I want to STOP feeling sorry for myself.

I just found this thread for the first time and it has been good to read the replies. I definitely think that learning to stop the negative talk is a great idea.

Lately it has finally been hitting me how so much of my feelings right now are related to being bored. Just too much time....That means there is even MORE room for negative self talk and pity and guilt. Now I just need to figure out how to get motivated to be busier! I know this is vicious cycle.

Having said that, I also hope that you won't use your self pity to beat up on yourself with more.. What I mean is this; you feel the way you do for a lot of reasons. I doubt you woke up one day and said "Self- I am going to have a hard life. I am going to have troubles that will confuse me and make me sad or worried or----".

In other words, I think you should acknowledge that your feelings are real. That you do have issues and that is difficult. Then allow yourself some time to be sad about it, and then move on from there. Don't let those thoughts add to your guilt- which is what I do.(feel bad for feeling bad for myself which then makes me feel guiltier and then bad for myself and then sorry for felling sorry yadda yadda).

So if you need to cry it out- do it. Go ahead and find a little space for it, but THEN leave it in it's own compartment, and go visit another place- the one where you are positive and proactive and living for now and not yesterday. It's not that I think self pity is good for us, I just think that we need to be kind to ourselves without feeling bad about it. Not sure that i am making ANY sense at all here, sorry!

Yes, CBT can help. Cognitive-behavioral therapy. My problem is that I keep remembering how productive I was before I was hit with bipolar disorder. But I try to keep focusing on what I can do NOW and realize that I could even be worse off and take one day at a time. I am finding things about my life now that ARE good and that wouldn't be the case if I were not in the shape I'm in....

I love your "so what?" response, lonegael. Another word I like to use is "yet" as in, "I don't have. . . can't do. . . don't feel. . ." I'll add "yet". Things take time and living is in the whole process, not just the end result. We can learn and do good stuff at any time along the way.

Hate to say it, but sometimes I revel in my pity parties.

Yes! Hence the word "party".

This is a great response Lonegal!

Thanks for that list, Sundog. I keep forgetting things like that, keep falling down that rabbit hole of depression and confused thinking.

There's a lot of great collective wisdom here. Thanks. It IS important to remember the positive things that happen, and to remember compassion for ourselves. I instantly start bludgeoning myself with criticism and regrets, despair about changing anything in the future. I also start feeling that at age 55, my life is over. I have to push past the fatigue and brain fog and self-absorption that depression causes. I've always backed down from things that are really hard or scary. It's a lousy way to live. I want to have more character than that.