Guilt when there IS something to be guilty of...

Hope you don't mind me posting this here. I have read that guilt is a form of anxiety and I am ruminating about what I did and any possible consequences all day, every day.

I have tried to read a book by a therapist called Windy Dryden on guilt. The problem is, the examples he uses are like people choosing to see a spouse's parents instead of one's own because the former need help ,ore than the latter.

What about when the guilt sufferer HAS done things which are objectively wrong? I think I did them because of poor impulse control, because I had very low self-esteem (to make myself feel better) and because I have been depressed/anxious for some while. But the guilt is killing me. I am going over what I did wrong all day, every day, trying to piece together exactly what I was thinking and feeling at those times (with added OCD/compulsive thinking making me feel I HAVE to be able to remember exactly my thought processes and feelings.

I am not religious so I can't pray for forgiveness. I have tried mindfulness but it doesn't tell you what to do with guilt and when feelings are telling you how rotten you are and how you don't deserve to feel any better.

Can anyone recommend any resources to help me?

Hey there!

Gentle hugs, if wanted.

I know as a lifelong OCD'er, I feel guilt keenly. I've done one thing in particular, in the past, over which I've had a very hard time getting over.

I AM a religious person, and while I personally think that is a help in the general sense, I can also tell you that doesn't help your mental state much when you can't forgive yourself. Knowing my God forgives me is nice, but when I can't forgive myself, well, I just keep beating myself up over it. Literally. So in that sense religion can only do so much in the here and now, dealing with feelings of remorse. Even us religious ppl still have to forgive ourselves and it's still not easy.

I don't have any resources, at least not any secular ones. I know the way that I have dealt with persistent guilt is to remind myself I'm not perfect- obviously I'm a bad person (at least in my own mind) to have done whatever I feel so horrid about, but I must not be too bad if I feel so awful- so I tell myself I'm not perfect, I did something bad but I'm going to LEARN from this, I'm not going to do it again. If there's a next time, I intend to not do whatever I did again. I just try to turn it into an opportunity for growth. Okay, I've seen what I'm capable of, now I'll make sure I'm not the person to do such things anymore. I don't know if that's similar to what 'normal' folks do..... but it's the only thing I've found that takes the edge off something when my brain absolutely refuses to let it go.

I don't know if that helps, or not, but it sometimes works for me.

Acceptance my friend. Its a weird feeling. Humans crave acceptance. Especially from self. When someone has anxiety or mental disorders such as OCD, its a sign that someone does not accept something about themselves to a certain degree. The only thing you can do is look yourself in the mirror and understand that while you may have done wrong in the past, everyone deserves a damn good chance to do good and become a better person, and to live past their past actions.

Look at the bigger picture of life. See how endless the opportunities in the world are. It's a big place and we are so small. Whatever you did won't matter in a shorter amount of time than you think.

Not much to add, just to say that you are not alone as a sufferer of OCD in having that thought process. It's something that I've thought about *a lot* of times. One thing that is perhaps worth bearing in mind is that many people are capable of doing bad, selfish or even abusive things without even self-reflecting and realising that why they did was wrong. I can literally think of people who groped others at school (i.e. committed assault) and never in a thousand years would consider themselves deviants or criminals. I think us folks with OCD sometimes have a tendency to go the other way and ruminate and self-reflect to a point where it is no longer useful. Stopping this is easier said than done however.