Old lies die hard

Although my life has turned around thanks to Tegratol and I am no longer lieing the lies I used to tell are giving me nightmares and bad dreams. I told some BIG ones.
In nearly all of the dreams I am being shunned by old friends or left alone and scared for one reason or another.
In truth I did loose one friend due to the lies I used to tell but my family all seem to accept the lies as bipolar out of control and have forgiven me for them.
I guess I just can't forgive myself.
I know I was out of control and my meds were wrong but I absolutely hate a lier and yet I lied for years. They were stupid lies too. Not there to protect me or anything. Just lies so people would think I was interesting.
Now I'm stuck with the dreams. Nearly every night I face what I did and I'm left scared, guilty and VERY lonely when I wake up.
My TDOC wants me to write the dreams down so we can talk about them. I don't know what good it will do though. It's not like I can change them and it's not like I can forget what a lier I was.
Sometimes I really hate myself for what I've done.

Okay.. mooky. I'm new here, clearly you're not. I've been dealing w/the diagnosis for "only" 4 years.. I don't know how that figures into the equation.
I think you OUGHT to follow the pro advice.. If you can remember the dreams, write them down in as much detail as possible.
And talk about them.
The talking may NOT make you feel much better, and probably won't right away, that's sort of an absolution/forgiveness thing you'll likely have to work out ..let's say, for yourself, on your own... but the tdoc MIGHT help.
In a similar moment of doubt and self-loathing I found this gem..

Guilt.. the gift that keeps on giving.

It made me smile.

:) Thanks Sirkay I needed a bit of humor right now.
I am writing them down when I can remember them well enough and I'll take the pages to my TDOC this WED. I talked to my husband about the dreams and all the guilt I'm still holding. He doesn't understand but at least he listened.
Thanks for your input. It means a lot to me that someone out there understands.
BTW welcome to the forums.

Mooky: I know you are feeling responsible for the lies but remember a good part of it WAS the illness talking. Now that you are doing better it sounds like you need to be giving yoursself some credit for putting things right where you can.

I second that.

And I think sirkay's advice is good. I'm glad that you're writing the dreams down, even while not knowing how it'll help or that your husband is not understanding. Mine doesn't understand my guilt either, and it is RELENTLESS, but that's because he doesn't suffer from it. At least he knows it's all tangled up with the illness and has compassion.

Hey Mooky:
I know about the guilt for sure. I didn't make a habit out of lying, except the biggest lie of all, I cheated on my husband. One day I had enough of all of it, out of the blue I kicked my husband out and told the other guy I was done.

Never felt guilty about the guy, but I sure felt bad about my husband. To this day, he suspects I'm sure, but does not know. It would kill him. When I kicked him out I refused to go to counseling or take his calls. He was devestated.

The truth is, the marriage was never going to work, I kept begging him to get me help because I knew there was something wrong with me, but he refused.

But I have definately beat myself up over the years. When I got my diagnosis, the first thing I did was go see him and have lunch (even though I was remarried by then, my new husband knew about it, I took my grandma). I told him everything about my diagnosis and wanted him to know it explained a lot of my behavior. I told him I should have handled it better and I was sorry. About a year or so later I heard he was engaged. I called to congratulate him, I apologized again, and this time he apologized too, he said he should have believed me when I asked for help.

I tell you this to say, I am so glad I got the chance to tell him that. I wanted him to feel free of the years of wondering what went wrong and possibly taking it out on his new bride.

Even if you don't have the chance to apologize to the people you hurt, my advice is to get it out of your system by not only writing down your dreams, but write a letter of what you would say to each person if you could. You don't ever have to mail it, tear it up and throw it away, but you would be amazed that it feels better just to release it from your body on to the paper. And I know you know how to express your feeling in written form!
Read the letters to your tdoc if you wish. The guilt will not subside over night, but I think the dreams will decrease in frequency and intensity if you write down the apologies because it is like you are apologizing in your dreams right now.

Alcoholics and drug addics do it as part of their recovery, and Lord knows they feel guilt for the lies and pain they have caused, why should we take a page out of their book?

Hi Mooky,

I thought writing dreams down was a waste of time until I did it. My Pdoc was able to tease out a lot of stuff that was coming out in weird dreams. It's been a huge help. I was having dreams in the theme of being "too late". It turns out, that theme went all the way back to a tragedy in 1987 when I was "too late" to stop it from happening. Once the source of the "too late" dreams was identified, some healing took place and the dreams stopped.

I hope you have good results from your next Pdoc visit.

Kelpie

I went to see my PDOC on Wed. I brought her 3 dreams I had had and BOY did she uncover a lot from them. Some of it was obvious to me but a lot wasn't. Turns out that some of what i thought was because of the lies could be because of all the changes I've been going through. In two of the dreams I'm either unrecognized by friends and family or shunned by them. The other one had me feeling like a hypocrite.
I'm still writing them down to see if they will change at all now that the basic problems that caused them have been reveled.

People tell me I'm a liar.. but I don't agree with that most of the time. Often, it's simply because I changed my mind after making a "dreadful promise' OR I forgot that I had commited myself to something.. lost track of time or whatever...

So, I feel guilty when they call me a liar, but - I try not to let it bother me. That's hard to do...

I just have to blast some loud music on my ears to drown them out... whether it be internal voices of dispair or my 'loved ones' making slight remarks about my past.

I don't think I can get over what I've done... and like you said: You can't forget! - - Do your best to get away from the reminders and try to occupy yourself when you think of those things..

That's be best I can do!

Good luck,
Nick

Here's the thing.. I kinda LIKE who I am, even on meds, and everything I've done is PART of who I am. Sure, I wish some of the things I've done hadn't impacted OTHERS, especially my spouse, the way they have.. but I wouldn't give back the experiences. I can live with the fallout, tho' the loss of trust is hard to take. I try NOT to justify some of my outrageous behavior as bad "manic" decision making When I'm in bad "spaces" I can usually get away with isolating myself behind a door or at the computer or doing outdoor chores. I count blessings and first among them is that I'm "above ground" and that I haven't wrecked everything I care about. Some truths SHOULDN'T be told, I've learned, but here's this: you can't love anyone else if you don't love yourself.

Hi ya Mooks,

Man... do I get the lying for the sake of lying thing. I used to tell lies just to make myself sound cool. I thought I was so UNcool. I would mostly embellish true stories just enough to make them fantastic and entertaining. If I went on a walk in the woods, I would make it a major hike requiring great skill. If I got moderately drunk at a party, then the story would be about how incredibly smashed I got. I would even lie and say that some clothes were far more expensive than they actually were and other clothes were found at bargain basement prices to show my shopping prowess... silly, stupid stuff like that.

It got pretty tough to keep up with who I told which lie to. I had to work at it. I think that because I was always so high functioning, my friends either mostly gave me the benefit of the doubt, or giggled at my "slight" exaggerations.

When I started getting real with myself in recovery, I had to come to grips with my propensity for lying. It was FAR to easy for a lie to slip out of my lips. And then... I had to deal with the guilt. Oh God, the guilt.

I am not one to be easy on myself. I was raised the first born daughter of a Marine with far too much perfectionism running through my veins. So, dealing with the guilt was a tall order for me. It sat in the pit of my stomach and often made me sick with anxiety. I was SURE that someone was going to find me out for the phony that I was. I struggled with the guilt for YEARS.

And for me... the answer was a spiritual solution. In my faith tradition, once a person has accepted Christ, all sins are forgiven... period. I knew this and practiced this for years. I was raised in the church and had a pretty good understanding of the concept. But... this guilt... this guilt and self-loathing that I carried around about MY past misbehavior was making me literally sick.

And it hit me... pretty much out of the blue... "Julie... if God forgives you... you know, the One who created the universe... the One who created you... Yeh, that God... if HE forgives you... who are YOU to NOT forgive yourself?.... Are you saying that you KNOW better than God?"

Really? You mean that? Of course I don't know better than God. I'm not better than God. Jeeeze... At that very moment, I had permission to forgive myself. Actually, at that moment, I had an admonition to forgive myself. If I was going to grow into the person that I was created to be, then I could not allow my misplaced guilt to get in the way of that.

Except for a few minor "relapses" (usually during depressive episodes), I have been free from the guilt since that epiphany. I know that this particular epiphany is not for everyone because not everyone subscribes to the Christian faith. However, there are truths in it that may help, regardless of one's faith tradition.

Mooks... I send a hug your way. I know the pain. And I wish you well in finding an end to it!

Be well,
Jules

Oh Jules how I wish I could find my way out of this guilt pit the way you did but I can't.
As hard as I've tried to believe, I just can't.
I've studied and gone to MANY different types of churches and had hours of bible lessons and all that but in the pit of my stomach I just can't believe in God.

You have no idea how much I wish I could but it's me against the pain.
With the help of my tdoc and husband I am exploring the guilt to see if there is a way trough it.
Some of what I thought was guilt in the dreams my tdoc said wasn't.

We worked through three dreams and came to the conclusion that 2 of them were more about trying to define who I was now that I've changed so much. And boy has it been a big change.

Both physically and emotionally people don't recognize me any more.
I lost 120 pounds thanks to bariatric surgery, changed the way I dress from comfortable to more upscale and got on Tegratol which (apparently) made for a bigger change in others perspective of me than I realize.

There still is guilt in the dreams but I am slowly pecking away at it.

Thanks so much for your friendship. It means a lot to me.

(P.S. I usually do not feel comfortable putting anything of a religious nature on a forum. If I offended anyone please forgive me.)
.

Mooks, my friend... I'm so glad that you have support in working through this issue. And... it sounds like you have a very wise Tdoc. All of that is incredibly important. Obviously, I don't mind talking about spiritual stuff as long as it is in the context of personal experience. I guess that comes from being a recovering addict and hearing many people speak openly about finding a spiritual path. Oh... and, I dunno, maybe because I'm an extrovert and I talk about nearly ANYTHING! :) I certainly don't expect my path to be the path of anyone else.... only that there may be a "gem" buried somewhere in my experience that could help another human being who is trying to feel better, just like me.

I, too, have had to learn a lot about myself since my bariatric surgery. TODAY is actually my 5 year "bandiversary!" wow... 5 years. To date, I have maintained a 130 pound weight loss. Yes... I have had a lot to learn. That is not the same face in the mirror that I grew up with. My Tdoc and I have had many discussions about "life after bariatric surgery." You know, I expected the positive medical outcome... but I did NOT expect the major psychological changes. I thought that I'd still be me, only thinner.

Congratulations on your success in WLS! Isn't it interesting how it has managed to "weasel" its way into your dreams?

I will tell you, returning to the discussion on guilt, that I OFTEN mistook my anxiety for guilt. I could not put a finger on my anxiety... I just knew I felt uncomfortable, like I had done something wrong.. like I might get caught any second .... and somehow I decided that I "must" feel guilty about something and INSTANTLY something that I regretted would come to mind. It was a self-fulfilling cycle. Anxiety masked itself as many things in my life... including guilt.

Again... I'm glad you're making progress! Keep on pecking away!

Be well,
Jules

I will be 8 years post surgery next June and I'm still not used to it.
I had the surgery for medical reasons but i must admit I was kind of looking forward to being slim for the first time in my life. What a let down.
Unfortunately I didn't count on all the hanging skin and the jowls and stuff.
My husband says I look great, as long as I cover the flubber belly that is.
I don't agree. I look old and tired and just plain old frumpy even when I try to dress up and stuff. Every once in a great while I feel like i look good. Those moments are precious and I savor every one.
That whole problem has brought down my already low self esteem.

Did you have any problems like that? Do you have extra loose skin you have to hide?
Some day I'm supposed to have an operation to remove the extra skin but every time we get the money for it there seems to be a thousand other things that are more important.
I end up feeling like I'm the one that isn't important...Story of my life.
Sorry. Depressed today and need to bawl on my keyboard. i guess i should stop now before the pitty party gets too out of hand.
Thanks for being there for me.
Take care.

I am 47. I was 42 when I had my surgery, and had been obese since I was in 1st grade. I carried most of my weight around my mid section. So, I was bound to have a huge amount of skin left over around my mid section.

As it ended up, I was a size 12 woman in a size 28 skin. It was not pretty. About18 months after my bariatric surgery, I did go ahead and have reconstructive surgery. The plastic surgeon took 8 pounds off of my mid section. I also had a bilateral mastopexy with augmentation. Both of these surgeries were very important to my functioning and to my self esteem. I did have to pay out of pocket because my skin issues were not bad enough for insurance to cover.

I was very fortunate not to need work done on my face. For some reason, my very round, plump face slimmed right down with very little evidence that there was ever an obese person underneath there.

I do understand how the skin can really impact how you feel about yourself. I sometimes feel terrible about my arms and my thighs. But, I have to work to get over it. For now, I am not going to volunteer for any more surgery. I have this other big surgery coming up.

Funny enough... I was diagnosed with Bipolar II after my reconstructive surgery. It was after this surgery that I simply STOPPED sleeping. It was winter and I became desperately depressed... so depressed I could hardly move. (all of this happened while I was finishing my dissertation, no less!). I was finally referred to a Pdoc as a result. I'm SO grateful.

Mooks... I hope that you and your hubby figure out a way to get this taken care of for you. You deserve it. You've come a long way... this next step would complete the journey.

Be well,
Jules

Mook.. I don't know how to address the self-seteem thing; I've already preached the line about the necessity of loving yourself before you can love others.. when I said it I wanted also to say that it goes back to repsect and the necessity of respecting the person you love, which also begins with yourself. When I have esteem problems, it's a manisfestation of my depressive mode, the "rest" of the time, whether I 'm near the base or above it, I tend to be nearly messianac in my conviction that I can do anything, that I know everything.. destined for greatness.. and I *love* that part of my "illness."
THE POINT.. my wife did the bariatric thing, mainly for esteem reasons and she knew, going in, that the loose skin would be there.. I don't think she realized how much there'd be and it has been a source of distress. Here's the thing. I love her, she does look beter, ESPECIALLY when she dresses up.. but well.., I love HER, the girl I married, the woman that ate the girl I married and the woman that's survived HER trails and MINE.