How can I stop hating myself?

Question

I know I'm a nice person but I hate a deep rooted hatred of myself. I hate everything about myself. I was mentally abused by my parents from as far back as I can remember, that made me a natural victim and I got bullied at school. I had no one to turn to. And to this day I won't ask for help off anyone. I consider it to be taking and I'm a giver.
I still feel bad for asking a bunch of strangers but I'm 28 now and haven't spoken to my parents in years but I still hate myself. I have to hide it from my friends too, which is killing me.

Answer 1

The choice is entirely yours!

You can continue to hate yourself and waste your life and your opportunities or you can make the choice to work on loving and accepting yourself as you are.

It's all about your perspective and attitude. Make the decision to be your own best support system and do it NOW!

Answer 2

I recognize myself in you. The best advice I could give you is to practice transcendental meditation. It is a simple technique which you after having learned, practice twice a day for 20 minutes. I learned it 20 years ago and it has been very helpful to me. I come from what you could call an emotional disfunctional family and struggled to come to terms with this.Learning this technique has helped me to forgive my parents and to feel better about myself and what I have got to offer to other people. It has been in the news a lot lately. David Lynch and Donovan are doing a tour at the moment to promote the technique.Good luck.. Whatever you may decide.
I had the choice to start with psychotherapy 20 years ago or start transcendental meditation. I chose to do transcendental meditation. I know now I made the right decision. I have managed to overcome quite a few of my problems.
I hope this is of some help.

Answer 3

It's perfectly normal to ask for help every once in a while. If I never did I surely wouldn't have made as far as I have. It's kind of like the yin and yang idea. In order to complete the balance you have to take as well as give. Here's an odd analogy but a good one. When you were concieved you were the one (the only one) out of millions that made it to the "goal". If you were that determined then, nothing should get in your way of being the best you can now! You obviously have it within you to persevere out of millions of others. That's something to be proud of. Another good philosophy is that "everything is interesting if you are interested" . Find something to do that you find interesting and allow yourself to get into it. Eventually you won't even be thinking about your own self preception. (I.e. Distract you mind from thinking negatively by thinking about better things.) Hope this helps man. Good luck to you.

Answer 4

Dear Usher,

I feel for you and in these 27 years, I have been down that road. First of all congradulations on getting the courage to ask strangers with such a personal issue.

To be a good giver you must make sure you have something to give and hating yourself makes it a lot more difficult to put your best foot forward.

Don't think that asking for help is taking, asking for help is surviving this little notion called life.

I for one, always hated to admit I needed help because I always portray this image of self confidence and toughness. So for me asking for help meant coming accross as being weak.

Never, ever think that!

The road to learning how to love yourself is a long one. You have made the first step, you have realized that you have a problem and you have seeked help for it.

Don't take that journey alone, it will be much harder. My best advice to you is to talk to a therapist who will help you understand yourself better, why do you blame yourself for what has happened to you, and how to deal with all those issues.

I know that in time you will get there but you have to believe in it too.

Best of luck to you!

Answer 5

You said it yourself, you are a giver, not a taker. That right there tells me that you have a good heart and are good to people. One thing that you need to realize though is that everyone needs help every now and then, you just need to be able to tell yourself that you need it. You will need to come to terms with yourself before you can go back and talk with your parents. Dig dep down and find the good things about yourself, I'm sure there are plenty of them. Have your closest friend help you with this. It will be a good start to accepting help and accepting yourself for who you are. Take baby steps and find all of your good points and when you find a part of you that you don't like, find all the good things in that part and stay away from the negative things. Sounds like you have a long way to go but remember that nothing is impossible and I am confident you will come to terms with yourself and be happy. Keep me informed on your progress, I would like to know.

Answer 6

You should prolly go talk to a professional, not necessarily a professional for crazy people but more like a social worker. They help and it doesnt feel like you are going to go to a mental hospital..

They will talk to you about your past and show you how the things you do now are a product of then. I know thats obvious but they will also show you little things and give you tasks when bad feelings arise. Also exercise is a great mood booster! It has a natural way of making you feel better, so its good to work out everyday so you will always have a great feeling :)

I hope you figure everything out best of luck

Answer 7

Why hate yourself? I understand you were abused, but that excuse only lasts until you get away from the situation which you have obviously done.

You are who you choose to be. It's that simple. So, if you hate yourself, change who you are. If you are a giver, you can't be a bad person though. And getting help from others is not a bad thing. It's only the people who come to rely on help from others to do the things they should do for themselves that it becomes a bad thing.

You can go to therapy, and hash this out for thousands of dollars and years of your life, or you can accept what happened to you, put it in the past, and live to be a better person.

Answer 8

It sounds like you are harboring a lot of sadness and anger and are ready to ask for help. You are not alone in your struggles. Many people in similar circumstances feel like you do. You have developed this idea of who you are and how valuable you are from your early experiences,. You have also formed a generalized view about others, such as what you can expect from others and who you can trust. It may be hard for you to trust others enough to share these very painful feelings. The key to feeling better, though, is to face these feelings in the context of a healthy relationship with a professional, such as a psychologist. Putting these feelings into words is a great start and I am glad that you trusted this community enough to begin the process.

Answer 9

For someone who feels as locked up as I do. I would recommend finding a counselor or someone to talk to.

I am in the process of finally finding a counselor, and just making a phone call to find one, has started to lift a little bit of pain from me.

I am starting to realize that you cannot keep this all bottled up inside. It is taking over the person that you want to be, and that isn't fair to live like this.

As for being a giver. Asking for help is not taking. It is giving yourself a gift, that will make you feel like a better person.

Either find a close friend who you can open up to, otherwise just pick up a phone book and call a local counseling service. Talking to someone will help, and alleviate the pain from inside of you.

I am finally starting to realize this myself, and want to be the person I thought I was. But depression is washing her away. I want to feel "normal" again and I want to cure myself from these feelings.

Also a great recommendation that I personally do is journal. That way whatever is in you and bottle up, is escaping out of you. When I am in a mood where I just want to get it out, but not really talk to anyone I do this, and I feel better afterward. You can toss it away or keep it for further reference when or if you do go into therapy.

Good luck, and just remember that there is nothing wrong with giving to yourselve or taking help to make you feel better .

Answer 10

Sounds like the self hatred you have is rooted in the way your parents treated you as a child. Which sucks. I hate parents who do that to their children. Anyway your at an age where you have the intelligence and reasoning to question the beliefs you formed in response to that abuse. Dont hate yourself because of your parents inability to nurture you as their child. They were the ones with the problem man not you.
I used to really hate myself but I dont as much anymore. I like myself more than I hate myself now. Think of it as you discovering yourself for yourself and replacing it with the self image you hold of yourself which is based on the way you were treated by your parentsand is the cause of the self hatred. I believe that a genuine self hatred would be an appropriate response only of say a murderer. And even then that self hatred should lead to regret and change to be better person. I dont think your self hatred is genuine. I think its more like you were taught to hate yourself by your parents. They treated you badly and so you treat yourself badly. Children dont have much choice but your an adult now who can re-evaluate how they treated you. Be kind to yourself and start giving yourself the love that your parents failed to give you.

Also once your better you might wanna think about reconciling with your parents.