Entry 0002 - Self Esteem is the Way to Be!
When you're a little kid, you don't really get how a lot of things work.
That's part of what growing up, scraping your knees, and watching stupid videos in school like "Stranger Danger" are for. We need to be taught the hard way that running your body parts into solid objects hurt, or that guys who offer ice creams in white vans are dangerous. The first happened to me, the second one never did. This isn't what this entry is about.
This entry is me talking about what never really made sense to me as a child, and something which I'm slowly learning today as an adult. Mind you, I've understood the concept for years now. But it always seemed like something that happened to other people. And I couldn't figure out what I did wrong, that I couldn't develop this essential skill.
That skill, ladies and gentlemen, was high self-esteem.
I remember specifically having one packet which I received when I was around six or seven. From school, it was by no means a mandatory assignment, and was probably one of those "enrichment" exercises which they handed out now and again. I believe it was entitled something along the lines of Self Esteem is the Way to Be! or something like that. The details are really fuzzy. What I do remember is that the instructions in the packet baffled me.
Once, I was like any kid and convinced I was invincible. Oh, and that I was also a genius, who could become a doctor scientist archeologist secret agent inventor astronaut on the starship Enterprise to become a Jedi. Most people have similar goals when they're four years old.
The thing is, they usually grow out of these sorts of ideals very slowly. Kids are supposedly supposed to have an inflated sense of invulnerability, possibly all the way through college. I remember becoming regularly convinced I was stupid and worthless at a very young age. I thought I was doomed for failure, and regularly had the crushing feeling no-one loved me.
When this happened is hard to pinpoint. I think it was when I was about seven, but it might have been as young as when I was six years old.
This is despite good parenting. My parents were very nurturing, very caring. However, this still meant something was wrong with me, mind you, because they always said I needed to have a better attitude about things. But I digress. They tried very hard to help me. At regular intervals, when I cried so much out of fear I was hated and doomed to be a terrible person, my Mum would sit me down and have me list every single person who loved me. This was a regular enough event where, as an adolescent and a teenager, she would ask, "Do we need to sit down and count the number of people who love you?" and the response was supposed to be nostalgic laughter.
I knew having these thoughts and feelings were wrong. Due to my brain being out to get me, I interpreted "wrong" not being merely "incorrect" but "morally bad to have". Some things taught in school didn't help. At one point, I was told that "It was impossible to love others if you didn't love yourself," and I thought that was true. This put me in quite a dilemma at the age of eight. If I hated myself so much, was my feelings of love for my family and friends all a lie? Was I doomed to be a horrible person?
Repeat, lather, rinse, repeat.
Unfortunately, this is coupled with an event which happened during the summer directly after I turned seven, which I'm still not emotionally comfortable enough to talk about. (I'm working up to it. I think next weekend I'll post something.) I don't think that's the "root" of my depression, the subject itself is just very depressing. However, I do think it didn't help matters. Initially, adults probably thought I must have been sad because that incident, and if I remained sad and depressed it was because I had a bad attitude problem.
What also didn't help matters was when I was skipped up a grade after the second grade. I was seven-going on eight, depressed as hell, and bored in school. I remember two questions my mother asked me.
The first was, "Dr. [our family doctor] wonders if you should see a childhood therapist." I didn't know what this was. It sounded like a Very Bad Thing. Especially when she started to describe what psychologists did when I asked, and I got more frightened and uncomfortable. I said no. Mum seemed relieved.
Then, a while later, she asked, "Do you want school to be more challenging?" Hell yes! "We were considering skipping you up a grade." I readily agreed to this.
Skipping over the third grade, going directly into the fourth grade, opened up a whole new basket of worms. And is probably likely the subject of a different post. But the point is, the whole thing didn't help my already abysmal self-esteem. Things progressed to the point that, by high school, teachers and even my parents sometimes thought I was moping around on purpose.
I was making things "more difficult for me" by acting the way I did. It was clearly an attitude problem. And the longer I acted the way I did, and let it affect school and friendships, the more in trouble I would get. My parents regularly tried to fix this.
They insisted I become involved in sports in high school. Supposedly, this was to help my college applications. So I spent five years (two in middle school, three in high school) in cheerleading. Yes. The panther was a cheerleader. Laugh while you can.
There are other examples as well, but things didn't really actually improved until I got better at bullshitting. By senior year, I was decent at it. I got better in college. Then, I started to see therapists for the first time while I was there.
They said I should stop bullshitting.
When I moved back home for a year, and didn't bullshit, I was apparently "worse". I made my parents quite irritated at me - and rightfully so, as I hadn't graduated, was unemployed, and generally spent most of my time browsing the internet being mopey. I said I had depression. They said I was using excuses to get out of being responsible.
Finally, after I gave up and started to bullshit again, and also after I applied for a whole bunch of jobs, my mother was relieved.
"When you get a job, you'll feel much better." Mum said. Probably true. I can't disagree.
But then she said, "You're not depressed. You just have low self-esteem."
How ironic.
(once again, criticism is quite welcome. thank you for reading!)
That's part of what growing up, scraping your knees, and watching stupid videos in school like "Stranger Danger" are for. We need to be taught the hard way that running your body parts into solid objects hurt, or that guys who offer ice creams in white vans are dangerous. The first happened to me, the second one never did. This isn't what this entry is about.
This entry is me talking about what never really made sense to me as a child, and something which I'm slowly learning today as an adult. Mind you, I've understood the concept for years now. But it always seemed like something that happened to other people. And I couldn't figure out what I did wrong, that I couldn't develop this essential skill.
That skill, ladies and gentlemen, was high self-esteem.
I remember specifically having one packet which I received when I was around six or seven. From school, it was by no means a mandatory assignment, and was probably one of those "enrichment" exercises which they handed out now and again. I believe it was entitled something along the lines of Self Esteem is the Way to Be! or something like that. The details are really fuzzy. What I do remember is that the instructions in the packet baffled me.
Once, I was like any kid and convinced I was invincible. Oh, and that I was also a genius, who could become a doctor scientist archeologist secret agent inventor astronaut on the starship Enterprise to become a Jedi. Most people have similar goals when they're four years old.
The thing is, they usually grow out of these sorts of ideals very slowly. Kids are supposedly supposed to have an inflated sense of invulnerability, possibly all the way through college. I remember becoming regularly convinced I was stupid and worthless at a very young age. I thought I was doomed for failure, and regularly had the crushing feeling no-one loved me.
When this happened is hard to pinpoint. I think it was when I was about seven, but it might have been as young as when I was six years old.
This is despite good parenting. My parents were very nurturing, very caring. However, this still meant something was wrong with me, mind you, because they always said I needed to have a better attitude about things. But I digress. They tried very hard to help me. At regular intervals, when I cried so much out of fear I was hated and doomed to be a terrible person, my Mum would sit me down and have me list every single person who loved me. This was a regular enough event where, as an adolescent and a teenager, she would ask, "Do we need to sit down and count the number of people who love you?" and the response was supposed to be nostalgic laughter.
I knew having these thoughts and feelings were wrong. Due to my brain being out to get me, I interpreted "wrong" not being merely "incorrect" but "morally bad to have". Some things taught in school didn't help. At one point, I was told that "It was impossible to love others if you didn't love yourself," and I thought that was true. This put me in quite a dilemma at the age of eight. If I hated myself so much, was my feelings of love for my family and friends all a lie? Was I doomed to be a horrible person?
Repeat, lather, rinse, repeat.
Unfortunately, this is coupled with an event which happened during the summer directly after I turned seven, which I'm still not emotionally comfortable enough to talk about. (I'm working up to it. I think next weekend I'll post something.) I don't think that's the "root" of my depression, the subject itself is just very depressing. However, I do think it didn't help matters. Initially, adults probably thought I must have been sad because that incident, and if I remained sad and depressed it was because I had a bad attitude problem.
What also didn't help matters was when I was skipped up a grade after the second grade. I was seven-going on eight, depressed as hell, and bored in school. I remember two questions my mother asked me.
The first was, "Dr. [our family doctor] wonders if you should see a childhood therapist." I didn't know what this was. It sounded like a Very Bad Thing. Especially when she started to describe what psychologists did when I asked, and I got more frightened and uncomfortable. I said no. Mum seemed relieved.
Then, a while later, she asked, "Do you want school to be more challenging?" Hell yes! "We were considering skipping you up a grade." I readily agreed to this.
Skipping over the third grade, going directly into the fourth grade, opened up a whole new basket of worms. And is probably likely the subject of a different post. But the point is, the whole thing didn't help my already abysmal self-esteem. Things progressed to the point that, by high school, teachers and even my parents sometimes thought I was moping around on purpose.
I was making things "more difficult for me" by acting the way I did. It was clearly an attitude problem. And the longer I acted the way I did, and let it affect school and friendships, the more in trouble I would get. My parents regularly tried to fix this.
They insisted I become involved in sports in high school. Supposedly, this was to help my college applications. So I spent five years (two in middle school, three in high school) in cheerleading. Yes. The panther was a cheerleader. Laugh while you can.
There are other examples as well, but things didn't really actually improved until I got better at bullshitting. By senior year, I was decent at it. I got better in college. Then, I started to see therapists for the first time while I was there.
They said I should stop bullshitting.
When I moved back home for a year, and didn't bullshit, I was apparently "worse". I made my parents quite irritated at me - and rightfully so, as I hadn't graduated, was unemployed, and generally spent most of my time browsing the internet being mopey. I said I had depression. They said I was using excuses to get out of being responsible.
Finally, after I gave up and started to bullshit again, and also after I applied for a whole bunch of jobs, my mother was relieved.
"When you get a job, you'll feel much better." Mum said. Probably true. I can't disagree.
But then she said, "You're not depressed. You just have low self-esteem."
How ironic.
(once again, criticism is quite welcome. thank you for reading!)