Hate what I look like.

[AndIWouldHaveGotAwayWithItToo]

I'm really 'plain'. I don't even scrub up well. I prefer not to wear make up because I think I look better without it. I don't have a nice figure/body.

It's destroying what little confidence I have.

I know all the stuff about personality being attractive etc but I hate what I look like so much it's really impacting on my life

I don't know what I'm asking for really. No one here is going to he able to make me feel better about it. It just makes me really sad.

This is beautiful, thank you for sharing. Great reminder.

"No one here is going to be able to make me feel better about it."
That's quite a statement.

What would you have to give up if you stopped thinking this way?

Have you considered that you have a thoughts problem not an appearance problem.

A part of you likes to pretend to itself that people think you are unattractive.

All behavior has a payoff otherwise it's not repeated.
The payoff for you is that you have 'certainty'. Therefore you use this to reassure yourself of your 'awfulness'. There a safeness in it
You can therefore stay one step ahead of everyone and deny them the opportunity to criticise you. Because no one can speak to as harshly as you speak to yourself so the cycle of harsh criticism keeps others out.
Does any of that ring a bell.

It's a defense mechanism you developed as a way of coping.
Unfortunately the side effect of you using this is that you have to buy into what your mind keeps feeding you.

This isn't about dolling yourself up to look lovely, it's about you fantasizing about what thoughts are in other people's heads about you.
If you can find a therapist who does acceptance and commitment therapy, something like that might help you to see the mind trap you are in.

It does sound like you have body dysmorphia OP. You're plain? So what? Lots of people are plain and very few of them are hiding at home, or in a corner and hoping that no one will look at them. Have you tried anti-depressants? If not, and I haven't noticed you mentioning them in any of your previous posts, it might be worth giving them a try.

I'm struck by your age too - you're 47 - I know you say you've felt like this for years but maybe the peri-menopause is adding to your social anxiety. Have you tried HRT? I would go to your GP and have a chat, if I were you, and I would ask how HRT and/or antidepressants might help you to feel better about yourself and like you can go out and live life to the full. It seems such a shame that you're living such a limited life due to anxiety about your appearance, anxieties that seem to be so out of proportion to reality.

@AndIWouldHaveGotAwayWithItToo Have some people said derogatory things about your looks in the past, or rejected you supposedly based on them? I had EMDR therapy for all sorts of things in my past and it was really good, would recommend. The past has untold effects on one's current self and experiences.

@Alcemeg Years ago I had a lover who is a writer and speaker on psychedelics and related subjects (he has a Wikipedia article. ) I was young and wanted to experience everything, also thought it might lead to enlightenment. I tried mushrooms, LSD, etc.

I basically mostly only had bad trips on either, even if 'healing' and stuff was involved with the intent. I even had a related brief psychotic break months afterwards.

Eventually, a few years later, it was just pot that first landed me in hospital with bipolar. No mainstream doctor would recommend illegal drugs to anyone, and they often land people in hospital with their mental health.

Maybe sometime the NHS will acknowledge some benefit to psilocybin (though this is unlikely IMHO.) By the time it's on offer medically it'llve probably had an active, non-psychedelic ingredient extracted and standardized, and multiple peer reviewed studies in mainstream journals. In which case I'll accept that that tablet has potential value to some people maybe.

Until then, I know the harm that recreational drugs supposedly to achieve enlightenment or healing or any goal can do and has done, to myself and others.

I acknowledge the spiritual element of humans has value, but this is not it, it's just brain farts from drugs.

Thank you for sticking your neck out to share, @OldFan ! I did wonder what your personal experience was to make you so wary. And I completely understand it.

I had no expectations of the psychedelic experience. I did it in my mid 40s, nearly 20 years ago now. The guy who introduced me to it all was, as far as I was concerned, full of shit. Generally, I assumed he was either joking or delusional, but after a lifetime of obeying all the rules I felt curious and ready to experiment. I was astonished when it transformed my life in many positive ways.

Later on I tentatively, and very carefully, in complete privacy and quiet, shared the experience with a couple of close friends (separately) and they too benefited from it (apparently miraculous recovery from PTSD, and equally miraculous escape from a long-term abusive relationship). The common pattern for all three of us seemed to be that the experience somehow helped us to rid ourselves of pointless negativity that was poisoning our lives.

Meanwhile, the guy who introduced me to it all lost the plot. “Drug-induced psychosis” in his case was triggered by full-on abuse of all kinds of drugs, including weed. Cannabis is a funny one because it is easy to integrate into daily life as a sort of social relaxant. I’ve seen a few people spiral into paranoia with it. But I eventually found out from his family that he had shown signs of [what was probably] schizophrenia much earlier in life, though, so it’s a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation that we’ll never have answers to.

Based on his own experience, my now-DH is very much of your view: that it’s all just a meaningless drug-induced brain-fart. We just agree to disagree on this. He was younger when he did this sort of thing, and mixed it with alcohol and weed etc, in chaotic environments such as festivals, so his actual responses are hard to disentangle. Who knows, really!

I’m all for evidence-based medicine and RCTs, but suspect that this particular therapy is difficult to capture in a way that is acceptable from a drug licensing point of view. Medicines are expected to be predictable (i.e. everyone will respond the same way) and convenient (e.g. must not interfere with work schedule), but one of the things about the psychedelic experience is that it seems to deliver what you most need, whether you enjoy/want it or not. Tailored therapy indeed! Or, as you and DH would say, just a load of old brain-farting 😎

But I eventually found out from his family that he had shown signs of [what was probably] schizophrenia much earlier in life, though, so it’s a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation that we’ll never have answers to.

Stoners dismiss the fact that cannabis can precipitate mental illness, but it especially correlates if people have taken it regularly when their brain was still growing.

Thank God I didn't do that.

I haven't read the whole thread but being pretty / attractive / beautiful has some considerable drawbacks. People are often intimidated, men don't approach for fear of rejection, women don't strike up friendships as readily. And it's hard to adjust as you get older - you only have to look at some of the older celebrities to see how they try (and mainly fail) to hold on to their beauty with fillers, facelifts and botox. The most beautiful are the most natural, with sparkling eyes and a genuine smile.

I've had a few 'plain' friends in my life, and as I got to know them I couldn't understand my initial first impressions - I quickly saw they were not plain at all, they were actually really attractive. One friend with an enormous nose was really beautiful. She used to hate her nose but she had a beautiful smile and made the most of her lovely eyes and she had gorgeous hair and skin. My other 'plain' friend never wears make-up and her neatly cut hair is gradually going grey but she always looks great. She swims and does pilates and is very youthful, loves gardening and skips like a girl as she approaches 70. She is extremely popular, is kind, volunteers regularly and has a lovely personality.

I think your real problem is confidence. I would find a therapist that can help with body dysmorphia. Could you also be depressed?

I mean, I tried pot a few times in my teens but wasn't a regular smoker. (sorry for the tangent to thread.)

Therapy would be unlikely to do you any harm OP. I've had good and bad therapists but if you don't get on with one you can just try another. Even the NHS will let you do that.

Do you think it could be dysmorphia? Depression?

You come across as very intelligent and it seems you’ve worked on the things that we are all told will help us when we are unhappy in our own skin. You do not give me the sense that you are truly impossibly unattractive; more like you can’t see your physical self in a positive light no matter how you appear to everyone else.

I think you might already have the answers but also may just need someone to talk to who understands?

Off topic, but LSD really helped me.

And I don't understand the judgement. I've been sufficiently more compos mentis on a tab than I have been falling asleep in my own puke because I've had too much wine after bellowing nonsense at strangers.

It just puts everything into perspective. I wake up the next day, clear head, no hangover, and a feeling of lightness and wellbeing.

Yeah it's illegal. A lot of illogical things are legal and vice versa. I like it and I'll have it on the odd occasion. I'd hardly consider myself a hardened criminal destroying society.

Agreed! In his case, though, he was acting very strange even as a pre-teen so it seems likely that his drug use was a kind of self-medication. His parents would do anything but admit that mental health might be an issue in the family.

All I'm saying is that for some people, even just a single immersion into the "psychedelic" space does have the potential to expose the weakness of core negative beliefs. At that point, there's certainly a risk you might die laughing, or at least it feels that way!

I did say it's not for everyone, but it was a very effective cure for me and my friends, and it addresses the root cause of a problem like OP's, instead of just masking symptoms like SSRIs (which are by no means problem free).