The Anxiety I Feel - New To This Board

[.........I have always known that my skin picking accompanies my anxiety levels. Until the past 3 years I would wake up in the middle of the night and cry for 1 hour straight. This started when I was much younger, such as age 17. In my young adult life, I would occasionally start hitting and thrashing out at my first husband...IN MY SLEEP. He probably deserved it, but it was definitely a sign of anxiety. This would all cause me to feel so tired during the day, so tired I did not feel like working a job or doing anything much. I look back now and look at how horribly depressed I was, but no one told me. I wish I could have gotten some help as a young adult. [.................................................................................................................................................I decided after my divorce to go to counseling. The guy was so nice, but he just did not do a good job. I had to scrape together what money I could for the counseling, and it was really hard to come up with it. This counselor told me I was smart, young and beautiful and had no reason to have emotional difficulties, and that I should just decide to stop. This did more harm than good. I never went back to a counselor again, as this was a terrible failure and waste of my scarce financial resources. [...............................................................................................................................................So for years I would waken in the middle of the night and cry, cry, cry. I hated nighttime so much. I would feel so lonely, so hollow inside, like my body was a hollow tree trunk. The entire inner core of my body would just physically ache from the emotional pain when I was crying. In the middle of the night, all alone, I would think thoughts like this, "If something happened and I died, no one would miss me (which was true) and it would be at least a month until someone found out." I would think how my work would just terminate my job with no questions asked, and how maybe a coworker or two would give a half-hearted effort to call me once or twice but give up after they got no response. I would think how it would be perhaps someone from the power company who would find out my demise when they finally came to cut off my electricity from unpaid power bills. [...............................................................................................................................................The sad thing is I have read or heard of people who have died like this. This is such an uncaring world. I am not the kind of person who alienates people, either. I am friendly sharing and caring, but there are many people who do not appreciate that. [.................................................................................................................................................I have been horribly discriminated against in two jobs, even though I was exceptionally good at both of them. I was the first female to attempt to do the first one and the men couldn't stand it, but I needed the money so bad. One of them even raped me to try to make me quit. I think that is how they put us women in our place--by rape. They talked about me like I was a "whore" because to them, why else would a woman want to work in a place with only men? It was suggested I go work in a bank or something, but they didn't realize how low the pay is for a bank teller. I went to 5 different lawyers and not one would help me. I knew the key to bettering my life was through financial ability to get my own home, and a decent car. I was going to, by golly, endure this horrible punishment I was being put through so that I could have money for school and better my life. But...this is when my picking "re-started." [..................................................................................................................................................As a 5 y.o. my parents were in a bitter divorce with child custody problems. I went into a foster home until I finally demanded, as a 5 year old, to go back to my mother. My dad was forced to take me, and I did not want to go with him. I had picked when I was a child. I got mosquito bites on my legs and would pick at them, so that I looked like I had measles. [...............................................................................................................................................I finally outgrew it. It was replaced by nail-biting as a preadolescent. That was also about the time my dad noticed my body blooming into the shape of a woman. I always ended up escaping him, but he tried and it was very traumatic to me to hear his whispered comments, or having him waking me up for school in the morning by touching my breasts. Once I turned 16, I was kicked out of the family and have been out ever since. [...............................................................................................................................................The bottom line is, it is your family who is going to make or break you. If you are "kicked out of the family" for God knows why, then no one else is going to want you either. They don't always intend to be uncaring, but they have lives of their own, and families of their own, and don't have time. [...............................................................................................................................................I married a nice man, but no person is perfect. He started yelling at me out of his own nervousness, and I tried to be patient. He has finally started yelling at me less and less, and my picking has decreased. This tells me my picking is directly related to feeling lonesome, being yelled at. I finally have my own business, and it is helping people in very dire circumstances. It gives me fulfillment, and I have stopped crying at night. My job is hard and so I have lingering picking problems. [..................................................................................................................................................I hope me opening up to what I see as obvious causes of picking will encourage others to also open up. My life finally got better--not perfect-- and the crying at night has stopped and the picking has slowed.