I don’t like to use my blog for rants, but I am angry. And if I’m being compassionate with myself, then my anger is just as valid as any other feeling. So I’m going to give myself permission to write about my anger.
I was telling a friend recently about the presentation I gave at work on self-compassion, and he responded with hostility and disdain. I was not prepared for the attack. I understand that some people prefer the “suck it up” approach to pain and suffering, but why would it make him angry that I teach people how to be kind to themselves instead?
I also had a conversation with another friend who reminded me that many people don’t think the students I work with have real problems. I work at a counseling center of a college that is made up of predominantly wealthy students. Many of the students who come to counseling are the ones who don’t fit in because they are not white, not rich, not Greek, etc. Other students fit in just fine. Other than their mental illness, that is.
Either way, as far as I’m concerned, their suffering is equally valid.
But I seem to be in the minority. Because when I tell people where I work, they question how these students could possibly be suffering. What do they have to be unhappy about? Their lives are great. They don’t have real problems.
This is a sore spot for me because I was one of those people who didn’t have a good reason for my depression. My parents are both doctors. I was able to go to good schools, get a Ph.D., obtain a good job. I haven’t been traumatized. All of my basic needs were provided for. How could I possibly be depressed?
I don’t deserve compassion. Don’t deserve meds or therapy or any kind of relief because I’m just being weak. Lazy. Selfish.
People don’t claim that someone isn’t really suffering from the flu or that they don’t really have cancer because they have a good life. But for some reason, we believe that the privileged are immune to mental illness. I believed this, too. Which is why I didn’t ask for help.
But mental illness does not care what your background is. It does not discriminate. It is an equal opportunity employer, distributing pain and suffering to the entire human race.
For whatever reason, the hostility of these attacks has hit me full force, and I am angry. I’m trying to figure out how to deal with these comments when they come up in causal conversation without attacking back. But I can’t keep people from judging me or my clients or my profession. Not even my family and friends.
In therapy I tell clients to control what they can control. I cannot make someone see the value of having compassion for themselves and for others, but I can have it for myself. I can remind myself that my pain is real and that I deserve to treat myself with kindness. And I can be a voice for those people who need to be reminded that their pain counts, too.
And I can blog about it, which always helps.
I love this post. I share your anger! This is an article I needed to read right now at this exact moment if you can believe it. It’s a little surreal for me.
The pain is pain. It is what it is.
Why my suffering should be any less? Just because I haven’t had a miscarriage, haven’t lost a family member or a friend… And yet I still suffer a lot.
There is nobody who could deny it better than me though. I feel an enormous shame! Every time there are news like what happened in Paris or the fire in Indonesia and many others. Every time I read other people’s stories about how much hardship they went through. I admire them and have a lot of empathy for them. It should after all make me feel grateful.
But no amount of gratitude can take away the shame that I have. There is no comparing when it comes to suffering.
It is what it is. Pain is pain. Anger is anger. Feelings are not negotiable.
Thank you for your rant, I’m glad that it’s not only me feeling in this way.