Writing a Letter to Your Self

I was deeply moved by a post someone I highly respect made yesterday. In it he let a heavy burden slip from his shoulders. I know that some weight is still there but I hope that his step it is greatly lighter now. I found my self wishing that I could do the same and unburden my self of a problem that has been wearing me down. Like many people struggling with depression and addiction I suffer from constantly beating my self up and even hating my self a little for my mistakes and bad decisions. Now being a writer I often have a dramatic and narrative focused approach to anything written. So in an effort to try to make peace with my self and stop this self hate I have written a letter to my self voicing all the times that I have wronged my self and unfairly beat my self up for something that was not my fault. We all make mistake and we all pay for them but some of us do not know when to stop paying. Just because we slipped did something wrong or failed to live up to our expectations does not mean that we should hate our selves for years on end. Sometimes we find it all to easy to see virtues in others and only faults and inadequacies in our selves. The world is hard enough with out being able to count on your self for support and friendship.

So I have written my self a letter, it is long and personal and you are welcome to read it if you like but it is not important for you to see it so long as I see it and try to really believe it and stop treating my self so poorly. If you are struggling with similar problems of self worth and love then I hope that this idea might be of some help to you. You do not need to write your letter down here you can do it on a word document or in a journal but the important thing is to not just say it to you self but actually write it down because things take on a substance and importance when we see them written down.

If you want to hide a post you can use just type spoiler in brackets at the beginning and /spoiler at the end. I hid mine because it was crazy long.

Spoiler

Dear Jack

I deeply regret that we have grown estranged over the years, back when we were young we did not have this problem and we would have thought it strange and impossible to think that anything could ever drive us apart. If I had to guess when this change first took place I would have to say that it was the result of our battle with diabetics. All those nights sitting up late pulling out our hair because we took too much of a snack or gave too much a correction shot. Our Folks have always been wonderfully understanding and supportive so I know that they are not to blame for these feelings. It saddens me to realize that somehow over the course of all those long lonely nights I started to blame you for not making good enough decisions, to blame you for not doing good enough and for making us have to stay up for an extra hour all those times. To blame you for making us unable to go out and fave fun the next day because we had to catch up on sleep. When ever I feel that you did not make the "right" call on what insulin ratio to use for dinner and we end up with a high blood sugar I blame you and beat you up.

Then we started looking at erotica more and more and tried out porn and even some hentai *gags* And we found some relief there until it was clear that this was not healthy and not for us. So we tried to quite though sheer strength of will alone, and I had a new reason to beat you up. "Only 2 days! You only lasted 2 days" And "Oh perfect we had a week clean and things were going along perfectly and now you just had to read that erotic story. We were not even feeling depressed!" It was always your fault for not begin strong enough and I road you so hard that it is no wonder that we could hardly make it 2 days with out a relapse for a months on end. But then you found the Sacred Sexuality Project Videos and the Tedx talks on porn addition, and we leaned that Porn addiction was not about what we wanted but about your brain wanting that Dopamine hit. We learned that it was not your fault that you failed, that you were not weak because in truth most people can not beat Porn addition though pure will power alone. One needs the right tools understanding and support. Well we got some good tools together and we understand PMO addition better now and we even have joined a support community. And while it is still a hard fight to stay clean we have somehow made it to 28days. That is 4 weeks and no small achievement. However now that PMO addiction is no longer ruling our lives we have found our selves back at the old staple of diabetes giving us problems. And here I find my self giving you a hard time again and beating you up for not doing things good enough.

But perhaps it is time that I stop letting my angy and guilt make me treat you so unfairly. Because if I was wrong about blaming you and making it your fault that you were not strong enough to beat PMO addition with just your will, then maybe I was wrong about it always being your fault that our blood sugar does such strange things. Our folks are have been telling you for years that there is no way you could "know" what decision too make, but tragically I have not let you listen to them. Diabetes is so random and unpredictable that you would have to be able to see the future its self to accurately make all the right calls. Of course the right and wrong answer are plain to see in hindsight but this is no surprise because as we know hindsight is 20/20. It has been and still is wrong for me to beat you up over things that are not your fault. You try so hard, maybe too hard some times and you do your best. It breaks my heart that the first words out for your mouth when you wake up are "I am sorry that I did not do better last night" Our folks never ask for this and even ask you to not apologize so much for things that are not your fault. It used to be you and me together against diabetes and what ever else life could throw at us. But somewhere along the journey I lost sight of what is important. I look at your forum posts on NoFap and I see 2 things, one you are always trying to cheer and support other people and 2 you are always very hard on your self when you talk about things in your own life. You are such a caring person and you always tell your friends "No worries" and "all good" if they make a small mistake. I owe you the same compassion that you so freely give them. It is time that we tried to mend fences and stop hating each other. It is time that we tried to be friends again. I know that it will take time to unlearn the bad habits of the last 10 years. But that is what Nofap is all about, new beginnings. So let me tell you for once that I am sorry for being so hard on you, that it is not your fault that your diabetes gives us problems. You are a wonderfully caring person and you did not learn that form me, you are a good friend with an old and venerable soul and I would be proud if we could be friends again. So lets start today I will promise to try to stop beating you up and blaming you if you will try to stop saying you are sorry so much. When we stopped fighting and started working together we were able to get a grip on our porn addition, so who knows maybe if we work together we can finally beat diabetes as well. And start living the life we have both dreamed of

 

Thank you for the positive response and support It is hard to believe that it could be so hard to remember to treat yourself with at least measure of the same compassion and understanding that you give freely to your friends everyday, but I guess sometimes it is easier to see the good in others and miss the worthy qualities in ourselves. I hope that this thread was in some way helpful and again I thank you for your compassion.