I don’t know where to begin. I don’t know what to say really. You know when you do something wrong and you immediately get that feeling of “maybe I shouldn’t have done that” and you begin to feel physically messed up about it? I feel guilty every hour, minute, and second of the day. The voices tell me that I’m guilty and the people that I see but are supposedly aren’t there tell me that I’m guilty. That we’re all guilty. But I’m not talking about minor guilt. What I’m speaking of goes so much deeper than that and it scares me so. What do I do? How do I not feel guilty all the time? It’s like my brain is stuck on this feeling and I can’t get it out of my head. I could really use some comforting words
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I suffer from something similar it is called guilt complex. When I first became unwell, I was convinced I had committed a crime and that the police were after me. After some time it became overwhelming to the extent I almost turned myself in.
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I don’t know why I feel this way. Or what it is I really did. Truth is, is that if I ever find out I don’t think I could ever tell anyone what it is I’ve done. What if it gets worse?
It might be your sz(delusion) that is making you feel this way.
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My voices tells me that im guilty too, sometimes of murder, sometimes for other things I know I never did, but I dont feel guilty because I dont give any importance or meaning to what my voices says, I really dont care and you should ignore these voices too.
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you sound unstable in your thinking…your guilt will go away if you seek a psychiatrist and get on medications for schizophrenia.
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I have had issues with guilt, too. I couldn’t stop reliving everything I’d ever done wrong, and I felt as though it was a stain upon my soul that wouldn’t come clean. In conjunction with this, I apologized constantly because I felt that everything that I did was wrong. I started feeling suicidal and made plans. I had to be put on lithium. I’m feeling much better now and don’t feel guilty. I guess the lithium made the difference for me.
I would suggest you talk to your pdoc and let him/her know how you are feeling. You shouldn’t have to go on feeling this way. There are meds out there that can help.
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That’s terrible. I hate that feeling. I don’t think I ever had it that bad though. I’m sorry you’re going through that kind of pressure. I guess you should just keep telling yourself you have not done anything wrong and then discuss it with your counselor. Hopefully he/she will know how to combat that. I hope things get better.
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If you said or acted inappropriate it happens we’ve all been there. If you broke the law there’s only one way to get on the right track and I’m not allowed to talk about it.
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The voices are false. They are not people. If you want to pop off to them and say " and i am glad i did it! Moo ha ha haw" , then feel free to do that.
Make certain you really laugh afterwards though.
Hallucinations like to feed on negative emotion. The guilt is a delusion of yours?
The two will work together feeding off each other unless you snatch control from it/“them”.
Dont let your symptoms of hallucinations and/or delusion take emotional control of you.
Treat the voices as a symptom. Please do not give hallucinations personhood. Giving hallucinations personhood solidifies to a point that “they” have opinions and that you should care about that.(you shouldnt)
The opinions of hallucinations should not matter as it is false. Hallucinations are nothing more than disrupted connections of brain cells. Thete are no people there to have an opinion of you.
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Sometimes, for unknown reasons, I will recall incidences from childhood and all different points in my life where I know now I was probably wrong. Some of it is so shameful I don’t think I’ll ever tell another living soul. But you aren’t the only one who goes through stuff like this. Meds might help. I ask God for forgiveness and to give me peace of mind, and I noticed usually I feel a little better the next day. Might work for others, but every one has different ideas about that kind of thing. Have no idea what triggers these thought. But if voices are accusing you of things you didn’t actually do, or accusations that you know don’t apply to the real you, then try not to let these voices or thoughts affect you. If it becomes too unbearable, then talk to a psychiatrist. Maybe you shouldn’t discuss it with any one you know. They might now be able to separate delusions from the truth and it might affect the way they see and treat you.
i used to suffer from guilt quite a bit. i would often apologize for petty offenses. most of my guilt came from “misspeaking” or “unkind words” which i was able to mature past.
i did a few things to get rid of my guilt. i stopped socializing so much to limit my misspeaking. i started to avoid certain foods i thought caused guilt like meat…and one of the biggest things i did was stopped masturbating as i felt it made me weaker. i believe guilt is a sign of weakness.
I’m no longer guilty. i did it. it can be done
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I feel guilty all the time. I know I’m an imperfect sinner. I have trouble doing what is right. And it’s tearing me up inside.
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I struggled a lot with delusions that I have hurt people I love. The guilt is hard to deal with. It helped me to go to therapy and address the underlying fears that triggered my guilt.
For me, I watched a lot of people I love die in a very short amount of time. The idea that something like that could just happen randomly was overwhelming, so my brain invented the idea that it was all my fault. It was trying to protect itself, in a way. If it was my fault, I could prevent it from happening again. If it was just random chance, it could happen at any time.
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Try this exercise ask yourself the following questions to help reveal a core belief you may have. I will answer them as myself so you get an example.
What am I feeling? Guilt, extreme condemning guilt
Is there an identifiable reason I feel guilty? No one thing comes to mind
Did I hurt someone? No
Was it intentional? not applicable
Did I apologize? not applicable
Did I commit a crime? No
Did I commit an immoral act? None that I can think of
Did I do something that violates my personal values or ethics? No
How long have I felt this way? all my life
Did someone else shame me for something I did or said as a child? yes
Who shamed or humiliated me? My dad’s best friend
What did they tell me about myself? "you are a wicked little temptress, you are evil at your core, If anyone knew this about you, they would not love you anymore"
Do I believe this is true about myself? yes
What evidence do I have that supports this belief? Mom left me when I was 2, and I never measured up to the standards worthy of my fathers love.
What is my belief about this evidence? Mom and dad are perfect therefore there is something inherently wrong with me, therefore I have no right to be alive.
Why am I guilty? Because I exist.
I has taken me a long time to overcome this core belief because of course it is not true.
I have every right to be here and I belong.
So do you.
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I can tell you about myself.
I feel that the girl inside me ( that i am) is not allowed to exist at all. Not now not after i die and go to heaven. The reason…cause im guilty.
Thats just coming from this world…cause its broken.
So i admitted and said im guilty. And forgot about it.
Only way to get rid of the feeling " im guilty" is to admit it and say im guilty. Even if you are not.
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Various philosophers (Freud, Mead, Adam Smith, Bakhtin, Lacan, Hermans and Kempen, Derrida, Nishida, Rochat) theorise that to have a self we need to have an other in our mind. Some of these theorists are very down to earth. I quote Smith below.
Two or three of these theorists (Freud, Nishida, Rochat) go further to suggest that in order to have someone else in our minds, something nasty - guilt - must be going on since otherwise we would see her and see that she is another part of ourselves. They suggest we need guilt to keep our selves, split.
Adam Smith, the father of economics, is very down to earth Scotsman, and does not mention any nastiness. This is adapted from his (1757) The Theory of Moral Sentiments.
"When I try to examine my own behaviour, when I try to evaluate it, and either to approve or condemn it, in all such cases, I divide myself, as it were, into two persons; and that I, the examiner and judge, represent a different character from that other I, the person whose conduct is examined into and judged of. The first is the spectator, whose sentiments with regard to my own conduct I try to enter into, by placing myself in the spectator’s situation, and by considering how my behaviour would appear to me, when seen from that particular point of view. The second is the agent, the person whom I properly call myself, and of whose conduct, under the character of a spectator, I was trying to form some opinion. The first is the judge; the second the person judged of. But that the judge should, in every respect, be the same with the person judged of, is as impossible, as that the cause should, in every respect, be the same with the effect.
I can’t find the Freud quote (a lot of his work is about the necessity of guilt) but I do have quotes from Kitaro Nishida and Rochat that suggest something guilty is going on.
For my own part, I admit my guilt. If I did not, I think I would feel guiltier.
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Another thought, guilt tends to be a motivator to change how we are living, treating others, being honest, fair, helpful, compassionate etc. Condemnation however is not a motivator, it causes us to feel helpless to change. So identifying exactly which one you are feeling is really important. Guilt refers to what you have or have failed to do/done, this means you can change how you behave and become better. Condemnation refers to who you are and implies you cannot change.
As far as we are all guilty, I’m certain everyone has been guilty of harming another wether intentional or by accident. Guilt is a feeling.most can relate to.
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Can you think of anything you did that could warrant your guilt feelings? And, even if you did do something, it doesn’t matter because God will forgive you no matter what you did.
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