Soooo... IDK how to talk about this, but I did a bad thing recently. Like, it didn't feel to me like I was doing anything wrong at the time, but I did something highly immoral, and also managed to screw over a friend (Sam) in the process. Sam and his friend Evan have put a set of rules into place, which will stop me from doing that again (as if I would), and they have both said it will take a lot of rebuilding for them ever to trust me again.
Um. Have you ever done something you know is really bad? I want to put all my efforts into being rational and getting through this, whether or not Sam ever trusts me again. It was a really bad thing, and even though I'm recovered now I feel like SH-ing or worse again. Yet the only way I can rationally make it better is to survive and be the antithesis of the thing I did before. I also need, partly, to be selfish and protect myself from more people knowing, for many reasons. I want to talk it through with a mutual friend of ours, Dennis, who will hear about what I've done soon anyway, tomorrow - that will be rough, and I hope I don't chicken out of it. I'll ask Dennis how he thinks I should apologize to Sam. I've already thought of a couple of ways I can take on some of Sam's responsibilities and make life easier for him - if he wants me to.
So, any suggestions for things that have worked for you? It's not all about me. It's a terrible thing I did, that should have repercussions, yet it's still logical for me to avoid the repercussions, hence the quandary.
Thanks, RYL. Any comments would be really appreciated.
(I'm slightly confused as to whether I should post this here, as it's a little different from the old days. I read the board rules, and they suggest I did it right, so I hope so. Please move if inappropriate.)
Sorry to keep talking. This is definitely deserved guilt, and it would be wrong if I were to be completely absolved of feeling bad about it. This is, scarily, how I used to feel when I had depression, but then I felt like I was a burden/evil/etc without any factual basis for it. Now, it really does have a factual basis. So, the usual rules don't apply.
I don't want to go into too much detail, but I just did this thing you should never do. It's like if the director of a charity was found to be embezzling money from it. That's the only analogy I can think of. Kind of like that bad. I kind of did it willfully, but as if I didn't realize what it was I was doing. Like, I wasn't stupid enough not to know it wasn't bad, but when I was doing it, it kind of seemed okay. Maybe I was just convincing myself it was okay. I don't want an easy way out, just to find the best way out.
Thanks. Well, I'll see what Dennis says as I'm talking to him tomorrow. I talked to him like 8 times today but said nothing about this, so now I've texted him saying we need to talk, to make sure I can't back out of it like a loser. :p
I did own up to it when I even realized, but I'm not sure I made it clear that I've properly taken responsibility for it. I'll see what Sam wants to do wrt further responsibilities, but there's this one project at work we'll all have to do in the future, which nobody particularly wants to do, and which is used to benefit my work project. So actually I imagine he'll see that as pretty fair, considering he has his own work project he'd much rather be getting on with.
I feel just as bad, but much more relaxed now I've sorted out actually talking to Dennis instead of nobody.
I found a better analogy. It's more like if a dedicated schoolteacher hit a child one day. More like that.
Dennis is really lovely and I don't deserve him (or any of these guys). He claimed he understood partly, and we talked for over an hour, mostly not even about that but about my work in general, future directions, etc. He confirmed that I should apologize to Sam; I was waiting for that confirmation in case Sam didn't ever want to talk to me again.
So today, I did that. Sam actually gave me a hug, first thing. He was confusingly nice. I don't understand. :( He is acting like we are friends again, but I totally don't deserve that. I will talk to Evan next - see what happens there. I doubt he'll be as undeservingly nice. Strangely, the rumour doesn't seem to have gone around too much, either.
Another update. Talked to Evan. He is even less huggy than Sam, but he did give me a sort of awkward pat thing. :P He didn't yell at me either, and I was really expecting him to. I do not understand why they're being so nice. He said everyone has to be pulled back on track sometimes.
I still feel like death, but I guess this is as sorted as it can ever be. I am hugely less confident than I was (thanks to my own fault, of course), and supposedly I was already very underconfident, according to everybody. But my colleagues are all men, so it could just be that they're overconfident. I kind of thought of suicide a bit still after all this, but I'm not going to go out and do it. So. Better? I have no idea whether these are good things or still undeserved, terrible things. I thought both Sam and Evan were going to strongly advise me to quit, but neither did.
Not overly happy about comments disappearing. I was not talking to myself up there... I guess I may as well continue to do that though as it's as good as anything.
I don't know what you have done but what I would say is if others are forgiving you; you need to look to how you will forgive yourself. Obviously, you will not forget what you have done but it is how you learn to live with it.
Learn from your mistake and move on. Everyone makes mistakes; no one is perfect - trust me.
*Hugs*
I've not replied to this because it's been almost impossible to reply to as I'm unsure what's going on. However I echo the above. We all **** up. It's in our nature. We aren't perfect and never will be. I think forgiveness is key. You may not be able to forgive yourself for what you did but perhaps you can forgive the events that lead to it? Stress, anxiety, poor judgement, a moment of madness or whatever.
Learn and move on. If others are forgiving, (they don't seems to be as horrified as you), then forgive yourself the mistake.
As for the post deletion - many delete posts for many reasons and seldom because they are trying to freak another person out. Don't worry about it as I sure the reason was nothing to do with you whatsoever
~Phoenix~ is my Little Sister of Awesomeness and Self-Delusion :P Bitter Angel is my Mitten Animad is my Top Trump All Im Living For - Is my beautiful and special daughter who isnt called Kim but will moan if i dont add her :P
