Image by Gino Crescoli from Pixabay ​

Luckily for all of you who read this blog, I am between assignments in school right now. I am feeling a little lost without having something to write! I am doing a competency-based RN-MSN (Masters of Science in Nursing) which is 16 courses with 3-5 assessments per course. The assessments range from 3 to 20 pages. For the last 7 months, I have been pumping out paper, after paper. I am kinda weird, I know. I have really enjoyed it. The unfortunate part is that doesn't leave a whole lot of motivation to update my blog even though writing about something other than quality improvement would be desirable. So, here we are!

In my last blog, I mentioned watching all sorts of videos about the culture around toxic positivity and hustle culture. The post dabbled into the role of social media in that. While I do like aspects of social media, there are plenty of aspects that leave me wondering if I should even be on it as much as I am. I do know when to take a break. I also know that there are times when my mood is not right to be scrolling through my FB feed. One of those times is when I am feeling sorry for myself. If I want a way to feed self-pity, surfing through the supposed "perfect life" of everyone else is pretty dangerous. My headspace isn't in the right place to challenge what I am seeing. In a "normal" state for me, I can remind myself that the heavily edited material that I am looking at and not get my undies in too big of a bunch when I see toxic positivity memes in my face.

Self-pity is a tough one for me. It's a fine line between having valid feelings about the hand we are dealt. There are plenty of times that grief, loss, and trauma that questioning "why the hell is this happening to me?" is warranted and justified. So, I looked up the definition of self-pity. In my mind, I know when I cross over into self-pity but I would have a really difficult time explaining to someone else where that line is. Dictionary. com: "excessive, self-absorbed unhappiness over one's own troubles." Yes, that makes sense to me. And.....how is excessive defined? When do I go to far?

The first inpatient treatment I went to, I was highly emotional when I transferred from detox into treatment. I was so relieved to be there. My detox was unpleasant, long, and very difficult. That alone left me in an emotional spot. Beyond that, though, I felt so broken. It felt like the bottom had fallen out. I didn't know what life was going to be now. I was scared of the work I was going to need to do to find sobriety. I felt like I was different too. I clearly remember my first group session, everyone went around the group and shared something about themselves. I just started crying out of sheer relief. I wasn't all that different. These are my people! I knew exactly what they were talking about. I knew they understood me! Yeah!

Fast forward 24 hours, that tune changed a little bit. I sat down with my counselor and we needed to put together a treatment plan and an outline of the assignments I was to complete during my time there. I started to share how horrible I felt that my family had assisted to redo my condo and I couldn't afford it anymore. I felt like like I was given all of these resources and opportunities in my life. I had managed to screw that all up because of my alcohol use. I "should" be an alcoholic. I "should" know better. I am divorced, looking at foreclosure, I am physical and mentally ill. I shared a few more things and the counselor said, "well, a priority topic for you is going to be self-pity." Whoa. That was rude. I legitimately felt bad for having all of this opportunity and falling apart! It took about two weeks before I shared anything in individual session with her because I didn't take that feedback very well. 

It wasn't that she was wrong. I was in a self-pity spiral. It's not uncommon at all for people with addiction to become self-absorbed and fall into the self-pity trap. What may look like a series of excuses for why life is so horrible and you can't expect anything of me is a whole lot of self-pity. I didn't say things like that to make excuses, I wanted people to feel sorry for me and then turn around and tell me what an amazing person I am. I was looking for validation. I was looking for someone to tell me that I wasn't such a horrible person. The problem, though, if people did, it was only a matter of hours or days before I did something else to make my life or someone else's life terrible. Then I started with the self-pity so that people would tell me, AGAIN, that I was not a bad person.

I have mentioned in previous blogs that the first year of my recovery was tough. I was angry, mad, annoyed, etc. etc. Some of that was driven by my self-pity. I was about to lose my nursing license due to my use. My family knew I needed to find recovery and were making changes to support me making changes (which is a nice way of saying - boundaries and expectations were set, some behaviors would no longer be tolerated). Things were changing. Addiction was still running the show for that first year even though I wasn't drinking anymore. I spent time complaining about how the Board of Nursing program took away my choice to drink. Great, now I am sober, but life still sucks. When I got into outpatient treatment, I had a counselor tell me "HSPS didn't take away your choice to drink. You still can. It's just that there are consequences to that decision. You don't like having the consequences because you rare did before." I sat on that for about a week or so before I decided she was right.

As I started down the path of mental health therapy, I had a lot of work to do to re-frame how I was seeing things. Addiction is a selfish disease. I could easily suck the air out of the room with the problems in my life and myself when I was using. Yes, I had SOME problems. But, I also had a lot of situations I MADE into problems so I could continue to fuel the "whoa is me" narrative. I didn't listen to anything anyone had to say except for compliments about myself. If people wanted to offer me some advice about making changes, they would hear very quickly that nothing was going to work. Nope. Never. You don't know how horrible everything about my life is every minute of every day. 

In retrospect, I understand why I was doing what I was doing. It was another good year of therapy to balance feeling unhappy about situations and not turning it into a full on pity-party. That line was not very clear to me. I had viewed the world from a victim standpoint for years. And by years, I mean 20+ years. I didn't know there was another perspective to be had. My therapist worked with me to see that I engaged in that behavior to find validation. I required so much external validation to survive. I had nothing good to say internally so I found reasons to validate what I was feeling inside. I probably understood on a deep level that what I was portraying was exaggerated, but I could not help myself to continue to do that because I got something I was seeking. I really don't like that part of myself. I look back on that behavior and see how maladaptive it was. I was manipulative. I actually enjoyed making people feel guilty. I was needy and dramatic. I was exhibiting strong personality traits of borderline personality disorder. I was out of control.

The process of changing internal messaging is challenging. For me, re-framing perspectives has been the most successful skill to avoid falling into the self-pity pit. I talked about "comparing" in my last blog post. Re-framing is different than comparing. It can morph into comparing quickly which is not helpful for me. The hardest re-frame was actually changing my approach to addiction. I could continue to complain, moan, bitch, and wallow in the wreckage addiction caused in my life. And I did, deeply, for about a year. Something clicked after that first year and I started to see myself as a survivor of addiction. Many of my brothers and sisters in the world of addiction don't make it. I did. I have some choices to make moving forward about how I want addiction to be told in my story. Yes, it was sucky and resulted in devastation. And I lived to tell my story. Not everyone does.

The other big re-frame was looking at validation needs. Let's be honest -- we all need some external validation to prop us up from time to time. However, the primary source of validation and understanding needs to come internally. That is a constant work-in-progress. Life happens and some of what happens cuts me off at the knees. When I think back to early recovery, I had to explore what I wanted to hear from people. First, I wanted people to tell me that I was an amazing nurse. I needed and wanted that validation when I actually wasn't the best nurse due to my physical and mental impairments due to alcoholism. Now that I am sober, I appreciate the feedback that I am a good nurse. I will never turn that down. At the same time, I don't need to hear it in order to get to work. It's OK for me to say, "Yeah, I am a good nurse. I am good teacher. Not everyone is going to jive with me, but I do my best to do right by those I serve." Now, catch me on a bad day when I got my ass handed to me by something or someone? I might see out a little reassurance that that moment time doesn't negate the entirety of my career.

I also carry an enormous amount of anxiety. My anxiety has all sorts of messaging that can lead me to seek out assurance or validation. I know today when to step back and see who/what is talking in that moment. Is it really the anxiety talking? If so, let me take a moment to get out of my anxiety state and look at this situation from another perspective. I have so many examples of this in my life. A straightforward one is when I am confronted about something uncomfortable or challenges something I do feel confident about. A friend took a big leap of courage to tell me how I had disappointed them in how I handled something. Because I am a black and white thinker, I thought, oh no, they are right, they are going to dump me as a friend. This is the end of our friendship. I am so horrible. I can't believe I did this. They are totally right. What do I do? Well, first, a sincere apology was warranted and accept responsibility for my actions/decision. Then, a sincere commitment to be better. Guess what, they accepted that and forgave me. 

If I were in a self-pity place, I would have seen that interaction as an attack on my character. I would have not taken responsibility. I would call four other people and tell my "version" of the situation and make sure those individuals validate me. I would have ended the friendship. I would assume a stance that they hurt me by calling me out. Everyone always does this to me. This is exactly why I don't like letting people get close to me, they just disappoint me by being mean to me. That is not what happened at all. I made a bad call. I am a human being. They cared and loved me enough to have the hard conversation with me, let me know that I had disappointed them, and allowed me the opportunity to make it better. Still friends today.

I may continue on this topic in a future blog. As I sit here and think about this topic, it is just interesting to figure out where to find this line. I know some clear cut examples, but I have plenty of situation that sit in the gray!

Peace!
J

Image by alan9187 from Pixabay ​
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Several months ago, I decided to upgrade my YouTube account to premium. It was a little treat to myself so I could watch hours of videos without annoying ads. I can see how easy it is to find a topic and go down the rabbit hole. Not to mention, any video I watch is thrown into the AI machine and 25 similar videos are recommended. I found a few gems here and there so I don't totally hate it. 

I have been interested in watching these videos about today's motivational speakers and how toxic positivity is the primary foundation of most of what they talk about. Over the years, I have sought out motivational speakers. A lot of who I looked for were people in recovery. The recovery folks, as far as I remember, never really got on the toxic positivity bandwagon which I am truly grateful for. Having gone through active addiction and continuing to work on mental health, telling me to just "think positive thoughts" wasn't going to cut it. In fact, I get kind of testy if that is the entirety of the message. It's much more complicated than that. 

Where positivity turns into toxic territory for me is when I am experiencing strong or deep emotions - loss, regret, sadness, loneliness. If I took that leap to be vulnerable with someone and expressed those feelings, I sure as hell don't want to hear, "You are CHOOSING that. Stop it! Think positive thoughts!" The message I hear is those feels are not valid. I need to stuff them down and go on as if nothing is wrong. And, I chose addiction and mental illness to be a part of my life. Seriously? Of all the things I could choose for myself, I chose 18 years of suffering? In my active addiction, I wasn't choosing much of anything because I didn't know getting sober was a possibility for me. I wasn't sure how to get help or what help would work. My brain was so addicted that I confused survival with alcohol. No amount of positive thinking was going to change that. The only "positive" thoughts I had - I was positively going to get drunk the minute I could.

When I started DBT, my therapist and worked hard on reframing thoughts and thinking about gratitude. This is not to be confused with "THINK POSITIVE!" messaging. I was on a very basic level trying to change my inner dialogue from "I can't do this" to "Maybe I might be able to". That is a far cry from "I can't so this" to "I can do anything I put my mind to and succeed because I am CHOOSING to ignore my cravings and make every life change I need to support sobriety!" I was choosing to make steps toward a more positive life. But I had years of ingrained beliefs and perceptions that needed to be erased. As I was erasing certain beliefs, I worked with my therapist to substitute more positive beliefs about myself. That is far from someone telling me that the chemical imbalance in my brain is not real. 

I think back to conversations that I have had with people, hoping that I hadn't crossed that line into toxic positivity. When people seek advice or support from me, especially if that person is in early recovery, I might suggest a gratitude list. List 5 things you are grateful for today. The goal is to simply remind myself that despite having strong negative feelings, there are good things in my life that I need to remain connected to so that the negativity doesn't completely overwhelm me. I really hope that this suggestion was not taken as "ignore all your feelings. Be grateful for something because you have a lot more than other people." It's not about comparing, it's about connection.

One the skills in DBT is "comparing" which I was told right out of the gate that this might not be the right skill for me. The great thing about DBT for me is that 20+ skills were laid out in front of me. I learned about them, tried them, and like any good AA meeting, I took what I needed and left the rest. The comparing skill is not about comparing my situation to another person. That can be very dangerous. Self-pity can sneak in and ruin any attempts to shift my mood in a different direction. As an example, I could ask myself why I am sad when there are children dying of starvation across the world? Wow, that is a hell of a comparison. By that standard, I am not allowed to feel bad about anything, ever, because I am not a starving child. That does not mean that I don't care about starving children. I do. And I am allowed to have some challenging feelings as I am finding recovery and working through an episode of depression. A healthier comparison would be "while I am struggling today, my overall situation has improved a lot from 10 years ago when I felt this way and didn't know how to cope with it." I know how to use that skill now, but it took years to figure out a way to not negate my experience and make sure the comparison is relevant.

After watching all these videos about toxic positivity, it became very clear to me how easy it is to slip into the oversimplification of complex emotions. A year or two ago I wrote about all the "motivational" memes that were flying through my feed at the time. I don't hate little one line reminders to be grateful or spend time looking at the stars. What I do despise are these overly aggressive suggestions that if I am not in a state of complete happiness I am failing, that I am "choosing" whatever life experience is difficult for me right now, and that basically I am whining. For YEARS, society told people to pick yourself up by your bootstraps. We were finally getting some where with recognition that we are complex beings, with complex emotions, and maybe weren't given the tools to deal with the complexity. We started to recognize that depression isn't "just being sad" and anxiety wasn't "someone over reacting". We started to see that our brains are complex and most everyone could benefit from support now and again to figure out how to navigate rough waters. Now, it feels like we are reverting back to depression being a weakness of character. Anxiety is not real. Mental illness and addiction are 100% a choice. 

Social media is a double edged sword for me. I feel I have a pretty good grasp on the fact that what most people post on social media is not anywhere near an accurate reflection of what life is day to day. I can tell you that I do choose all pictures of myself wisely. I can tell you that I post funny memes even when I don't feel like laughing. I like to share aspects of my life I am proud of and refrain from using social media as a place to process more complex issues in my daily life. I suppose I do in a way by posting my blog there. That is purposeful on my part as this blog/writing are part of a therapeutic process for myself. I am never obsessed with the number of readers I get. Some times, I get surprised when someone mentions it. Like, "Oh you read it! Thank you!" 

On the other side, I like social media as a way to connect with people. I work nights, I am too busy. Social media, despite all the ads and algorithms, I like to see what people are up to. I like seeing and sharing in their successes. It gives me a sense of connectedness when my life and schedule keep me from being able to do much of that in person. 

Anyway, just some thoughts I have had rolling around in my head. I am almost done with school so that I can go back to writing about this that are FAR more interesting to me that nursing curriculum evaluations. :)

Love to you all,
Julie