There are two kinds of copes: healthy & unhealthy. What is your goal? If it’s to actually heal, you need to take steps towards healthy coping.
I’m working through my unhealthy copes. Things like targeted bitterness, willfully ignoring the issues, depersonalization, detached relationships, etc.
Long-term, I ain’t doin’ so great. But I’m trying to be in a healthier mindset in order to get better.
Baby steps.
And in case anyone needs a reminder: forgiveness does not mean “letting it ride”— sometimes it means letting it go of the hurt that’s clung onto you so that you can move forward, regardless of the other party. It’s a journey… it… certainly is a journey… and it will absolutely take time. And it doesn’t always involve closure. That’s where I personally am right now.
Anyhow. Yeah.
I don’t enjoy healthy coping. It hurts a lot. But I know it’s what I need to do in order not to destroy both myself & the others around me who may genuinely care.
Idk. Shit’s hard, yo.
EDIT: yeeeah, one time I did nothing else except immerse myself in a video game for like 3 months straight. No joke. Addiction has a lot of forms, but they’ll all fuck you up.
This is about the best answer that can be expected for such a vague plea for help.
I’ve done the video game addiction thing myself. Path of Exile…the game was good. Using it for unhealthy coping was not good.
Basically I would agree. The only thing you can change is yourself. Work on yourself. Dodge the second arrow.
Thank you for the link. It’s as if that article was spying on my wife, and I’ll share it with her when she wakes. Happy Tuesday!
Agree on the healing (‘healthy coping’) is hard af part. Being able to look at a memory and admitting that it hurt (and still does), took years.
But while I don’t enjoy the healing in the moment, I feel much better afterwards, than if I would have just distracted myself. I even saw myself being less clumsy after a while cause my mind is less distracted with keeping down ‘bad’ memories.
But disagree on the existence of unhealthy coping.
If your leg gets mauled by an animal, the first thing you do is getting away, no matter how, be it crutch or crawling. Once you’re safe you can start letting your leg heal. Same thing with your mental health.
If you get hurt by loosing a friend or a breakup, you get yourself to safety, be it by distracting yourself or just sitting somewhere or crying or just playing strong. Once you’re able to live, then you need get to the healing/healthy coping.The ‘unhealthy coping’ often feels less like a coping strategy, but like the way of life for someone who got his leg mauled and was either forced to continue as normal, never got to safety, or had to live with the animal and the constant mauling. They’re gonna have a lot of crutches, pathways and other weird behavior to work around the constantly broken leg(s). And someone who mentally never got to safety will have his addictions, detachments, depersonalization, etc.
But both will need to heal and let go of their respective survival strategies.
I get what you’re saying. However, my meaning is more “this can lead you into worse problems” = unhealthy coping. Alcohol worked fantastic for me to cope! But holy shit that has often led to worse situations and terrible health consequences.
People use painting to cope. Writing. Music Ways to express yourself and explore how you feel without self-destruction. Ways to explore things that suck without potentially harming in worse ways.
Saying “this is how I cope!” while doing self-harm is unhealthy. It’s a wobbly-ass crutch that is also full of glass that will hurt you if you once you lean on it too hard.
Do I blame folks for unhealthy coping? No. Not at all. I get it 100%. But a lot of it is used to numb the pain and ignore things instead of addressing it, and can turn into habit that will make your life so much worse, on top on your initial problems.
I think we’re saying the same thing, I’m just adding an additional line:
Coping = short term numbing the pain. Survival Strategy/Crutch = long term numbing the pain. Healing = working through those feelings.
And in this framework, sure, some coping mechanisms are healthier than others, but since they’re all short-term only and allow you to move into the headspace to heal, they’re basically all valid and healthy for that purpose.
And most people will use some sort of crutch to get into that headspace.
Missing out on a promotion and drawing a painting right in your bosses office after receiving the message is as difficult and unrealistic as sitting down right there and then and meditating on that feeling. Most people will try to make it through the day with distraction, be it alcohol, work, sugar or all of them combined. Once people are home, then they will paint their picture, go for a walk, sit down and meditate, talk to a friend, whatever their healing strategy may be.And people who continue with their coping strategy turn it into a crutch. And that is when it becomes unhealthy.
The main advantage of having this short-long term differentiation is preventing the shame of using something addictive and thus causing you to beat yourself up over it. But other than that distinction I agree with your points fully.
By learning the hard way that holding onto grudges just makes me an angry person and that life is far more enjoyable if I just let that shit go. You’re the only one bearing the toxic weight of that resentment, it doesn’t affect them at all, so who are you holding onto it for? It only makes your life worse.
Drugs.
Yeah I’d rather not. I’m already addicted to riding an electric scooter, super smash bros ultimate, and working. The work addiction and riding addiction made picking up DoorDash a bad idea since I’m addicted to it as well and would deliver orders after working 12 hours and not get sleep.
Cope?
Sugar, Video Games, Hobbies, SportPut in the work and heal from that on my own?
Allow and admit to myself that I have a long road ahead of me. Accept that I will fall back into resentment sometimes. There’s years of experience with resentment, but only a few minutes of trying to heal. And that it will be a lifelong fight that will only get easier, but will never be gone, like an addiction.Listen to how it feels having those years of resentment in my past. Try to accept and feel that feeling. Try to ask myself to what and why I was reacting with resentment. And question every truth/fact and answer that comes up. And question if the question is the right question. Really trying to get to the core of the resentment. Was I always resentful? How did I discover resentment as an answer to whatever caused it? What was the first thing in my life I resented? What am I trying to protect? Is there a better way to deal with it?
There are many more questions that would need answering, but these should give you a good start. Not all of them will be immediately obvious. Some will have an answer at first, that doesn’t sit quite right. But your subconscious will use the available time during downtime (going for a walk (without music), going to bed, etc.) to eventually come up with the correct answer or question. But it will take time.
Is therapy an option? Because dealing with resentment is a big chunk of their work.
If not, self-improvement books and podcasts. Brene Brown, Happiness Lab.
Learn about healthy boundaries. Boundaries are for you, not other people. That is, you can’t say “you can’t do that to me” because you only control yourself, not other people. So instead you can say “if you do that, I will do _____” and then do it. That’s putting you in control. Resentment can stem from lack of healthy boundaries.
Learn about mindfulness and practice it. Rumination on the past gets you stuck. Mindfulness has the benefits of helping you recognize your thoughts, giving you some distance from them, and anchoring yourself in the present. Mindfulness builds these muscles.
I don’t know your situation or what you resent so these are pretty scattershot recommendations. A trained therapist can help you identify the strategies that work for you and your situation. If you need help finding one, the directory on psychologytoday.com is great in the US.
Why do you feel resentment, towards whom?
Family, several people on the internet who justify the years of abuse I suffered, past abusers and bullies, and honestly everyone in the world because they all justify my abuse and believe I deserved it. Everyone sympathizes with my abusers and also gaslight me into believing they’re on my side. Okay, I deserved it. I also don’t deserve to be alive as everyone wants me dead but then they gaslight me into believing my life matters and I’m not a burdensome waste of organs, flesh, blood, and resources.
To what extent are you still involved with those you resent?
Honestly, it might be best to be away for a while and figure out if you even want them in your life and if so, what needs to change to help ensure there’s not gas being poured on the resentment and ongoing harm occurring.
You gotta figure out what’s best for you and to do that, you sort of need to find the rules necessary to help you stop similer behaviors and people in the future from recreating those harms and to level up the way you signal to others for how you are to be treated.
Next time you feel a reaction or unexplained intense feeling, try to figure out when it arose and what it was in response to. Try to expressit as I need x but got y and think about what can be requested or enforced to ensure it is corrected, althonyou will likely want a therapist or at least ask dispassionate audience for key issues and try to focus on just the facts so you can learn to make sense of these situations better
Its gonna be a little temporary pain and awkwardness as you find your bearings but it will improve basically every area of your life and help you more gracefully deal with relational challenges, at the end of the day tho, you have to be prepared to communicate what you need and expect and understand that some relationships that are fundamentally antithetical to that will not and shouldn’t survive you pursuing these things.
Change.
Screaming alone in a house all day while living in total isolation.
