Check out entry sixth where Miss Misery talked about the negative thoughts she had with herself.

Entry7-Why Am I Just an Afterthought

Dear Marsha

Thank you for your response last month.  You asked me to tell you what are some things that have helped me to dislike myself.  I’m starting to have the tough realization that these thoughts that I spoke about last month are going to be a lifelong battle. It doesn’t matter how many pills I take or how good my day is. Nothing seems to be changing this part of my life. And it doesn’t matter how positive my attitude is. The thoughts creep in when I’m tired, exhausted or just lack a social life. I’m in grad school now, so I know there is a reason for all this. But nothing makes you feel worse than feeling left out; being an afterthought. Instagram and Facebook are my worst enemies. Social media feeds my bad thoughts like a tick on skin. It sucks out whatever joy I’m hanging on to. Nothing feels worse than seeing pictures of people you know having fun together. I wonder if I’m worthy of experiencing that joy? Like feeling like I can conquer anything with the people I’m with. I feel like I can fight all these bad thoughts. A support system of true friendship. Constantly checking in on each other, having each other’s back and no second guessing the friendship……I desire that so much. But social media just reminds me I don’t have that. No one really wants to talk to me. I remember couple years ago, all the friends that would text me to hangout or come over. Probably one of the best feelings in the world. People wanting you. But I don’t get that anymore ever since I moved. I’m just an afterthought If you are me, you’re pretty useless. No one really benefits from having you around. If that wasn’t the case, I would have strong, close friendships by now. But no, it’s not for me. It’s not in the plan, I guess. Just going to accept that at this point.  Thank you for listening

-Miss Misery

Someone Else Thinks of You

Dear Misery,

I think that what you said is similar to a lot of people.  Maybe not you, but others, look at social media for self-worth.  “Likes”, “clicks”, “views” and “shares” can make a person define how wanted or unwanted they are.  One of the things we talked about was that your love for yourself is the first place you have to find worth.  As you said so honestly, you hate yourself.  When someone truly hates themselves–without knowing it–they spend more time trying to prove that they are deserving of rejection than looking for proof of the opposite.  When you hate someone, you want to make them suffer or prove that the person is unworthy of trust or happiness.  

Before I go any deeper I have to say that there are tons of people use social media as a way to present themselves as something they are not.  They do all that they can to reinvent themselves and redefine who they really are.  I do the same thing because I don’t take a picture of my kids not listening to me, or my house when clothes are everywhere or when my yard has random toys scattered around. There is a friend of mine that is crippled in her legs and in all the 500 pictures that she takes of herself, she never takes herself in her crippled form.  She makes sure to take pictures in such a way that removes the things she dislikes.  I even know of a friend that post old pictures of trips that she went on years before just so it continued to make people think they were on another trip.  There are people in relationships that post the trips, the kids laughing, the gifts, the times of snuggling but they don’t post pics of the fights, the tears after hurtful words are exchanged.  No one truly wants to memorialize the true realities of life as life really is.  

When you, or someone else,  struggling with their self-images, self-worth and self-esteem comes across their friends picture of the perfect trip, another new baby on the way, the successful relationship, the amazing view going to work, the relentless visits to the beach, the endless amount of hangouts…it causes you to think you are worthless, friendless, rejected and unsuccessful.  You are not the only one that does this but sadly yourself worth was removed by a person, which was your father and now you are making the same mistake to place the feelings of self-worth in the hands of people again.  You allow others to make you feel wanted, valued, and special, but I know that there are others that are surrounded by people and can still feel alone.

I know this is a journey for you.  I know that you’re writing this during a time when you are at your lowest moment but we can all benefit to hear that our worth should never be found in anything but Jesus.  NOTHING but God is constant.  He has never changed his view of us.  He never stops seeing us as the apple of his eye.  It is something for you to think about that maybe God allowed your move to another location to surface your over dependance on others.  We all need relationships but in this raw moment that you were having, it is clear that, like you have said in the past, God’s voice is hard to hear.  So your move may have been designed to help you see that before you were drowning out some real issues with the voices of others.   

For the sake of others that are struggling the way you have, can you tell us what are some of the things you say to yourself when others don’t text you, call you, ask you to hang out?