept MYSELF.

I feel like I am a sham…I’m fooling the world. They all believe that I am someone else….they all believe that I ‘m the person that they WANT me to be.
They want me to be extroverted, intelligent, witty, athletic, well spoken, well educated, fun, and successful….and I know the things to say to make them believe all those things about me. Sure…I am most of those things…but not to the extent that others want to see me as. I feel like I’m the ‘top in show’ when it comes to putting on an act to give each individual person what they are wanting from me. I am my own worst enemy.

I’m the original for saying, “I don’t care what people think about me.” The crazy thing is that the person who is least honest about that fact is ME. Inside my subconscience is screaming,”I SO care what people think about me.” But it also knows that it isn’t socially acceptable. Everyone knows that society accepts those who confess to NOT care about what other people think. So I thought that I was fooling them all…

The person who I was most fooling by not being truthful was MYSELF. All I’ve ever done was damage MYSELF. I’m ashamed of myself inside…so much that many of my motives in life have been done in search of external affirmation because I don’t give it to myself. When it wasn’t making great grades in school and college, being in the best sorority, getting my MBA, getting the best job, advancing the ranks, being the best teacher, or starting my own business, I was seeking the approval of my jerk of an ex-husband or striving to be the hub of my always growing social network. When I had achieved all of that I started to excel at running and began to lean out….which again brought attention and admiration.

The sad thing is that my eternal quest for the next validator lead me to the dead end road of anorexia. Anorexia literally devoured all of those achievements from the past. I lost whatever confidence I did have. No longer did I have the energy to excel at work or to care about maintaining friends. I cared about little in my world. Worst of all I lost the energy to even run. I lost the desire to achieve ANY personal goals outside of ONE…what the scale told me. I allowed the scale to become the only gauge of my personal self worth.

I am worth it. I am a fantastic person. I am intelligent and someone worth knowing. I just need to learn to internalize that wholly.