HOW MY BELIEFS HAVE CHANGED

I was talking to my Richmond Fellowship Tyneside support worker about the changes in my thought processes that she wasn’t aware of because we’ve only been working together for a short time and I realized that it might make an interesting blog post… As much as I hate the thought of people going through what I have, I hope that if there are people out there who have the same beliefs that I used to hold, then reading this might work as reassurance that you can get through it and come out the other side!

I will die young

This belief was such a huge role in my mental health deterioration that I had to discuss it in a Psychology session whilst an inpatient in a specialist psychiatric hospital. I had to put a lot of work into changing this belief and developing a replacement for it (in fact, I wrote all about my efforts here) because without that work, I was well on track to succeed at committing suicide. This belief spurred on my suicide attempts because it led to the thought process that eventually, one of them would work and I’d be free forever. Now that I’m happy and enjoying my life (for the most part!) I wish it could carry on for all eternity!



I deserved the abuse

This belief started literally immediately after the abuse did. Straight away I knew I’d brought this on myself. Though, I won’t lie; this was definitely an irrational thought because if I was confronted with it then I probably couldn’t provide much evidence to support it! I guess I just thought of myself as a generally bad person; and perhaps it being so irrational is what kept it so solid in my head. It meant that no matter what anyone said they couldn’t disprove my belief because there was nothing to really contradict! Eventually, I learnt that what was done to me says more about the person who did it than it does about me.

TEN THINGS I BELIEVE IN

I recently had a mental health crisis and in it, a Paramedic said that they believed that in the moment I felt suicidal and they believed that so much that their job was to make sure that I didn’t take away the possibility of that feeling going away. That their job was to make sure I didn’t kill myself. I told them that the suicidal thoughts were much more powerful than the hope that those thoughts would go away.

Having such a strong belief that dying was the best option for coping with life, made me think about all of the other, very negative beliefs that I used to have. Before psychology in Hospital, I held the belief that I was destined to die young; I honestly believed that I’d been put on this earth to commit suicide. I also felt – and occasionally still feel – that I deserved what had happened to me. What had been done to me. The Psychologist, and many other professionals, told me that if I’d never say that to another person then why should I be any different? These two firm beliefs spurred on my self-harm and suicide attempts and for a while (about four years) they were all I believed in. So, I thought that it might help to talk about the positive, healthy beliefs that I now hold…