Scruffanie

Today was not a great day. Lots of stressed people at work, including me.

Anyway, in my irritated state, I sent a msg, in which I was venting, to the person I was venting about! As it was pretty generic, I then lied and said it had nothing to do with them. I should add it was not nasty but obviously not received well.

But since it happened I have not been able to stop beating myself up about it, anxiety, tears,self-hate and loathing. Telling myself what a horrible, worthless person I am...for venting about another person and then lying about it.

Why am I this hard on myself and how do I keep my reactions in perspective? This situation should have felt embarrassing and I should have been honest, but for me it felt catastrophic and I panicked.

Self hatred was a major reason to drink before so I am pleased to say drinking didn't enter my mind as an option. I rang another AA member to talk it through.

I guess what I'm asking is how do I deal with these feelings sober so I can do the right thing instead? I'd love to know if others can relate?

Thank you all for reading.

xx Scruff

jazzfish

I can relate. A lot of my self-anger, for me, was driven by my seeming inability to do the right thing. I lacked maturity and discernment. Two things that helped are first, any time I had a reaction based in anger, I put it on hold for 24 hours. I could write an angry message, but I waited 24 hours before deciding to send it. Usually, that provided enough cooling off time to better judge its value and impact. The second thing was accepting that it was OK to feel all those things; those feelings were sending me signals about things I wanted to change in my life. Of course, if I wanted to make positive changes, then I also needed to forgive myself and work on those things I wanted to change. This was a far more productive and positive route than constantly numbing myself with alcohol and wondering why my life wasn't turning out the way I planned.

Scruffanie

Thanks Jazz. You are right. I should have waited, I was frustrated but didnt need to do what I did and it was a bit out of character for me. Normally I wait out those feelings. Work has been very stressful and I am not sleeping well, but that aside, I dealt with the situation very poorly.

I'm struggling with forgiving myself, but your words have helped me to see that in order to change I must forgive myself and learn from this.

I am now 5 and a half months sober and growing everyday. I am grateful for AA and SR to help me in my fearful moments. Being sober is wonderful but the learning can feel hard at times.

Thanks again xx

Berrybean

Awww Scruff. I feel for you. Really.

Where are you in your step work? It was this that really made the difference for me. Both in avoiding these kind of things, but also in dealing with them afterwards when I do behave in ways that are less than I'd expect from myself. For me, after something like that it would mean a step 10 inventory and making amends (either direct amends if that would help the other person, or indirect amends if talking to them might just make them feel worse - remembering amends are about making them feel better, not us. If an any doubt about this I'd speak to my sponsor first ). Prayer features large in my coping strategies as well. Both at the start or the day, and at the end of the day, and after any spot inventories.

In the meantime, maybe try to remember it's progress not perfection, and cut yourself some slack while resolving to learn from the experience. (Pre-sobriety how would you have dealt with this? I'm guessing there would have been a lot of self-justification going on, which I don't sense in your post, so there is change and progress. It just can't all happen overnight.)

Wishing you all the best for your sobriety and recovery.
BB

kenton

Hi Scruffanie, I can completely relate.

Some of us seem to have quite extreme emotions. So if someone upsets me, I get really angry really quick. This means I often react without thinking and do or say things I regret. Then I feel really guilty really quick. I then hate myself and tell myself that I am the worst person to ever walk the earth even though I probably had quite a valid reason to be hurt and upset in the first place.

All the emotions .... the anger, the hurt, the regret, the guilt, the self-hatred.. they're all extreme. I can't seem to do anything in moderation. Which is obviously why drinking never worked out well for me....

Like jazzfish said, when I feel anger I try to give myself a bit of cooling off time and space before responding. Can't always manage it but I'm a work in progress. I also talk it through with my husband to try to get some feedback on how a "normal" person would respond.

Now that I'm sober, when I've lost my temper or done something I regret, I beat myself up for a while but then I say to myself, "no more." I try to remind myself that I'm human and there isn't one person in the world who doesn't make mistakes. I also understand the value of a sincere apology and have no problem saying sorry and meaning it when I've done/said something wrong.

When I was drinking I had no respect for myself so had no problems hating myself and beating myself up for extended periods of time. Now I'm actually starting to like myself a bit, it's getting easier to accept that I am flawed, I'll probably always make mistakes but I'm not a bad person.

I know it's easier said than done but I hope you stop giving yourself a hard time. Try to focus on the fact that drinking didn't enter your mind. Instead you rang someone, talked it through and posted here. Think about how amazing that is

Scruffanie

Thank you BB xx for your kind words.

I am taking my step 5 this week on Wed. I have taken my time with step 4 and have been as fearless and thorough as I can.

I pray morning and night and anytime during the day if I need to....except today....I let self pity in which prompted the msg and then I let fear guide my actions.

I will definitely pray on this tonight, at the peak of my panic I could not even believe that God would forgive me when I know this is not true.

I don't think a direct amend would be a good path for the other person, they are stressed too and like me, doing their best, they said less than nice things about me too but it does not excuse or justify my actions. I am upset that I hurt this person.

So I learn from this. Call Sponsor first! Pray first! Check self pity and let it go! Don't act when I am feeling angry or hurt.

Thanks again xx

PhoenixJ

counselling?

Scruffanie

Thank you Kenton xx I relate to what you said.

My emotions can be so extreme and overwhelming. I can usually see my part in any argument. Like you I can always apologise when I need too.

All I can do is learn from this and see what tomorrow brings to judge what the next right thing to do is.

And, yes, stop beating myself up. Pretty sure I suffer from the human condition too . Your words have helped me greatly xx

Scruffanie

I just re-read my initial post and I didn't mention that sending the msg to the perdon i was venting about was an accident. I meant to send it to someone else. Doesn't change what i did but i didn't intend for it to go to them.

jazzfish

Yep, I've done that before, too! I started writing all my "rant" emails in Word, so that I couldn't accidentally send them anymore.

Carpathia

I completely relate to this scenario, Scruff.

It probably would be true to say many of us resorted to the same behavior, only to see it turn disastrous for ourselves and others.

You made a mistake and you learned a lesson.

Restraint of pen and tongue...how many times did I hear that when I first got sober? Your painful experience is a good reminder of the need for it.

Chin up, buttercup. This too shall pass.

Dee74

I think a lot of us can relate to perfectionism, control, and very high (even impossible standards).

For me alcohol and other drugs became a way for me to try and regulate the pressure I put upon myself.

Since I got sober I've dropped the self hatred, and I've become a lot calmer.
I no longer 'sweat the small stuff' and I've become a lot better at seeing that most things are 'small stuff'

Will it matter in a month? a year? 50 years? Most times...no

I think of myself as a caring thoughtful and forgiving person.

It's weird for me to look back and see I could never apply those things to myself.

I think everyone'S done the email thing.

I've posted things here that were meant as PMs...we all makes mistakes sometimes

D

Scruffanie

Thank you Dee, wise and on point as always you are spot on. My expectations on myself are way out of proportion to my expectations on others.
I can forgive others for pretty much anything but find it impossible to forgive myself.
Pleased to say that today I feel better but it took and extraordinary amount of support from others to get me to that point which is pretty insane.

Thank you Dee and to all here on SR who supported me, it meant a great deal and helped immensely xx

Ariesagain

Sending you a hug.

I was out running today and suddenly started thinking about something stupid I did at work, oh, 33, 34 years ago. And I was reliving it and beating myself up about it...then it occurred to me that if I had actually murdered someone back then I probably would have served less jail time than the punishment I was giving myself.

So you're among friends.

We screw up. We're human.

Have another hug.

210dontdrink

Patience in a moment of anger will prevent a thousand regrets.