Awww teke.
My heart seriously hurts for you.
I am 24 years old and have endured endless, traumatizing hours and months -even years- hating my body - resulting in near death. At least when I was at my sickest I could barely think clearly enough to churn up those self-loathing feelings. Bodily acceptance will be the hardest battle I fight on this earth- in addition to loving myself.
Our bodies truly are just packaging for our true selves. It is important for me to always remember this admist a culture/society that feeds us a steady died of idealized standards of beauty.
Gosh- I KNOW the feeling of insecurity. It could be my middle name. Dealing with it? I am not quite sure I'm even remotely close to overcoming it, but I have found that alot of my INNER security stems from the lack of trust within myself. If we distrust ourselves to make the best decisions available to us, then it breeds insecurity about most of our opinions, thoughts, beliefs and courses of action. Distrusting almost every part of ourselves is a given when dealing with addicts I am beginning to learn. We all deserve to have relationships that foster love, healing and support.
Last night I was thinking about how I have SO much anger to work through with abf. How it feels physically WRONG to be nice to him because of the countless hours of deception, lies and betrayal I have endured. Then I read an excerpt from this book I am reading "Self Esteem" by McKay and Fanning which is a phenonmenal read. It focus on our Inner Critic and gives countless ways to overcome the lack of self-esteem through exercises and different techniques. It takes time and effort, but I am finding some of the tasks quite helpful.
Anyways - the authors have a chapter on Compassion. It talks about compassion towards self, others who have hurt us and others we have hurt. The part that focused on others that have hurt us asked the reader to accept the fact that the things people have done to us have been based on their current situations and the best options available to them at that time. It's hard to swallow for me- because it completely takes out the anger and resentment component and asks us to accept the wrong for what it is/was and then reminds us that our power is in our choices.
You are wonderful and beautiful just as you are, sitting here, reading this today. I know it may be hard to believe to you because you FEEL otherwise but the fact is that you are already worthy and okay. You do, however, deserve to feel good about yourself.
If your physical discomfort is extreme I would advise you to take up some physical type of activity. I KNOW it can sometimes feel like a horrific task trying to move our bodies - but it is amazing what a little activity can do.
You are in my thoughts.