Self-defected

[Bermuda]

I'm at a point on my road in which I am able to do things that I never thought I would be able to do and I am beginning to realise how deeply entangled my self-worth is in this cPTSD web. I don't know how to get out of it.

My professor today after an exam in front of two other students repeatedly complimented me and told me that I should skip the courses and he could just recommend me to sit a final exam for the most advanced course. The students around looked super proud of me. He said I should really consider doing it because after all, what do I have to lose?

I replied instinctually with, "But I am a perfectionist and if I fail, I will feel like a failure."  Another student said, "Oh yeah, I know that."

My inner dialog had actually said, "Now he's going to expect that I can always do well and he will be disappointed that I can't. I definitely can't skip ahead because I WILL fail and then I will end up dropping all the courses because the thought of showing up while being so far behind (in my mind) already will become so overbearing and instead I will lay in bed at home for a year crying wishing I were doing the thing that I can't do right until I find something else to do somewhere else where no one knows me. He doesn't know that I work hard because I know I will fall behind."

...Logically I can see that this gets me no where. I will not take any other course, or just sit a final exam, and it makes me think about how I make so many choices now to kind of work around the more predictable aspects of cPTSD and how deeply engrained these problems are. So much so that I cannot separate the imposter syndrome from the executive dysfunction from the perfectionism from the avoidance from the low self-esteem. They feel the same. One exhale.

I guess it's good that I can see this now, and maybe working around my symptoms is the best I can do right now, but what is it like for other people? Afterward, one student told me she really envies people like me who can study so hard and I told her I always envied the people who can just show up and take an exam.

I want to aim for carefree and having a moderate amount of confidence. Where do I start? How do I entangle this?

[Armee]

Aw Bermuda. It's such a rotten trap that has been set for us where even good things are terrorizing. I'm sorry I get it. 😔

For me, things like imposter syndrome and perfection are not just about low self esteem. They are also actual triggers. Life or death.

(Also, I'm proud of you. You are these good things other people see. I know how painful and scary it is though.)

[rainydiary]

For me it feels important to try to accept and really feel the good things people say about me.  And also doing what is truly right for you (like sitting for courses and taking exams when you are "ready").  I still catch myself trying to be what I think others want and the less I do that, the next step of what I need to do often illuminates.

[Bermuda]

Oh Armee, I know. There was a time for me too when these things would not have even been possible. I can't even imagine life like that anymore. I wouldn't have been able to perform the tasks necessary to even submit myself to a program let alone show up. It's so hard to give myself grace.

Rainydiary, that is it. It is also people pleasing. I don't want to let my professor down or anyone else. Even the voice of disappointment in my head was borrowed from someone else.

I am good enough. I can do things at my own pace. Like everyone I have strengths and weaknesses. I am just me.

[NarcKiddo]

I am the product of a FOO (and to a large extent a school) where results mattered. My interest in the task at hand was immaterial. I was lucky enough to be reasonably academically gifted so I am one of those people you say you envy. I just showed up and took the exams. I mean, I did do the necessary amount of work to get the grades required but all my focus was on the grade, not the subject. So there was very little in the way of enjoyment for me, or getting inspired by something and doing my own study. It was all very sterile and the notion of doing something I was not terribly good at for the sheer interest or enjoyment of it was alien to me. I skipped various things to get to the end goal quicker, including an entire year of primary school as the teachers said I was too advanced where I was. FOO of course gloried in this wonderful academic daughter they could show off. Never mind I was uprooted from friends in one year and stood out like a sore thumb by being put up a year.

It seems to me that we both have a desperate need to perform but are coming at it from totally different directions. I am not really sure how one gets through this and out the other side. I'm taking one step at a time and trying to get to know, appreciate and love myself. One unexpected help for me has been discovering fitness. I am not naturally talented and was heavily discouraged from physical activity by FOO. I have discovered the joys of doing something I am not very good at until I am better at it, while enjoying the journey.

I am going to quote you, because you have said good things that we all should remember:

"I am good enough. I can do things at my own pace. Like everyone I have strengths and weaknesses. I am just me."

[Bermuda]

Oh yeah NarcKiddo. I don’t know much about your story but I get the impression we probably had similar stresses but we’re subjected differently to them, if that makes sense.

My brother was the prized one. He failed every class but scored the highest in the region on all his final exams. My parents showered him with praise and showed him off, bragged that they couldn’t fail him because he was in the newspapers. I tried so hard to be noticed academically. I didn’t fail, but I don’t test very well because of my fear of failure ironically. My marks were always higher than his. I graduated two years early with a 3.75gpa. My parents wouldn’t even sign the necessary paperwork for me to get a diploma. There was no party for me. There was instead a lecture about how I would never survive and that I can’t go to uni because they weren’t going to help me. They wanted me to present a plan on how I would be able to ever take care of myself just to pick holes in it and humiliate me.

Now I just humiliate myself. No middleman necessary.

There are things I am extremely good at, and there are things that I find more than difficult. Teachers always wrote home that my work was inconsistent. It wasn’t just because of my home life, but also because I was already traumatised and already going through these cycles of pushing myself until I shut down, or I have a terrible freeze response and can’t answer the most basic question, that makes me look like a cheater, like a fraud.

I have internalised all of it. I want to be able to go and sit an exam and not care about the results. I am studying because I want to, because I enjoy it. No one cares about whether I score a 70 or 100. That’s adult life. …But I care. I care so much that I consider running away and not trying rather than facing the fact that I may score a 75, especially if my professor thinks I am amazing.

[Armee]

Bermuda, beside risk of failure and all the fallout that entails in trauma-land, would you want to jump ahead to just taking a final, if you could? Does skipping the classes make it more likely you'd feel like an imposter? Does skipping classes help you reach an important goal faster?

Thank you for clearly writing the part about inconsistent work. This unpredictable inconsistency fills me with dread too in every area and is why I always always feel like an imposter because you might think I'm smart but there are other times I will have zero access to anything in my brain. And then feeling like an imposter makes me feel like I need to die because of that time...

[Bermuda]

I guess not Armee. I don't have a goal. Skipping ahead would serve me no purpose. If I skipped from course 2 over to course 6 I would actually skip over at least a year and a half worth of university credits. Not that I am saving them up for anything either. I guess the goal is to show up. I don't want to miss that experience. This seems to highlight that what is actually upsetting me is probably not that I am holding myself back after all and that it's the cycles themselves, the expectations, and the people pleasing. Me taking my time serves myself.

Armee it is awful that you relate but it is comforting to know that someone else experiences that too. I work hard to get ahead so I can't fall behind but I always feel like I am behind and just one second from failure. Someone asked me where I lived and I panicked and said somewhere random because I couldn't remember where I live... but I am so talented.

[Kizzie]

My last T and I came to see those times when I can't access anything much in my brain as my brain going offline because of stress so  my go to strategy became to try and calm myself, reduce stress as much as possible, make things about me and my well-being, and consider how not being perfect all the time for me is to live more fully and healthily. It all helps me to get my brain back online.

Really though it's all about what's healthy for you, what will make you happy.   

[Armee]

That experience of being in the classes themselves sounds super important then. Sucks that the instant response to praise is panic but at least you are clear on what is the right course of action for you right now.  keep taking your time. I think it's probably super healing to work through these situations that have come up in this course. Each course will probably present different opportunities to heal, so even if you are smart enough to pass the last exam without taking any more courses (which I believe you are!),  it is probably pretty valuable to move through as you are.

I love the way you say that "I can't remember where I live....but I am so talented." That about sums up my self-sarcastic soundtrack too.