Hoping it helps me out to be able to share.. finally

Hello,
I just found this site on Google and thought it would be nice to be able to tell someone about my life anonymously. I've never been diagnosed with BDD and didn't even know it existed until I saw a TV show about it and saw the similarities. I have been obsessed with what I looked like as long as I can remember. When I was seven years old I wanted to be a model. My innocent, young brain concluded that learning deportment and catwalk skills would make me beautiful, I didn't realise that being beautiful was the qualification for the job. It amuses me when I think about that now. I have been absorbed and obsessed with what my body looks like my whole life. I'm 23 now and it just never ends. It's like there is a part of my brain sectioned off just for thinking about how ugly I am and comparing me to other women. I obsess mostly about things on my face. I have unsymmetrical eyes that no one else seems to be able to see; it drives me wild. It is really hard for me to look people in the eyes when they're talking to me because of this. I hate the shape of my face, the form of my mouth around my teeth and the way my nose moves when I smile, and the fact that my skin just doesn't tan. I look at other women and wonder how they got to be so lucky.

The severity of my obsessions or my ability to cope with what I look like changes every now and then, but it's always there. Two years it got so bad I couldn't leave the house with out a hat an sunglasses. I was about to drop out of university for the second time (because of how uncomfortable I am around people my age and younger)and was forced by my boyfriend to see a school psychologist (how I even got a boyfriend is another long story). I was so uncomfortable going there and so convinced that they couldn't help me I only went three times. I had to fix myself so I sucked it up and took the hat off. I just started small, like going to the corner shop and eventually got rid of it. As part of my self improvement I got a new job as a croupier and enrolled in a new degree at university. I really thought I was better, I guess. I proved otherwise. I've dropped out of school again and the job is torture. This is where I work currently. It pays well and I have no other qualifications. It is literally standing under a spotlight in a room of dressed up, overly attractive women. What was I thinking?!? Drunk men judge me. I am socially awkward because I can't look people in the eyes. It is TORTURE!!

Everyday I wake thinking about my looks and I check the mirror, I check the mirror on my breaks at work ( I get one an hour!), I cry when I get home, check the mirror and go to bed. All night I compare myself to the women at work. It's exhausting. I am awkward with my colleagues. I have no friends and can't make any because of people my age socialise by going to bars and clubs. Not a chance! I'm also undeveloped as a person because of a lifetime of thinking about this. I have never focused on what music I like, what hobbies, getting my own style. I have nothing. It's hard to have a conversation. I've only got my boyfriend who I think with leave me when someone better comes along, and if not because of that, because I'm no fun crying all the time. He is everything to me. I just can't understand why he chooses me. We've booked a flight to move overseas and get a new life so I need the horrible job. I'm so stressed and miserable. I hate that this will never end. That this is who I am. I just want to accept what I have like other women do, instead of being in this horrible existence. I fantasize daily about ending it and escaping this body that I hate and freeing my boyfriend to be happy with a beautiful women. I have it all worked out, the implements and the method, I'm just too much of a wimp. I really disgust myself.

likehuman,

This is my first post here also. I don't know if I even have bdd, although I have all the "symptoms". Like everyone here I feel my views about my own appearance are legitimate, and that my opinion is the only one that matters. I've had this "condition" since the late 90's. I've often theorized that bdd is made up by doctors to convince ugly people that the problem is just in their heads.

Having said that, my life still sucks & everyday is a chore. I'm telling you this because I am now a 33 year old MALE and I was in a promising relationship with someone who I still love very dearly. I lost her and I've never recovered from it. I probably never will. My obscessive behavior was a huge wedge between us too. Eventually, her unhappiness made her distant and ultimately unfaithful.

Now it's been 7 years since i've even seen her, not that I could ever stand to again. I tried suicide, botched it, went to therapy (briefly), got on crazy meds and here I am, 7 years later. I'm alone with the same problems, plus, the added depression of losing my one true love. I've had a few very short-lived relationships since, but it's not the same. I couldn't be vulnerable, nor did I want to out of fear of being hurt.

So if you truly love your boyfriend...GET HELP!!! Do it even if you don't believe in it yourself, you may in time. Do it for your relationship if not for yourself. We, with low-self esteem rarely do anything that's good for us anyway, right? Don't be so stubborn that you sabotage your relationship. Don't be like me.