She told me I have no right to demand that other people feel as bad about me as I do. I can think I'm scum of the earth, but other people are allowed to have different opinions about me. Just like I have no right to try to tell them that chocolate is the best flavor ice cream, and they better agree with me. I might think it's completely impossible that people feel differently, but that doesn't mean I'm right, and I can't tell people how to feel.

It helps so much that I had it pounded into my head basically since the day I was born. Most kids are taught Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. This is the song I heard multiple times a day when I was learning to talk, and forced to sing back:

Nobody loves me
Everybody hates me
I'm going to live on worms.
First you bite the heads off
Then you suck the juice out
Then you throw the skins away.

I grew up in the country. Worms were everywhere. That song seemed like the blueprint for my life.

But even if that was forced down my throat, so to speak, that still doesn't mean it's true. I was force fed black and white thinking, force fed that this nutty idea was somehow my own, and that I should correct anyone else who had a different opinion about me.

But - that's not true. If where I end up when I follow the logic isn't true, then I should go right down the line to the beginning, pick out what's true and what's not. Very little is true, when it comes down to it. But I've been taught to adamantly insist that "nobody loves me, everybody hates me" and that's just how the world is, there's no room for any other possibility.