Guilt and negative thoughts

[frances]

Hi there,
A lot of my anxiety is due to having had bad thoughts about people I love. They (the thoughts) came during a period of high anxiety and upset me a lot and contributed to the anxiety spiralling. I have manged to stop the thoughts from coming again, which I am glad about, but I just cannot shake off the feelings of guilt from having had them. These feelings of guilt are very similar to the feelings of extreme anxiety.
I know the thoughts were not "real" and were a product of a troubled mind, but how the hell do I forgive myself so I can lead a relatively normal life without this. It is making my family upset also as I am so stressed, but I cannot tell them what is causing it. I know I am a good person, but this is making me feel so bad.
love frances
Can anyone help

[minny]

Hi Frances!

Im sorry to hear youre having a rough time of it lately. There are many people who totally understand what you are feeling so for now, be good to yourself. There is a lot of support and advice available to you withing this site!

Good luck

Love Minny..xx

[jo-jo]

Hi Frances

I think what you are experiencing is relatively common for people experiencing a high amount of anxiety or stress and I know I've seen similar posts here in the past, so don't worry, you're not alone.

The important thing is to realise that they are ONLY thoughts and as distressing as they are for you, thoughts don't hurt anyone. You really must try to forgive yourself as I'm sure that most people at some time have thoughts about other people that are not very nice. I think I might have mentioned this on the forum before but sometimes I dream that I am punching my dad and really trying to hurt him, but in real life there's absolutely no way I'd do anything of the sort. Sometimes these dreams are because we've had a disagreement about something (my dad has a funny attitude sometimes!!) but as he's 78 years old I don't consider its worth letting an argument go too far.

Maybe your feelings are happening for a reason too - if this is the case maybe it would be best for you to try and work out why you're feeling like this and then deciding if you can talk to that person about the issue?

Having these thoughts doesn't make you a bad person, you already know that, so stop beating yourself up about it and if its about something you can't explain or resolve, just let it go and drift away as do so many of the millions of thoughts we all have everyday.

Take care, love Jo xx

[frances]

Thanks Jo and Minny.
It's good to be reminded that I am not the only person feeling like this.
Take care
Frances

[Meg]

Oh Frances,
You are ceratinlym not the only one with these. Its one of the ost common symptoms that spiral people off into panic.Thinking about what they were thinking about .

Fact : everyone has these thoughts about people and events , however when not in anxiety and obsessing mode they are fleeting thoughts that come and go momentarily but we instead tend to hold them and tyhen start obsessing about themand the response we have to them.

You need to learn : thoughts not instruction s . Thoughts only thoughts


Nic , can you re post the thoughts thread . I can't reach it from venice !!



Meg

It is impossible to get out of a problem by using the same kind of thinking that it took to get into it.
- Albert Einstein.