Sorry - this might be a bit long, but my IP social worker said something to me that I found really insightful and I wanted to share.

We were working on negative cognitions that lead me to relapse (drink) and she wanted me to write down my most common ones and come up with arguments against them, or coping strategies to deal with them.

One of mine was "I'm a total screw-up, I just want to drink and forget it.". My counter argument was, "It's not my fault I lost my job, it's not my fault I have depression, alcoholism is a disease" She had an aha moment and said that I was totally internalizing my diagnosis and wasn't seeing myself as a person beyond my mental health challenges.

As I thought about it, I realized that it's true, I've been in this last depressive episode for so long, that I've kind of forgotten what it feels like to feel normal. And as for the alcoholism, for the last 2 years my addictions treatment team has been encouraging me to keep my recovery front and centre - even telling me I need to take a lower stress job than I'm qualified for, so I can focus on recovery. I resent this, and it makes my alcoholism, seem like this all permeating factor in my life which is really limiting what I am capable of.

But I am so much more than my diseases. It's just that I forget that to focus on the negative (which I'm really good at).

So my social worker wants me to come up with a list, by Monday of 10 things I like about myself, or am good at. This is going to be hard, but I know it will help me. I may come back and post what I come up with - if it doesn't sound like bragging.

Just wanted to share this to get people thinking, in case you too are trapped in thinking that your diagnosis defines you. It doesn't.

with love.

Splitimage