I don’t know how to help myself

[Purpleletterbox]

I’m really struggling with my mental health. I’ve always been a worrier as long as I can remember. I’m 50 now. I’m exhausted with it. I can’t stop thinking about things that have happened in the past, things I said years ago, things i regret saying recently, things I know I shouldn’t have said. I can’t see any way that this is ever going to stop. I have tried medication but it didn’t help. I’ve had several rounds of CBT and counseling but neither helped. I exercise regularly, about 3-4 times a week. I’ve tried meditating but I end up thinking about things I’ve messed up on. What’s left to try?

How do I stop this? I regret do many things I’ve said and done in the past (and recently too). How can I stop dwelling on this? It’s taking over my life. Once I start, then I’ll think about something else I’ve done that I regret, then something else and it goes on and on and on.

You figure out why you started this, who did you learn it from - mum, dad, grandma?

We learn more in the first 10 years of life then at any other point in your life. Unfortunately the capacity to understand what we're hearing, seeing, reading, being told, and absorbing doesn't begin to kick in until around age 9/10 so we tend to just accept things as truths/facts and they become part of us.

So if young you believed - because it was part of everyday life - that there was a value or normality in worrying you will do the same as a matter of course. But you can change this way of thinking, at a subconscious level.

I think CBT is total shite.

I found a counsellor of my own years ago and she has been fantastic. It's just helpful to talk through early history, relationships and then you start to understand why you have certain patterns. You understand yourself better by going through the history.

CBT to me feels like ' we'll forget all this vital information we need to unpick, let's just find a way to stop doing x,y,z. ' No. People aren't like this. We need to understand why it's happening. It always comes from somewhere.

The other golden question I always ask- do you have any sense you're ND. If you do, it's worth exploring this for your own sense of self. I find on threads here, every ND person said how much they struggled with CBT. I can see why. It completely fails to acknowledge ones neurotype and way of thinking.

Learning to try quieten your mind is definitely a helpful practice. Even if you start with 1 minute a day of breathing exercise, using an app to guide you. The intention is to shut up every voice in your head. With practice, it gets easier and easier and you get better at it.

Basically, the professionals say that every voice in your head is probably lying to you, so find a way to shut them off through practice. I absolutely believe that to be true.

Basically, the professionals say that every voice in your head is probably lying to you, so find a way to shut them off through practice. I absolutely believe that to be true.

It's absolutely not! Why would your own mind lie to you?? It may be working on information that's outdated or that was misunderstood in the first place but your mind is primarily concerned with your safety and happiness, not hoodwinking you.

I’m in my 50s and a worrier too. I did 18 months of psychodynamic therapy which helped me understand where the worrying habit came from and I practice mindfulness. It takes a lot of practice and it might not be suitable for everyone but in conjunction with a counsellor it really helps me. Also try writing down everything that’s on your mind in these situations - it doesn’t have to be legible - it’s the act of getting the thoughts out of your mind and onto paper. I don’t know how it works but it does help.

Also try writing down everything that’s on your mind in these situations - it doesn’t have to be legible - it’s the act of getting the thoughts out of your mind and onto paper. I don’t know how it works but it does help.

It works by taking the thoughts out of the purely emotional part of your mind and forces the rational part of the mind to engage and to consider if there's any factual evidence for what you're worrying about.

If we were able to approach everything with logic there would be no mental health problems, but equally there'd be no imagination, no creativity and no emotions.

Thanks for the replies.
My DM is a perfectionist, I guess that’s where it comes from. She worries a lot about things not being perfect.
I don’t like writing stuff down cos the thoughts in my head are so terrible and writing them down makes them seem more real.
I will look into psychodynamic therapy. I’ve not heard of it before.
And yes, I do think I am neurodiverse.

My DM is a perfectionist, I guess that’s where it comes from. She worries a lot about things not being perfect. Yup, that's your probable root cause. There's a lot of info on my AMA about how and why we think the way we do.

You could write them down then destroy them? Or do drawings etc.

It's helpful to externalise the thoughts.

Could be hormonal / menopause related

@Eyesopenwideawake My mind or inner voice tells me I’m stupid, ugly, an idiot, everyone hates me, I’m bad at my job etc etc. it is definitely lying to me. It says a lot of things but I can choose not to believe them.
Some people don’t have this internal monologue - believe me, it can be pretty nasty!

it’s clearly a symptom of what’s currently going on for me, it doesn’t come from nowhere. But that doesn’t mean it’s right.

It could well be that you’ve got a saboteur on board, a part of your subconscious which has been blamed for something in the past and is now so unhappy that it tries to deliberately hurt you. It’s something I come across fairly frequently, thankfully it is relatively easy to resolve.

Oo I think have a saboteur within me too. Is the easy fix getting therapy?

@Purpleletterbox in like this too. And I tie myself into knots about stuff that happened years ago. I’ve had therapy. But what really works for me atm is something dawn french said. She said to say to yourself “oh what a twat”. And it works by making me laugh. I didn’t expect it to work so well but it enables me to laugh about it and in a way forgive myself. First time I tried it I felt dumb but I had nothing to lose and was surprised at the result.

@Purpleletterbox I would estimate that around 50% of people I work with have a saboteur. I explain it like this.

When we go through something traumatic that we had no control over (especially in childhood or teenage years), we often blame ourselves in an attempt to feel some level of control over whether or not this trauma repeats
in the future: if we allowed/caused it to happen then we can do whatever is necessary to make sure it doesn’t happen in the future. Unfortunately, this then leads to a part of our subconscious mind being blamed for what happened. This part receives all our hate and self-loathing and ends up feeling rejected. It then ends up metaphorically throwing stones and hurling abuse.

It’s important to realise that this part doesn’t want to create unhappiness, it desperately wants to be a part of any happiness but this is the only way it knows how to get our attention. It feels mistreated and unfairly made the scapegoat for what went wrong. In these cases, we need to put the past behind us and resolve the conflict between this part and the rest of the mind.

I do this by reminding the rest of the crew - see my AMA for the captain and crew analogy - that what we went through was no fault of our own (when we are young we have no agency or control over what happens to us) and also, every member of the crew will make mistakes at times. The good news is that we will never be vulnerable in that way again so the only lesson we need to learn now is that no matter what we go through we deal with it best as a unified crew that works together.

Laughing is also very, very good therapy; just make sure you're when you're saying "Oh, what a twat" you add the words "and I love you" to the end of that sentence.

That makes a lot of sense. Thank you @Eyesopenwideawake

I think it depends on the sort of things you have said and done. If you were just blabbing nonsense and didn't hurt anyone you have to practice replacing the negative thoughts with something else, favorite song or something else uplifting.

If you were a "mean girl" and deliberately hurt people then try apologising, that helps me a lot.

It’s the first one, me prattling on like a twat most of the time. Oversharing then worrying about what I’ve said mostly!

I will try the Dawn French approach. I listened to her on a podcast a few months ago, I will listen to it again.