Failure

Failure
G

Green

Registrant
I had an interesting session with my T today. She noticed that I become visibly hostile and upset whenever she gives me a compliment. She said that learning to accept compliments on my accomplishments is one means of separating myself from my perps who were spectacular failures in life. I am not a failure. I am a successful. All I have to do now is learn how to believe it.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Green
 
Hi, Green, I'm David,

Ya, I always attributed my difficulty in accepting compliments to the constant berating by my father; I never could do anything right, according to him. I always thought that he, "helped set me up," for my perps.
I have learned to simply, but sincerely, say, thank you, when complimented.
I used to go through all sorts of acrobatics to deny that, "I had anything to do with it," or that, "it was nothing, anyone could do it."
It took a while, but it feels so much better accepting the compiment and now, thanking the person for giving me the compliment.

Good thread, will be interesting to see what some of the others have to say.

David
 
Green,

I usually try to brush off compliments. The only time I came close to being mature was when I used to redirect compliments at work to members of my team. But then I'd get compliments for that.

It's real hard to believe I can do something worthwhile, something good. I don't know that I've been hostile, but until seeing your post tonight I didn't know to watch for that. Now I will.

Thanks,

Joe
 
I have a very hard time accepting compliments, and more than that, believing they are even real.

When I was in high school, I played on the varisty soccer team; after practice we would line up and shoot at the goal, with the goalie trying to stop our shots. My shot always seemed to be stopped. One day, as we headed to do our laps after practice, the goalie said to me as he ran by, "You have the hardest shot on the team."

I said, "Not Javier?" (the South American wunderkind)

"Nope," and he just kept going.

To this day, I am not sure if he was serious, or messing with me.

I believe that the repetition of positive thoughts makes us stronger...man, it is hard to do.

Peace,
James
 
I have a hard time accepting compliments too. I don't get hostile though. Guess I have different reactions like:

If they really knew me they wouldn't compliment me.

What's wrong with them that they would compliment me?

What do they really want from me?

I don't ever remember hearing "good job" growing up no matter what I did be it bringing home staight A's from school or rebuilding a carbruetor on a car. What was sad is my dad would tell other peopole of my accomplishments but never say a word to me.

Definitely an area I need to work on too.

Good topic.
Gary
 
I think you're finding many of us survivors struggle with this issue of compliments. It took a loonnnggg time for me to accept compliments with a simple "Thank you" without having to deflect them, deny them, explain them away or wonder what they really wanted by complimenting me. For a long time I thought "they must really be hard up to believe I did anything special!"

Then there was the period when anyone paid me a compliment and it would scare the heck out of me. I truly believed I was doing what anyone and everyone else could do...nothing to speak of.

I began to change when I realized others need the chance to give compliments away. They felt they were involved in the entire process with me. It gave them a chance to give to me what they felt I had given them. It was a chance for them to help me along to feel good about myself.

When I started to feel better about myself, I found I could just accept the compliment as a "job well done" like I said to many others.

I still feel, at times, that I am just doing what I was born to do...nothing special. But I usually reply to compliments however I really feel: "Thanks"..."Thanks, that means a lot to me"..."That's kind of you to say that"..."I couldn't have done it without your help too" or some such statement.

It comes with time, healing and accepting yourself as really just plain okay!!

Howard
 
Howard, you expressed my experience to a "t".

I especially liked:

I still feel, at times, that I am just doing what I was born to do...nothing special. But I usually reply to compliments however I really feel: "Thanks"..."Thanks, that means a lot to me"..."That's kind of you to say that"..."I couldn't have done it without your help too" or some such statement.
Click to expand...
What I do in my vocation puts me constantly in the spotlight. I have learned to take compliments in the spirit in which they are intended even if I feel that I didn't "deserve" them [of course that is just a silly notion].

And receiving compliments has made me aware that it is just as important to give them. If criticism is the rain on the parade, then compliments are the sunshine on my shoulders.

Thank you all, all of you. You are the best.

Ron
 
Accepting Compliments:

To this day,and I am 62, whenever someone compliments me I say "Well it must have been an accident" or " Even though I am not worth it". I have more ways to put myself down than I can count and then I get furious at the world.
I am good at a lot of things but when start to really believe it I start the old cycle of sabotaging it because I dont have any right to be good.

Yeh it is a hard thing to relearn but I am doing it as we all are.
 
I have a hard time accepting compliments as well.

I don't get hostile, but I tend to deflect them or minimize them. If there is no way I can do that I tend to just mutter a thanks and feel that they are either just being nice or want something from me.

Apparently from the number of resonses, this isn't all that unusal...

Eric
 
Green
0h yes, I felt this - and still do sometimes.
I still go bright red with embarrasment and drip with sweat when complimented.
Even if I do feel proud of whatever I've done.
It's crazy.

But it's so deep rooted, from all the guilt and shame we felt / feel from our abuse.
And some of the blame I think lies with some of the factors that made us more vulnerable.

I wasn't abused by any family members at all, and my parents did the best they possibly could.
But it was a time and place where 'education' ( in and out of school ) was done by comparing me to others who were apparently doing better.
My parents constantly compared me to my brother who's 8 years older than me. And my dad still calls me by his name sometimes which pisses me off immensly !
School was the same, never complimented for doing well - but criticised for being average.

I for one grew up in an atmosphere of criticism, never any compliments and praise.
Except for one thing. Apparently I was the best at sex in the whole school.
Some achievement eh ?

It's small wonder we can't accept praise easily.

I began to change when I realized others need the chance to give compliments away.
Click to expand...
But Howard say's it all there.
It's not often people personaly praise someone without meaning it. And we soon learn those who do and treat their false praise with the contempt it deserves. ( I'd like you to meet my manager, an Olympic flatterer and bullshitter :rolleyes: )

Compliments are something we all need, it's great for our self esteem.
Let's learn to accept them

Dave
 
Green,

I've struggled with that feeling for years. I've never thought of myself as being of value. I'd always thought that all of my accomplishments were due to good fortune or just plain luck. I was terribly afraid that one day someone would shout out "You're a fraud!". That's the way I felt about myself. I hated it when someone would compliment me or recognize something I did.

Only after I started dealing with the issues of my abuse did I start feeling better about myself. I wrote a very personal resume of my career with all of the accomplishments and how they were achieved. I began to realize that I had worked very hard to be the best that I could. I also realized that I was harder on myself than I ever was on anybody else. I held myself to a very high standard, often unattainable. I started feeling proud of what I'd done. I also began being more assertive. Within a year of starting therapy I resigned my job where I'd worked for the previous 7 years. With my new found pride came the realization that I'd been a 'doormat' and I let people walk all over me. I couldn't do that anymore. I told my employers that I wasn't being adequately compensated and I told them why. They didn't agree so I accepted new position at another company with a 25% increase in salary. I never would have done that in the past. I wouldn't have stood up for myself.

I still have days of doubts but I don't let them stop me from moving ahead. This last year has beaten me up considerably. I'm still alive, I'm still employed, I feel like I'm really contributing and I feel valued. I think that low self-esteem is very common in survivors and it takes a lot of effort to overcome it and realize our own self-worth. We are all worthy individuals.

Steve
 
I can't believe that so many of you took time to write such tboughful responses. This is truly an amzing place, and I am so grateful to have found it.

There is a discussion in another board on hard it is to cry. I am crying now, and I don't cry often.

Thank you,

Green
 
How could I accept a compliment? Theres got to be something about anything that I should have done better. Why would I deserve an atta boy? Heck, if I would have done Kurt Thomas performances on the parallel bars, I wouldnt think I deserved the 10. If you have ever had the chance to see Kurt Thomas on the parallel bars, you knew HE did.

I think that Im a pretty good worker, good at my profession, but have plenty of room for improvement. Recently, in a letter to the editor to our newspaper, a resident wrote about how I was a truthful, diligent government worker that actually cared about the work I do. My response? To say I was just doing my job and that the work crews actually deserved the credit. Following that, I received more letters from residents in the mail, thanking me for doing such a good job for them. They havent been shared, just tucked away.

Nope, I cant take a compliment. I dont deserve them. Maybe I do, I just dont feel like I do.

Bill
 
Bill: Of course you do and intellectually you know it. It is the emotional side that gets in the way. And they are wrapped around our beliefs and the SA. It is like trying to unravel and fishing line knot. But perserverence pays off in the end.
 
On the light side:

I have to give a speech on Saturday. Should I ask the audience not to clap at the end because I don't like compliments?

Green
 
Nah: YOu should tell the audience that if they dont clap you will go into a deep funk and feel hurt cause you are a very sensitive person :D ;)
 
Today I read again the article 1. Daniel Peter: In the middle. This was in the Winter 2003 issued of Men Speak Out.

In it towards the end when all his demons are let loose.
He wrote:
He told them he was having a emotional problem, related to rape, and that he was haiving difficulty controlling those emotions. His feelings were ignored. The trainer told Daniel that we would be gotten rid of, because the Navy was sick of people like David> He would se no compassionate consideration. Oce more he we given charge to drive the warship. His trainer had said he was going to get rid of Daniel; he was set up for the fall.
Click to expand...
That really hit home to me and finally brought some honest tears for myself. All through my early childhood every single male relative who whipped me or beat me in the woodshed or wherever constantly screamed at me that I was a worthless piece of shit and that I had no right to live. The world would be a better place without me. These relatives up to and including my father always said the same thing in various ways.

Whe my three psycho perps at Military College were doing their thing with me they told me much the same thing. The only difference was that despite being a piece of shit I was very good at being available as a receptacle for their needs and was an expert at masking physical pain.

When I was a street hustler virtually all my clients, because of the type of psycho I was looking for also degraded me and mocked me in much the same way my perps did. And the hell of it I was looking for those types. I had no value except as a piece of meat. No mind no worth, just a piece of meat to use and cast aside.

i just took it from all of them. How could I. When I was with peers in a normal situation I was the bully and dared anyone to prove that I was worthless. If I even suspected someone of talking about me that way I went ballistic.

Nobody was going to push me around. Nobody!!

I had the same attitude all my life at work and in my marriage. Even when I tried to feel good about myself or think that I had worth all those vicious voices came into my head and pet me know it was a lie. So what did I do? I set about trying to destroy anything that was good and clean in my life. I became a master at that.

This is really the first time that I realized I was set so well to fail. There it was in black and white and written for me my someone else.

I have talked around the subject in therapy but I danced more than went deep into it. The reason for that was that I myself knew what a rotten piece of shit I was. I did not need any else to make me realize that.

Now as I continue down our path I realize that much of my life I have lived a lie. I no longer take ownership of the lie that was forced on me.

This has probably been one of my biggest stumbling blocks to healing. I was set up to fail.

When I think of it now and about all the others here who have had the lie placed with them I weep. At the same time I am filled with so much rage that it scares me. My rage, except with my family, has always been physical. My rage will be contained to ferreting out these jackals and strip them bare in front of society so all can look into the eyes of real shits that are evil beyond belief.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top