Shame in my own existence - yes, definitely, that is how it feels. I have started to get away from this to some extent, but when I started therapy this is what it was like: I would feel the need to apologise constantly, except that I was ashamed to draw attention to myself by doing that. I had (still have) a powerful self-censorship mechanism which tells me that the only way to stay safe from shame is to be silent, unobtrusive, and preferrably invisible. I would cringe a lot, prevaricate, and try to avoid a lot of shameful topics.

My therapist has responded to this by being patient, calm, and very empathetic (without being overtly emotional towards me). It took me a long time to recognise that he genuinely cares about my wellbeing, not only because it is his job to do so. And he has never flinched from topics that are shameful for me - if he deals with any form of countertransference in his reactions to me he is very good indeed at not allowing me to notice that. And that is also important. At the same time he doesn't push things when the pain of shame becomes too strong for me.

One way the shame response manifests for me is in a form of dissociation. It took me more than two years to dare to bring that up with T, because it was so shameful in itself to talk about.