# Feeling worthless? tired of trying? There is still hope and a way out!



## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

Ok so I know that feeling of being worthless because of my disorders, and I have lived with it on and off since my insane stepmother started a campaign of escalating abuse when I was 7 years old, simply because my half brother was born and it triggered her into applying her old family of origin pattern into her current family dynamic. She was 7 years older than her little sister, I was 7 when my brother was born. 

Her supremely effed up parents had started crapping all over her and idolizing her little sister. So instead of remembering how bad that felt because she was so insanely personality disordered by it, she started sh i tting all over me just like her parents did to her only worse, because she was also jealous of me and resentful that she got stuck with me instead of my own worthless mother. She resented my father too because he was an anal orifice and now she was really stuck with him, so she took that out on me too. She had been kind to me before her first child was born so it was even more confusing to me when she turned 180 on me. She started locking me out of the house all day in the middle of the Mojave Desert where it was 115 in the shade when I was 8. She escalated to starving me and I learned to steal food or change, to beg the lunch ladies for seconds when I was able to buy lunch at school in 5th & 6th grade, and ask the other kids "Are you going to eat that?". I scavenged the school dumpster in second grade until a schoolmate caught me and shamed me terribly. BPD N stepmom started hitting me, and isolating me from the family. I lived in my room and I'm glad I had one, because it was either be in my room or outside to have any sense of safety. She created lies, told them to my father, he believed her of course because I was a little kid and why would his wife fabricate lies? So I was always being punished for crap I didn't do, and actually couldn't even think of doing because I wasn't sick like she is. It's amazing what she was able to do right under my clueless weenie father's nose.

I was picked up from school the last day of 6th grade by my grandmother, and no one had even told me I was being kicked out of my family. I lost all my stuff that my evil stepmother wanted for her by now two sons. I went to live with my grandma and her verbally abusive falling down drunk husband. It was better overall, I got enough to eat and I wasn't isolated, but I was bullied in the new school and basically lived in a state of hyper-arousal and terror. I developed CPTSD and at the time (I'm 58 so this was the early '70s) nobody knew anything about how any of this stuff worked, it wasn't identified, there weren't even categories for psychological trauma caused by abuse. 

I grew up a nervous wreck, developed GAD and panic disorder, and was unable to do the work I wanted to do (head hunted by Mattel as I was an artist in spite of my anal orifice father's disapproval, I couldn't manage the daily drive). I still struggled through life as best I could with no meds and doctors saying everything was all in my head. On bad days I would sit outside on the back steps and thrum and churn on the inside on and off all day. It was hellish! But I still found reasons for living, I still saw beauty in the world. I lived in books, I was a Trekker and so I fantasized and lived in my head a LOT, but I still loved music and art and horses and dogs and my grandmother. I had a horse and some days I had to turn around on the freeway and go home, then try again later, but having to drive to go see him made me get out of my house. 

I was able to manage my CPTSD enough to get through college and get married. Outside stressors turned inward would worsen my anxiety, telling it to frak off and saying "Screw you I'm going to do this, it's too important to me!" let me tamp it down a lot of the time, but it also won and it was exhausting. The more times I sucked it up and was brave, the more it lessened basically. I finally had a couple books like "Hope and Help for Your Nerves" which is now pretty antiquated, and a meditation book, and s self esteem book, and I was practicing CBT without knowing that's what is was on my own. When it nailed me I remembered the times I won, and tried to be kind to myself and try again when I could. I had no one to talk to because I knew no one who had what I had, and I gave up on doctors as useless. Remember there was no such thing yet as an anxiety disorder! Eventually my next door neighbor developed the same thing but even worse, as her father was a raging abusive drunk who threatened to kill her and her mother on a regular basis. There's a correlation there!

Around 1990 I took part in a study at UCLA with Dr. Dennis Munjack. I had managed to mitigate some of my anxiety and panic by a centering and grounding breathing practice, meditation, and Alka Seltzer Gold and Rolaids to combat the lactic acid buildup from constant muscle tension that comes from hyper-arousal/fear. Lactic acid when injected into the bloodstream causes panic attacks. Well then! We know that now, but didn't back then. I discovered making my system more alkaline helped me by accident. 

Add in adrenal insufficiency and the depression and fatigue. I was supplementing my diet with free aminos and B complex which seemed to help my energy and brighten my outlook. Icurrently take chelated magnesium (glycinate) now to help with tension, and it's great for muscle spasm and helps me sleep really well. I take about 300mg a day of Metagenics magnesium glycinate, it's the easiest on your gut and works in a bout 30 minutes. So anyway I finally got on Klonopin around my middle 30s which gave me about 2/3 -3/4 of my life back! Except now I can't get off of it.

Around 10 years ago I got into Adult Children of Alcoholocs and in doing the work study discovered there was this entire pattern of abuse, alcoholism, drug addiction, OCD and anxiety in both sides of my blood family. So I saw it wasn't me, it was the crappy family and their background that was total crap I was an innocent victim of it. Their crap created my crap. As much as my life has suffered for it, as much as I have suffered because of my parental abuse and other bullying and the resulting physical, emotional and psychological fallout, as hard as it has been working through it, and plus the fact that I am working on it every day, I still mostly want to be here. My biggest tool to create that feeling is finding stuff to be grateful for as much as I can every day, and I also practice staying in the moment instead of seeing my future through the lens of catastrophe. I did enough of that, it's exhausting, and it just makes me feel worse. I want to live until I die, not be dying as I live, even though that is what in actuality we do physically from the moment we are born. 

Part 2 is below.


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

So to continue, I increased my practice as a Buddhist. I worked on full body relaxation techniques (Google "The Relaxation Response") so I could learn how to relax as I habitually tightened up without realizing it (the mind/body attempt to create armor and safety).

I kept going to ACA meetings. There are phone meetings if you can't face a live group. Or you can go and sit in the back by the door for a quick escape, but prepare to be appalled, fascinated, even relieved! I learned more as I heard other people talk and I did my studies about how my toxic family and environment I grew up in messed me up. It helped me to quit crapping on myself. I learned about how abused people internalize the voice of their critical parents and authority figures, so that even when they are not there, the tapes they made still play in our heads telling us we should just go die because we are worthless piles of feces (check out raised by narcissists on reddit). There is a ton of info right there and kind people to help you figure stuff out. It's just a place to start. I haven't even looked for ACA threads yet but narcissism is very common to the parents of children raised in dysfunction, which is included as a qualifier for ACA. I HIGHLY recommend the book "The Trauma Syndrome" by Tian Dayton, holy cow, as much as I know every other page was an OMG! I recognize that! moment. "Toxic parents" by Susan Forward is old but still viable, but the Dayton book is mind blowing.

I cleaned up my diet and nutrition. I had discovered in my teens I was gluten intolerant and didn't eat gluten foods for 10 years. Now I can manage it. Gluten was a HUGE trigger of nausea, bloating and extreme panic. I used to wake up in the middle of the night with massive panic attacks. The elimination of gluten helped and the Klonopin stopped it. I also have petrochemical sensitivities; sometimes the wrong perfume and definitely auto exhaust make me feel really ill and anxious.

I cut out from my life the people who I thought were friends but who abused me. I took responsibility for abuse I perpetrated, even if it was in defense of my healthy boundaries. I kept on. When I was super blue and gave up and just went through the motions, I eventually learned to find out what was triggering me and study it so I could exorcise it by letting it go, over and over if necessary, instead of wallowing in it.

SO the point is that if you feel flatlined, hopless, helpless, that nothing works, nothing will ever change, what's the point, you're in the center circle of hell and you just can't stand to be here: find out where THAT is coming from, because it probably isn't about the real YOU! YOU have value, YOU have a right to be here and a right to have joy and a sense of purpose in your life. YOU have a right to be whole and happy and free. You have a right to choose how your life will unfold going forward. I'm not saying you get your fantasy or dream life, but that you will get your choices back instead of having your inherited disorder make the decisions for you.

If you KNEW you had an alien implant in the back of your neck causing all of this, would you remove it?

So my suggestion for anyone struggling is to do some digging around and see what you uncover. If it's a sense of worthlessness or a feeling that you're not okay, understanding that's not really you, that it's a pervasive virus installed in your operating system by a terrorist, likely someone you are related to or grew up with, really helps! Go find all the antiviral programs you can, install them, keep updating them, and dig those toxic worm and trojan files out by the roots!

You can do it, I see people clearing out the rubbish daily, sometimes in fits and starts, sometimes entire truckloads full when they have a light bulb moment. Most of them had hit bottom and were ready to give up. It takes time, but if people can claw their way up out of horrendous physical abuse, multiple drug abuse, homelessness and serial abandonment, you can find the light at the end of the tunnel too. Sometimes it might look and feel like a train, but it isn't, it's the light of a brighter, saner, calmer new day.


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

Oops sorry, it's "The ACoA Trauma Syndrome". Why can I not edit my previous post? :frown2:


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## sunbreached (Apr 19, 2015)

Interesting that you bring up lactate acid, I havent heard of the effect until now. Because in myself, whenever I exercise, I get panic attacks soon after. This must be from the lactate im assuming, is there anything I can do other than supplements which I have tried, I guess the only way is antidepressants or benzos. Maybe its time to try some antidepressants,


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## minimized (Nov 17, 2007)

Someone shooting me between the eyes?


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

Lactic acid buildup in body builders when they are doing dead lifts and super heavy reps can make them vomit, I just found out. Oh joy. I'm sure that muscle tension was related to all my nausea which was also included in my panic attacks. I think it's a combo of brain chemistry being subverted by environmental stressors (toxic family, bullying and parental abuse, toxic chemicals, food and food additive intolerance), all of which over tax the body's flight or flight mechanism, we freeze instead and stew in internal chemicals, which feel awful. It's like putting a rat in a cage with an electrified floor, and administering random shocks. The rat ends up cowering in a corner unable to function.

I found out by accident that calcium carbonate helped calm my "nerves". I was taking it for nausea. I found that if I was tense and took an Alka Seltzer Gold I'd be relaxed in about 10 minutes (just the stomach remedy, they don'y make it anymore & moist of you are too young to remember the "plop plop fizz fizz oh what a relief it is" jingle). Rolaids used to work too, but the problem now is that it is polluted with artificial sweeteners and colors, which I highly recommend cutting out of one's diet!! Those things are nasty chemicals! Magnesium glycinate is also calming and relaxing, I use Metagenics and take 100mg 3x a day or so, usually 100mg in the am and 200 before bed so I sleep. I have a bad chronic muscle spasm in my back and taking 100mg is like two aspirin.

I'd try a couple or three plain white Rolaids which will probably be mint flavor, but at least cut out the colorings. Also for working out nausea, stay hydrated with plain water while working out, but without gulping, just sipping more often. All the power crap is full of artificial chemicals.
@minimized, NO! I used to think that was the only way I would be free, but I would hear this small voice in the back of my head saying that some day there would be a pill to help me. For me that was Klonopin and it saved my life, but it's got its own problems. Still I went from being scared to go out to eat to traveling all over the Western US, held down jobs, had relationships and found some joy. I still have struggles but there are still amazing things in this life to experience, and you have a right to find peace and joy. Nothing is a constant state, life and feelings and situations ebb and flow, nothing is forever. People have a tendency to want things to be just right for them and stay that way, but life is a series of curves and you have to surf the line. However the more peace you find, the more you have gratitude for every small thing that's good that you DO have, the more the peace grows and you can stay in it longer. Look into the relaxation response and mindfulness meditation. Get a hobby or interest that you can get a little lost in. Practice gratitude and stopping to relax your body all through the day. Tell the negative voices in your head to just shut the F up! They aren't actually _you_, and they have no right to space in your head.

When I was 16 someone asked me what I most wanted in life and my answer was "Peace of mind". They thought that was an odd answer, but that has been my answer my entire life. Peace of mind is an inside job, and if we have negative self thought we need to evict it. I didn't install my negative tapes, they came from external abuse and condemnation, but I have been erasing them for a long time no, and replacing them with kinder and more uplifting words.


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## Beast And The Harlot (Jun 14, 2015)

All I've ever known is loneliness and misery and that's all that'll be waiting for me as long as I'm still breathing in and out.

There's nothing I can do except admit defeat, bow my head and wait for death to take me into it's dark embrace.


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## minimized (Nov 17, 2007)

Teek said:


> Lactic acid buildup in body builders when they are doing dead lifts and super heavy reps can make them vomit, I just found out. Oh joy. I'm sure that muscle tension was related to all my nausea which was also included in my panic attacks. I think it's a combo of brain chemistry being subverted by environmental stressors (toxic family, bullying and parental abuse, toxic chemicals, food and food additive intolerance), all of which over tax the body's flight or flight mechanism, we freeze instead and stew in internal chemicals, which feel awful. It's like putting a rat in a cage with an electrified floor, and administering random shocks. The rat ends up cowering in a corner unable to function.
> 
> I found out by accident that calcium carbonate helped calm my "nerves". I was taking it for nausea. I found that if I was tense and took an Alka Seltzer Gold I'd be relaxed in about 10 minutes (just the stomach remedy, they don'y make it anymore & moist of you are too young to remember the "plop plop fizz fizz oh what a relief it is" jingle). Rolaids used to work too, but the problem now is that it is polluted with artificial sweeteners and colors, which I highly recommend cutting out of one's diet!! Those things are nasty chemicals! Magnesium glycinate is also calming and relaxing, I use Metagenics and take 100mg 3x a day or so, usually 100mg in the am and 200 before bed so I sleep. I have a bad chronic muscle spasm in my back and taking 100mg is like two aspirin.
> 
> ...


I don't know what to do. :|  I can't even come up with hobbies, which should be the simplest thing. Because everything else still feels constant and that there's only one way out...


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

So things I wish I could go back and tell myself when I was 20 something and younger. 

Find ways to get out of your head, it's toxic in there when you sit in the darkness!

Your life is as precious as anyone else's, and yours to live to the fullest that you can. You have as much right to happiness as every other person on the planet, but it's an inside job. It take some work, have the willingness to try.

Can you open your eyes? Can you see the colors and light? Rejoice! What would a blind person give to see the peach and gold of sunrise? Go watch a people are amazing video on YT, then look around and name all the colors you see.

Can you hear? Can you open your ears and hear music? Rejoice! What would a deaf person give to be able to hear Mozart's Symphony No. 40 in G minor? Or Yo Yo Ma playing The Six Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by Johann Sebastian Bach? Or go find Where the hell is Matt? from 2008 on YT and listen to Praan. Watch people dance and say it doesn't move you, silly as it is. Get up and dance with them. No one is watching. 

Do you have a nose? Can you walk outside after a rain and smell the scent of the world washed clean? Fresh baked pizza? Steak on a grill? Rejoice! Food tastes pretty blah without the ability to smell. Scent is the most visceral trigger for memory.

Do you have a mouth? Rejoice! If you have a mouth you can open it to speak, to sing, you can use it to eat a cookie. You can sip hot fragrant tea or feel the fizz of a sweet soda or the bite of the first sip of a cold brew on your tongue. If you have decent teeth you're better off than most of the meth heads in the country. (If you haven't yet ****ed up your body with street drugs be grateful for that).

That's just your HEAD! Look down, are there two good hands on your keyboard? Rejoice! How amazing are HANDS!!!?

Do you have a roof over your head? Hot water? Electricity for your computer? If you have a computer you are one of the richest people in the world by population.

If you want to feel better then do something for someone else. We're not here just to meet our own needs. It seems like it according to the media but the world is not all about us. When we focus on what we don't have we don't see what we do have, and we aren't grateful for it. Gratitude does wonders for the mindset!

Turn ME upside down and backwards and you get WE. You have community here that wants to help you. You have resources here and people just like you who are sharing experience and information to help you. You are not the only one.

If you have a place to go sit outside in the sun (when it's nice) or just get some fresh air, see something growing, see people off going about their day, it will help you to reconnect to something bigger than yourself, which is key. 

As anxiety sufferers we can be just white knuckling everything, because we learned on a deep level that danger is everywhere, that our own bodies aren't even a safe haven. That body and reactivity can be retrained.

There's an all or nothing perspective which is usually a result of a toxic upbringing, that if one can't have everything exactly the way one wants it (so as to be in control), then it's not safe. There are ways to retrain the body that learned to live in fear. Yoga is good because it stretches tightness of mind and body and helps relieve tension while building strength. When I was lifting weights I felt more capable. Mindfullness meditation also really helped me way before I got meds.

How about "Because life is not a dress rehearsal blah blah blah". We get one shot at however many trips around the sun fate gives us. If we choose to spend it in a deep dark hole where all we see is a patch of blue then we aren't giving it a good shot. Rumi says "Why stay at he bottom of the well when there's a strong rope in your hand?" There's always a rope somewhere to use to CRAWL OUT of the hole. It's not there for hanging yourself. Once you start looking for strong ropes to crawl up out of the dark into the light, ropes will be provided.

So the story about the guy stuck on top of his house in a flood. The neighbors had said "Hop in our car, there's a flood coming!" He says "God will rescue me". He's sitting on his roof waiting as the flood waters rise and a guy in a boat rows up and says "I'm here to save you, get in." He declines. Then a helicopter comes to rescue him and he says again "No thanks, God will rescue me". So finally he dies of thirst and exposure, goes to heaven, and says to God, "Hey God, why didn't you come rescue me?! I was waiting for you!" And God says "Rescue you?! I sent a van, a boat and a helicopter!"


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

Ukulele! 

:grin2:

Get an ukulele, go lurk at UkuleleUnderground, and learn to play a few chords. It's pretty much a guaranteed smile, and when we smile we trigger a whole cascade of happiness chemicals in our brain.


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## Beast And The Harlot (Jun 14, 2015)

What kind of New Age hippie nonsense is this?


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## MissIndependent (May 31, 2010)

Teek said:


> Peace of mind is an inside job, and if we have negative self thought we need to evict it. I didn't install my negative tapes, they came from external abuse and condemnation, but I have been erasing them for a long time no, and replacing them with kinder and more uplifting words.


Thank you for writing all this Teek. I like the way you think and expressed your story. You went through alot, with abuse. It's really good of you to share your success and advice 

I'll try your suggestion about mindfulness meditation. There are times in my life when I feel the power of gratitude and contentment, but sometimes pensive when alone and without distractions. So still working on things.


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## Teek (Sep 7, 2015)

The more we are grateful, the more grateful we become. Gratitude practice helps shift the mindset to a more positive setting. From there we start looking at things that happen differently. Instead of "Why is this happening to me?!" we can more often think, "Eh, why not me, **** happens to everybody." and through acceptance we have more equanimity and peace, and the more of that we have the more we can relax with the way life is, even with anxiety and SA and all the other crap people are buried in. Crap is fertilizer, fertilizer makes things grow. We grow, and the more we understand the calmer we become.

This is a biochemical thing, we can figure out how to have healthier patterns of thought, eat better to have a healthier less stressed body, we can practice meditation to learn deep relaxation and mindfulness to teach our physiology to calm down. Look into insight meditation, also look into the Relaxation Response by Herbert Benson.

I'm not kidding about ukuleles. I love mine to pieces! Now I have guitars too. They get me out of my head and give me joy. 

I just missed the hippies by half a decade but grew up with them and am the same generation. I remember Woodstock on the news and in the paper. They had some good clues as to how the world could work better. When they weren't OD-ing on drugs. However, I am a Buddhist, and that's where I'm coming from.


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