How do people with bdd deal with insults on their appearance

[quote="Reticent"]compliments were basically equivalent to insults when my BDD was at its worst.[quote]

I also feel like this Reticent, I don't know why but compliments tend to 'annoy' me? As if they are lying to me or they make me frustrated or confused from the fact that I don't see the compliment that they tell me? That they are making it up?

Anyone else feel like this?

Hope everyone is having a good day!

i don't deal with it.

it just makes everything 1000x worse.

Viva la Jay wrote:I'll remember the insult forever, and fixate on it.

I remember more insults than compliments. I mean, I take note on compliments but I easily get over them.

Totally^.

My aunt told me last week that I could model my hair but never my face. My dad doesn't find me pretty I find as he never ever validates me like he used to and my mom just does so out of pity. I feel like $#%^ honestly when I get insults especially when I get bad looks from those I have a crush on. I just want to drop dead. It just makes me hate humanity tbph. I usually just cry it out or stay significantly angry/depressed. That's how I handle it. I could use some suggestions myself.

I haven't gotten insults but I even twist compliments into insults in my mind. Like if someone says "You are so pretty!" I start to think why wouldn't they use the word "beautiful", and therefore it's just a lie to make me feel better, becaue I am awkward and fat and they wanted to make me feel better. Or if my husbands tells me I am beautiful, I start to think why doesn't he ever call me sexy? So he doesn't find me attractive? This goes on and on...

Sometimes he does say that I have too much "powder" which means a foundation with a wrong shade. This usually happens just before we are going out and I am feeling pretty. I usually do my make up in a darker light, since I can't confront myself on a daylight. After he makes that comment, I get reeeaally depressed, wash my make up and do it again, maybe even few times. Sometimes I give up and stay at home and just... CRY.

And frankly if anyone would really insult me, I don't think I could take it. I am very shy and I think people "see" or feel that I am very fragile inside and therefore they only try to compliment but never insult or critisize anything.

On the otherhand I would like to someone just step up and tell me the truth, tell me that I am ugly so I could be sure and not has this irregular illusion that I am beautiful.

Maybe with a truth it would be easier to accept it?

Most likely it would affect me,obviously if I'm more depressed like anyone else it would be far worse.But as BDD sufferers you could imagine how tough it is dealing with insults on our appearance.I remember for e.g a couple years back a family friends father who's nearly 60 years of age made a remark joking about my weight to everyone,I felt terrible.

At first I used to get very angry about it especially him making such a remark,also his age&that he himself was quite big,bald etc etc.But I would never do that to someone else personally.I think what used to happen with me for e.g was because I was understandably upset&hurt&also because of the OCD I would go over&over it compulsively.Compared to these days I hardly even give it any such weight at all.

But I do understand of course any such remark to anybody's appearance is quite hurtful&pretty damaging.

I have gotten so many and on such a regular basis I'm completely numb, ignore and don't reply with anything when somebody makes a derogatory remark about me. Sometimes later, when I'm alone and usually right before I go to sleep I tend to wallow in self-pity and remember certain insults and then wonder what I'm supposed to do to make myself happy and acceptable and then wonder what's the meaning of life.

While I haven't necessarily been called "ugly" recently, I have had a few people insult me based on my appearance lately, and it sends me into a tailspin every time.

A few months ago I was walking to work and two guys in a truck pulled up alongside me and told me that I was going to get my @$$ kicked if I kept dressing like a f@ggot. As I walked, they followed me and kept threatening me until they sped off. It didn't help that I was feeling pretty decent about how I looked that day, and it sent me into a tailspin that lasted for weeks.

A few days ago, I had a difficult patient who was complaining about every step of the pret-test (I do pre-testing for an optometrist, so I do the dreaded air-puff, take retinal photos, etc.), and then when she put her contact lenses back in, she started screaming. What had happened was that, when taking her contacts out, she had just randomly grabbed some solution to store them in for the eye exam, and had used, basically, acid that is meant only to be used in a specific type of case. When she complained about me to my boss, she said I looked like I was twelve years old (this was a day after I had shaved my head). For some reason, my boss told me what she said, and I've been in meltdown mode ever since.

For me, this is so much worse than being called ugly. It means that these people are making judgements about who I am, how smart I am, how capable I am, and how the world should treat me, all based on how I look, and that is my greatest fear. Both comments also struck two really deep nerves with me, and dredge up some really really painful stuff. About ten years ago I was swarmed by four guys who beat the living $#%^ out of me, smashed my face in, broke ribs, etc etc., and I was always concerned that maybe I looked too gay and that was why. As for the "twelve years old" comment, I quit my old job a few months ago after years of hearing that I wasn't good enough. It was tantamount to verbal abuse. It was not long after I got a "promotion" (to a position that I had been doing for years without the pay, and basically had to threaten to quit in order to get the promotion) that my hair obsession went from being inconvenient to self-destructive, and this was after constant criticism, and being told that I needed to basically change my entire personality.

A few weeks after the guys in the truck were following me, I finally became so mad that I started punching the floor in my basement till my knuckles bled. I was furious with them for setting me back months, when I had been making so much progress and working so hard to not worry about my appearance. I won't lie, it felt really good to let out that anger and frustration. My therapist even said that, by taking out my anger on something inanimate (and fairly indestructible), I was able to sort of reset myself. I can't remember exactly how she put it, but it had something to do with fluctuations in serotonin and adrenaline levels caused by the "fight or flight" response that I was stuck in for weeks. Maybe I should just get a punching bag!

This post has turned out to be a lot longer than I intended, sorry!

-- Mon Nov 18, 2013 4:04 pm --

Oh and one more thing...a couple of weeks ago a classmate of mine (who knows that I have BDD, and he told me that he has major anxiety and has been seeing a therapist for it) made a joking comment about how I should dress better for in-class presentations. But he's the type that would never EVER actually insult me, and I was totally fine with his comment.

The worst is when someone insults me and i know they are true ... I mean ,... if i knew they werent true then i would be able to brush them off . but i know they are 100x better looking than me and i cant even retaliate no matter what .... its a no win situation , either way im ashamed at my existence

-- Mon Apr 08, 2019 10:06 pm --

84phil84 wrote:While I haven't necessarily been called "ugly" recently, I have had a few people insult me based on my appearance lately, and it sends me into a tailspin every time.

A few months ago I was walking to work and two guys in a truck pulled up alongside me and told me that I was going to get my @$$ kicked if I kept dressing like a f@ggot. As I walked, they followed me and kept threatening me until they sped off. It didn't help that I was feeling pretty decent about how I looked that day, and it sent me into a tailspin that lasted for weeks.

A few days ago, I had a difficult patient who was complaining about every step of the pret-test (I do pre-testing for an optometrist, so I do the dreaded air-puff, take retinal photos, etc.), and then when she put her contact lenses back in, she started screaming. What had happened was that, when taking her contacts out, she had just randomly grabbed some solution to store them in for the eye exam, and had used, basically, acid that is meant only to be used in a specific type of case. When she complained about me to my boss, she said I looked like I was twelve years old (this was a day after I had shaved my head). For some reason, my boss told me what she said, and I've been in meltdown mode ever since.

For me, this is so much worse than being called ugly. It means that these people are making judgements about who I am, how smart I am, how capable I am, and how the world should treat me, all based on how I look, and that is my greatest fear. Both comments also struck two really deep nerves with me, and dredge up some really really painful stuff. About ten years ago I was swarmed by four guys who beat the living $#%^ out of me, smashed my face in, broke ribs, etc etc., and I was always concerned that maybe I looked too gay and that was why. As for the "twelve years old" comment, I quit my old job a few months ago after years of hearing that I wasn't good enough. It was tantamount to verbal abuse. It was not long after I got a "promotion" (to a position that I had been doing for years without the pay, and basically had to threaten to quit in order to get the promotion) that my hair obsession went from being inconvenient to self-destructive, and this was after constant criticism, and being told that I needed to basically change my entire personality.

A few weeks after the guys in the truck were following me, I finally became so mad that I started punching the floor in my basement till my knuckles bled. I was furious with them for setting me back months, when I had been making so much progress and working so hard to not worry about my appearance. I won't lie, it felt really good to let out that anger and frustration. My therapist even said that, by taking out my anger on something inanimate (and fairly indestructible), I was able to sort of reset myself. I can't remember exactly how she put it, but it had something to do with fluctuations in serotonin and adrenaline levels caused by the "fight or flight" response that I was stuck in for weeks. Maybe I should just get a punching bag!

This post has turned out to be a lot longer than I intended, sorry!

-- Mon Nov 18, 2013 4:04 pm --

Oh and one more thing...a couple of weeks ago a classmate of mine (who knows that I have BDD, and he told me that he has major anxiety and has been seeing a therapist for it) made a joking comment about how I should dress better for in-class presentations. But he's the type that would never EVER actually insult me, and I was totally fine with his comment.

Oh my ... thats really alot . I had spent most of my life in recluse expecially due to my deviated looks from normal people , once i gained courage and went to a party with my friends , I somehoe managed to get a little bit of confidence , as i was there , one really good looking guy told me "What is a guy like you doing here?" ... Did it struck deep in my soul? My fear was just confirmed , fear of not being equal to others , not belonging , Each fringe of my confidence shattered , I immediately left the party and never went to any again . one of my classmates beat me up badly in the school because of me being skinny (which is also one my greatest insecurities , in BDD too) , I mean what is the worst when your fears have been confirmed by others too..?

Hi!

I have bdd. I'm currently on 100 mg Sertraline due to my hair-obsession and depression associated to this.

Previously I couldn't handle insults on my appearence at all. I would let any kind of comment about my looks break me which would always result in a breakdown with me yelling and crying telling the person how the comment hurt me. What's interesting though, is that I don't care about insults on my appearence today as I did before. Maybe because we're joking around a bit in our home that someone might resemble someone else and so on, so when someone insults me I just say somthing mean back just to throw some $#%^ on the person right back at them. Sometimes my father can be a jerk and say mean things but then I just insult him right back. Yesterday he said I look like a famous lady who is over 100 years old. A comment that might would have hurt me in the past but I just think it was a stupid comment as I know there is no possible way I look like her, as I'm only 22.. But I answered my father that I think she is cute and charming so I would love to resemble her.

If someone would insult me nowadays I would just shrug that off. Because the thing is, I mostly care about my own opinion about my appearence. If someone else say something about my looks I won't really listen to them as I only trust my own eyes and obviously I view my own vision as the truth. I know what looks good and what doesn't. This has irritated my family, but on the other hand it's a positive thing, as it makes me listen less to what other people say about my appearence and trust my own eyes more. Which leads me to say that I actually don't care if some idiot say I'm ugly or not because I know I know, due to my own opinion of myself, that I look fine.

Thanks to the medicine, Sertraline 100 mg I feel alot more happy, relaxed, confident and social than before starting with the medicine. Life feels better than ever before.