Question About Self Respect

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

So, early December last year- about a month and a half ago- my father told me that due to the sorry state of my life, in his opinion I should kill myself. This wasn’t the meanest or the stupidest or the insanest thing he’d ever said to me, and it wasn’t even the first time he’d implied I had an obligation to self-negation, but it was definitely the bluntest, most blatant, unambiguously stated incredibly horrible thing he’s ever said to me. I spent the Christmas holidays in some kind of delirious psychotic break while trying to come to terms with it. Still trying, actually.

I’m twenty-nine and I’ve spent my whole life trying to please my parents by hating myself as much as they hate me. I’ve been aware since I was around thirteen that something was seriously wrong with both of them, but the fact that they are my parents kind of precluded my gaining clarity on the matter. Also, there were the many, many people who had never met my parents but would still immediately jump to their defense if I tried to talk about what was bothering me, because very few people are able to confront the reality that there are parents who do not love their children.

But this final blow, seems to have broken something inside of me loose. I have now, a terrible, frightening, almost certainly irrational clarity with regards to my parent’s intentions towards me. All the excuses and mitigating circumstances for their behavior- and there are many, many, many of them- seem to shrivel like paper held to a flame before this memory I have seared into my brain of my Dad telling me I should put an end to myself. I don’t like this mental state at all. But, it boils down to, none of their alleged good intentions can possibly matter if I’m dead. My father can’t mean well if what he means is death. My mother has her own list of transgressions, but mostly in this case I know she has pushed me into my father’s arms, knowing who he is. She’s never hesitated to use him as an anvil to her hammer.

The question I started this post to ask was, “Is it possible to respect yourself when no one else does?” I don’t mean this retrospectively; I’m not asking if I could have done better. I’m suffering from a crisis of purpose in the here-and-now.

I got kind of bogged down dumping out what’s on my mind right now, of which this is honestly just the tip of the iceberg. The reason I feel it’s relevant is the thing I said at the start of the second paragraph- my parents have typically disapproved of anything I’ve ever done, including breathing, and somehow I got trapped in the idea that the way to win their approval was to emulate their disapproval. I didn’t realize that’s what my strategy was- although for a very long time I’ve known something was wrong- until my father told me to kill myself and it resulted in the horrible crystallization in my mind of my question of why they were never satisfied, and only then could I see what exactly I was trying to satisfy them with.

So I think, possibly, I may finally be able to free myself of them. Except, I don’t know what to replace them with. My life is a shambles; I don’t have anything to be proud of. My extended family is very small and also possessing dysfunction comparable to my parents. I have no religion. For a long time, I’ve been using therapy as a substitute for life, and while I’m aware of that now, it’s not making me feel any less lost. My friendships have mostly withered over the past several years, although I do have one friend left who has been helping me through this and has astonished me with his heretofore unknown capacity for empathy. But, he’s not a philosophy. He’s just a very nice guy.

I need some kind of standard to measure myself by, something to live up to. Simply asserting something I want to be like and willing myself into a state of believing in it doesn’t work. I don’t know where else to look for something like this. Any ideas?

2

I think you should forget about what your parents think and live the life you want to live.

3

Fuck other people, and their opinions.

Go find a mirror. Seriously, do it. I’ll wait.

Got one? Good. Look into the mirror. The guy looking back at you is the only guy you ultimately owe answers to. Get yourself right with the Dude in the Mirror. Once you’ve done that, relating to the rest of the world is a whole lot easier.

4

Congratulations on this realization. It’s very common for people to reflexively think that parents always mean well and are always trying their best. Even my mother, whose father was a rather mean-spirited man all his life, kept leaping to my father-in-law’s defense when I’d try to tell her about how abusive he is.

One suggestion you may want to consider: For a while, don’t replace them or their philosophy with anything. Try to just be happy in your new freedom, and use the time to explore who you are now. Leaping into emulating someone else right away might shut out possibilities; you might grip onto a new role model without considering that others might be a better fit.

Oh, and the Golden Rule is always a good starting point for a philosophy. :slight_smile:

5

My only suggestion is to look outside of yourself for now. Do some volunteer work that brings you in contact with people, either people in need or other volunteers or both. **Earn **some self-respect by doing good.

My experience is sometimes you have to fake it. Just pretend you have something to give. You might find that you’re more solid than you think.

6

Jesus fucking Christ, what an evil thing to say to your child. What an evil thing to be.

I don’t have any real advice, just…sever all ties with your parents ASAP, and with anyone else who sides with them. Stay actively in touch with your close friend and with anyone else who wishes you well, helps you, gives you energy/clarity/peace. Stay in therapy. Keep posting here. :slight_smile:

7

You sound quite mentally coherent and of sound perspective. I have psychologically problematic parents too and I know it’s hard as hell to free yourself from their influence - you are wired to want to love them, but some people make it really, really difficult.

It’s easy to say “fuck everyone else, I don’t owe anyone anything” as Oakminster suggests, but it’s quite another to live it and really believe it. Plus it’s an incredibly lonely place to be when you feel like your own family really doesn’t love you (or at least not very much). I’m not sure what to tell you - other than your dad’s advice is bad, very bad. But I think you already seem to know that.

8

If you’re in therapy, have you talked to your therapist about wanting to build a life of your own outside of therapy? That’s really what they’re there for. If you feel that this won’t work with your current therapist, find a new one.

One concept that might help you while you’re working to develop that life is to create a “good mother” for yourself. In your case, it might be a “good father.” Since your own father is not giving you the support you need, think about what you would like your father to say, how you believe a good father would relate to you, support you, etc. When you’re experiencing self-doubt, conjure up the good father in your mind and imagine what he would be saying to you. As you say, sometimes it can be very hard to assert your worth for yourself. Putting the words in the mouth of another, especially a good mother or father, can make them real to you.

Good luck. I know from experience that it is not easy to break away from parental influence and trying to live up to their expectations.

9

This. This is what I’m talking about. For some reason, it just doesn’t seem to be possible to assert yourself into a new intuitive perception of reality. There seems to be some requirement for someone else to say the important things.

I’ve tried to talk about aspects of this with people before, when I’m struggling with my need for approval, and they will tellingly say things like “I don’t depend on other people’s approval because my parents taught me I can be my own source of self-respect.” And I think, okay, why are they not seeing the paradox here that I am?

There just seems to be an inescapable requirement of external approval for sanity, even if it’s now internalized external approval. It’s like a ship in a bottle. Yeah, it doesn’t come out anymore. But you know that at some point it had to be placed inside.

10

I hated myself for ages, but unlike you, I didn’t have parents who had implanted it in me. It kind of crystalized in my head one night in my late-twenties, when I was trying to fall asleep. Like a donkey-punch, it occurred to me I had done absolutely nothing good in my life. There were superficial achievements–like graduating from college and graduate school…things that people would always point out to me with admiration. But I felt like those things didn’t count. I was a dead, empty, monstrous robot and there wasn’t anything anyone could do about it. But I kept going through the motions of life and kept my self-hatred secret…which just made me feel more and more like a dead robot. It was bad.

Now I don’t feel that way. There are things about myself that I don’t like, but hell, everyone can say that! I think the difference now is that I can point out things that do count as real achievements, to me. It started when I cultivated a mere hobby turned it into a real-life passion. It has become a central part of my identity and makes me feel like a worthwhile person.

That’s what you need to do. Find a hobby–the most self-absorbed thing you can think of–and become really really good with it. Then find a way of reaching out to others with that hobby. Maybe you can teach people or become really active in a club. Cultivate a talent and give it over and over and over. Eventually, you will see the goodness of yourself and it won’t matter what anyone else thinks.

Your family should be cut out of your life like the rotten filth they are. You don’t need them to love yourself. You only need you for that. .

11

Your therapist should be acting as your proxy parent by planting that thought in you. Over and over. Everytime you say something self-loathing, they should be stopping and correcting you.

I know this will sound extremely corny and racial and all that, but bear with me. When it comes to self-respect, it helps me to think about the enslaved black people who dared to resist their masters and fight back (I’m watching the PBS documentary Slavery and the Making of America, which has lots of vignettes about specific slaves who left behind historical accounts.) Now where did they get off having that kind of self-respect, when they had been treated like animals their whole lives! Maybe having a role model can help you. Mine is Harriet Tubman.

I’m agnostic, but maybe there’s something deep in us that won’t let us hate ourselves completely. Even in the most suicidal person, that little molecule of self-preservation is still there, screaming out. Some of us just choose to ignore it. You have to find your molecule and help it grow. If therapy isn’t working, then I would consider a game-change (maybe a new doctor perhaps?)

12

I am repeating this because this absolutely, positively works. If you happen to be a person whose parent did not “parent” them correctly, by using this technique, you can “parent” yourself. I know you said it’s paradoxical (and in a way I suppose it is), but it starts out as a mind trick and builds up into something solid that you can count on in times of crisis. Please consider trying it.

And my heart goes out to you for having to deal with such cruel people as your parents. You are a worthwhile person, no matter what they tell you.

13

Don’t underestimate the power of a very nice guy. Your friend can quite possibly be the one who helps you get beyond this.

There are caveats, of course. It would be a mistake to move beyond friendship. A sexual relationship would be a bit risky in your current emotional situation; if it broke off, it would leave you with nothing. But if he truly thinks you have some value, it will help you to see it.

Talking to your therapist is also a good idea. I’d also say that posting here on the Dope – not just about your progress, but on some of the sillier topics in Cafe Society – would be useful. If you say, “I loved that movie,” someone will probably come along to agree with you.

And I must say the most boggling thing of your OP was the line “This wasn’t the meanest or the stupidest or the insanest thing he’d ever said to me.” I couldn’t imagine anything worse than a parent telling their child to kill themselves. These people are more toxic than Chernobyl and you need to cut them off until you finally come to terms with things.

14

“Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
~Eleanor Roosevelt

…which is absolutley correct. But the reverse may be true: we need others to fully feel good about ourselves. If the likelihood of the OP’s family being drug and/or alcohol abusers is the case, I recommend Alanon. If not; some other group where you can have your say.

15

You need a new context to see yourself in, and you have no idea how to create one by yourself.

I think you are correct, and that it is not possible; context requires something external to measure yourself against. You need a new External.

I have a few practical, non-philosophical, suggestions that might help you get started.

Attend Unitarian-Universalist services regularly; you need some structure, and they are reportedly non-dogmatic and non-judgemental.

Learn a new language; you can get tapes and books at the library. Different languages have some different fundamental concepts, and that might help.

Train for a road-race? Physical activity is great for depression, and I can’t believe you’re not in a depression right now.

Challenge every assumption you have be reversing cause and effect, and see where it leads you; you are doing that already with your whole life, but do explicitedly and in words, for individual assumptions.

Finally, I hope you can find a way to garden; nothing is so humbling and empowering as gardening; it puts a lot of things in perspective. Get dirty and create something.

I hope these suggestions might help you through this rudder-less period.

16

I’d give the Quakers a try, too. YMMV, but I’ve found the UU’s to be accepting of everything just for the sake of being accepting, rife with bland conversationalists who nod at every word you say while smiling vacantly. Quakers have some non-negotiably humanitarian convictions - I felt I was around people who were very nice but who still had sand.

But shop around, which is what I obviously have done.

17

I am fairly sure he is not interested in my gender, and vice-versa, so a sexual relationship is a bit of a non-starter. We’ve been friends since third grade, and we know each other pretty well at this point, it’s just that up until two years ago that relationship was a fairly shallow “hang out at each other’s houses and play video games” kind of deal. Something seems to have happened to him that I still haven’t figured out, that resulted in him maturing immensely.

At times my father’s rhetoric becomes so cartoonishly immoral that he resembles a supervillain. Around the time he told me I didn’t have anything to live for, he gave me a speech which included the sentence, verbatim: “Only the weak desire to be equal.” I was “the weak”, of course. He was “the strong”, who have no need for equality. It doesn’t help that English is his second language, and he’s never learned it properly. He tends to resort to simple words wielded bluntly.

My mother on the other hand is more outright delusional. When I do something she doesn’t like, she tells me she can sense the “Dark Force Energies” (one of her favorite phrases) which are controlling my behavior.

18

Do you live with these people? Your best bet is to get away from them. You would not tolerate this type of behaviour from a friend and still call them a friend would you? It’s ok to sever ties with anyone who treats you in a negative way.

19

The quote and repartee is very succinct. I like that.

The odd thing about my family is that while it is insanely dysfunctional, there is no substance abuse to speak of besides tobacco use. I have three uncles that have killed themselves and an aunt and a mother who have tried, along with numerous hospitalizations and damaged individuals spread across both sides of the family, but the majority of them are teetotalers. My father and his brothers have a thorough lifelong addiction to cigarettes, and my mother’s father smoked as well, but they’ll hardly touch alcohol and I’ve never heard the slightest mention of any other drug being abused. My father was a sailor for nine years, the civilian kind, and he loathes getting drunk. From what I’ve gathered, it’s some sort of compensation for the general lack of baseline mental control that runs through the family. When you know that you’re not particularly stable to begin with, you can’t tolerate anything that further perturbs your internal equilibrium.

20

You may feel like you don’t have or deserve self-respect but I’m feeling a lot of respect for you, for making this break and searching for a better way to live. It sounds courageous and painful but also wonderful.

It seems like you could use some more friends. You don’t happen to live in New York City do you? If so, I’d be happy to buy you a coffee. Maybe even a muffin! :slight_smile: