Do You Sometimes Feel Ashamed?

 

Ways to let go of unhealthy feelings

About your AIS status

 

 

Editor's note: ... This article was adapted from several other non-profit sources.

As women with AIS and similar conditions, there have probably been times when we have felt flawed, unworthy, inadequate, or somehow defective, and that we keep saying over and over again "what is wrong with me."  If you’re like me, after initial diagnosis, you may have had feelings of shame and/or remorse about your worth as a woman.

Experts say shame often leads us to low self-esteem and it plays a major role in stifling “our best self.”  Shame is both a feeling or emotion, and an experience that happens to the total self.

We all experience some shame.  But the years and years of carrying around shame from your diagnosis or anything else is harmful and can affect your emotional well-being. If we do not work through these feelings and work to let go of them, shame can accumulate and weigh us down, until we feel even more of a victim.  A good counselor or therapist can help work through this shame and help us realize that we are really women; we just took a different biological path to becoming one.  Further, that having this diagnosis is not a death sentence nor is it our fault – it might be useful to think of it as a “genetic trait” or “a characteristic that just runs in your family” and it was never intended to destroy your happiness your whole life long!  Bottom line: feeling shame no longer means you have to live so sadly.

We can learn to “just say no” to the negative messages, negative thoughts, old beliefs of what is/isn’t a real woman.  We often say things to ourselves so mean and hurtful – things that we would never say to another person.  Maybe we heard them too often in childhood, or perhaps we just feel them so strongly because we see ourselves as flawed to a prospective mate because of our diagnosis.  Then, when we have disclosed the truth to loved one, if any of these people on whom we were so vulnerable have hurt us, then we could start to believe they are somehow right.

Think about this: studies have shown that if just one person says “I really don’t like your new haircut” – that it will take at least SEVEN more people saying “I love your new do” before we will discount the first person’s criticism.  Since you may not have shared your medical status with high numbers of people to get this 1:7 feedback, then we need to “eliminate the negative” much faster.

With 1 in 1,500 babies born every day with something other than the standard male or female anatomy, we AISSG members are not alone.  We don’t need to be ashamed of our bodies any more.  Shame uses the emotion that attacks us by making us believe we are somehow defective or unlovable.  This crippling emotion destroys self-confidence and prevents one from reaching our joy in life or love. Shame was a learned emotional reaction to an actual or perceived attack on the worth of an individual.

So let’s agree in 2006 to dealing with any lingering shame by:

• Recognizing that we may still be ashamed because of our diagnosis or medical history.
• Figuring out rationally and logically if there is any validity to telling ourselves negative messages, comments or beliefs about our bodies.
• Recognizing the effect of having this condition has been harder, but it’s not impossible to accept.
• Feeling the anger, sadness, hurt and pain that we may have been shortchanged in life, but it’s okay now as we’re becoming older & wiser.
• Learn to understand, accept and let go of all our past negative feelings and beliefs about your diagnosis and medical history.
• Learn to understand, accept and let go of all our past negative feelings and beliefs about your diagnosis and medical history.
• Take steps to write our new positive thoughts in a journal, to read more self-help books, to learn all we can about your condition, to offer support to others and if necessary work through our feelings with a counselor in therapy. 

The Dali Lama has said “if you are feeling sad, think of others; and if you are joyful, think of others.”

Offering up support to others whether AIS or not can be a good step to not just thinking about ourselves and focusing solely on our own problems. Yes, work through your feelings, but when you’ve done the work, reach out to others, too.

I believe that overcoming the paralyzing effects of shame that has kept us limited starts with developing an awareness of how and what we believe about ourselves.  Let’s question and explore more from now on and vow that we can learn to live as proudly as women with AIS and similar conditions, without any more shame.

 

adapted by Cindy Stone