Never apologize

My T is always telling me to stop apologizing for how I feel and for saying sorry. So I found this saying and thought it was appropriate.

I'm someone who used to CONSTANTLY say "I'm sorry". I am sure it came from being criticized incessantly growing up. It takes focus and real mental effort to break the habit. It started with me saying sorry and then catching myself. Being aware of it was a huge first step for me. Then gradually I started to say outloud, "No I'm not" or "scratch that" after saying sorry. Eventually I broke the habit. Apologies are appropriate sometimes, but not every other sentence and certainly not in response to how you feel. Your feelings are important, they need to be honored.

Your therapist is correct. Your feelings are valid.

I used to say sorry for everything. Now I don't. I haven't said sorry in over 10 years. We all make mistakes.

Ooh! I saw this earlier, but wasn't logged in, so I only saw your message about "Never Apologize" - not the rest of the text. That's really beautiful and touching.

I tend to apologize too much too (though maybe not as much lately, as I'm a little more depressed and sour at people!)

I have ONE person in my life who just exudes acceptance, similar to the text that you posted... and it is so insanely wonderful and healing. It's very non-judging. Nobody else in my life, even therapists, can pull it off to the degree that he does.

Nice find, thanks for posting it!

I don't apologize for feeling the way I feel, what I will apologize for is when I express those feelings in a hurtful way that ends up hurting the other person. I try hard to own my feelings but express them in a diplomatic way. This has taken a lot of work & honestly there was a time that hurting the person that made me feel that way WAS what I wanted & wasn't sorry in the least & never apologized for it either. Living in a war environment is not healthy.

The cliche' goes, can't control your feelings but you can control your actions. I remind myself I always have a choice in what I say and do. Makes me feel in charge and empowered.

My therapist apologizes for how I feel (as in, I'm sorry you feel X), so I wonder how that fits into this.

"I'm sorry you feel that way" still puts the ownership of your feelings on you.

I think I might take that comment to take the time to reflect on where my feelings are coming from & what is causing me to feel that way.

If we have issues we need to resolve, resolving them & seeing things in a different light can change thebway we feel about things. It doesnt mean that what we felt was wrong based of how we framed the situation in our mind, but reframing things can change how we think & feel.

But can someone else be sorry for how another person feels? It has nothing to do with them. They can only be responsible for their own feelings. And, to the OP's point, I don't think a person needs to apologize to anyone for feeling any particular way.

I think the phrase "I'm sorry" is weird.

Sometimes we use it to mean, "I apologize."
Sometimes we use it to mean, "I feel sadness/sorrow (about your feeling/experience)."

It's confusing.

It always makes me uncomfortable when t says this. Like I caused a bad feeling.

It's interesting, I have never apologized or even said "I'm Sorry" for the way I feel in any way, but when I cry, or even break down, the words "I'm Sorry," usually escapes from my lips almost unintentionally.

I wonder if anyone else does this?

For me, ONLY if thete is something important going on around me & my breaking down interrupts what is going on & attention ends up on me rather that the other event thst is going on...my "sorry" is more for interrupting than it is about my feelings. (This used to hapoen in DBT group)

Most times I am able to just sit at an event & silently let the tears flow

I do say Sorry for many reasons around the concept of courtesy and civility. I will apologize when I feel I have wrong another person. These 2 things are different in my opinion and both are important to my values.

That being said - whenever I "unload" emotionally on someone from a place of sadness (crying and what not), I say I'm sorry. It will just come out, as you said. My T, gives me this look of acceptance and frustration at the same time. She used to ask me what I was sorry for and I would say I don't know. I think I know now, that in those moments, it's for potentially putting a burden on her, dropping/unloading all this energy on her, and now she has to sit with it and dissipate it however she can/does. I'm not sure if I am making sense here and it is still kind of coming together for me as an idea or awareness.

It sounds like you have the capacity to take another's feelings into account. To me, that's a sign of emotional maturity and I think it happens to be one of the bedrocks of civil society. Good for you.

I was the consummate apologizer and even now my former therapist says there is no need to apologize for whatever. It used to be that I would apologize for existing, but not anymore.

MY former therapist would apologize when I was upset by something she said or did. The apology was ONLY meant for how her words or actions affected me. It was very rare that she was apologizing for the words or deeds because she said it was her job to sometimes tell me things that may not sit well with me causing her to be remiss in her duties as my therapist.