Blue I can so relate to this!!! I definitely use alcohol to feel more at ease in social situations when I feel inferior to those I'm with - like they're more funny and more interesting and more attractive than I am, the alcohol helps me. I know it's a crutch. T has picked up on that, but we haven't truly hashed it out... yet.

I think my feelings of self-hate really came to light after T's and my most recent understanding, how strongly I reacted to the idea that T might think of me as fat, after she used that word in a flippant way of referring to me. That word has so much negativity connected to it for me, and it's full of self-hate! T and I went over, word for word, what comes up for me when I hear that word - ugly stuff, I tell ya. I hate the self-hate, if that makes sense, but it's there, and I have to deal with it. I do believe that it comes from shame, a whole bunch of dirty ugly nasty shame, that we all must work through in order to heal. It's painful, no doubt. But slowly, we will get through it.