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Ever have that feeling you're too ugly to go out?

 
 
Lilith Myth
11:43 / 22.08.02
Every so often, I have an intense desire to lock myself in my house and never leave; fuelled by a very strong feeling that I am extremely fat and ugly, and people will stare. The extremely small number of people I've discussed this with say it's all in my head.

I'd really like to know if other people ever feel this and what they do?
 
 
Shortfatdyke
12:16 / 22.08.02
Various thoughts:

I worked out some time ago that being either fat, ugly or both was irrelevant. They continually try and tell me otherwise, but whenever I'm lucky enough to see, say, the sun rise over the ocean, I am reminded of what beauty really is. Sometimes I cave in and lock myself in my room, too - as the Barbewoman I unforgivably cancelled a meeting with recently will testify.

All people are quite funny looking, when you really look at them.

The truth is, that cliche about beauty being in the eye of the beholder is... well, the truth. I never fail to be unmoved by the 'stunnas' in The Sun. And if this makes you feel better - most people are so unaware of others when they amble along the street that a two headed monster could go rampaging amongst them, breathing fire and eating small children, without them noticing. As long as they don't push in front of them in the bus queue.

Everyone feels ugly. Everyone's fucked up to some degree. Some are just better at bullshitting their way through it.
 
 
Spatula Clarke
12:17 / 22.08.02
Arrange to go out with a couple of friends/a brothersistercousin rather than on your own. Provides a safety net, draws your own attention away from both your surroundings and yourself. A group you're confident in stops you from thinking that you're 'standing out'.
 
 
w1rebaby
12:29 / 22.08.02
Sometimes I look in the mirror and think "god, I'm fat, ugly and worthless" and at other times I think "what an amazing sex god I look right now". Seems to be so directly connected to mood that I don't really trust my own opinion of what I look like at all any more.
 
 
Ariadne
12:38 / 22.08.02
I think everyone's the same - one minute I walk past the mirror and everything's okay, and then two minutes later, having done nothing but make a cup of tea, I look so hideous and gross that I despair. All you can do is recognise how ridiculous it is. Or paint the mirror pretty colours and forget about it.
 
 
Jack The Bodiless
13:28 / 22.08.02
I'm with fridge. I look fucking awful today, and I know for an objective fact that I look a lot better than yesterday, when I looked quite sexy. Could be a bad morning, could be the crushing headache threatening to make me bleed from the eyes... it's definitely not related to the way I actually look, though.

This better not be an excuse to avoid coming out on Saturday night, Ms Myth...
 
 
Lilith Myth
13:56 / 22.08.02
well, Mir Bodiless, I have to admit (though it could be jetlag - just got in from the US) that the way I feel now I can't go out. In fact, there is no food in my house, and I still can't go out. I know it's irrational, but... y'know-
 
 
w1rebaby
14:01 / 22.08.02
I think that the enforced "human contact" and general stress involved in travelling a quarter away around the world may be giving you a bad reaction here. Jetlag always makes me act very strangely.
 
 
Ariadne
14:04 / 22.08.02
Yes, I'd agree with fridge - jetlag does weird things to your head.

I'd suggest ... i don't know, have a shower or a quick nap, put some lippy on and get out the door. Just to the corner shop and back. Because it's all in your head - I know what you look like and unless something radical has happened in the past two or three weeks, you're gorgeous!
 
 
Ariadne
14:05 / 22.08.02
Oops, hang on, I may have by fictionsuits muddled! Nevertheless, even if you're not who I think, I'm sure you're gorgeous!
 
 
Trijhaos
14:05 / 22.08.02
I feel this way all the time. I should really go find a nice bridge to live under. I think I could develop a taste for billy goat if I really had to. Of course, my self-esteem is pretty much non-existent so that probably explains my problem.
 
 
Bad Horse
14:14 / 22.08.02
Make friends with someone who has an obvious facial deformity and always go out with them, no one will notice you any more. I've got a big hairy mole, so I would do at a pinch.

As everyone has already said it's a mood thing, it comes and goes. I have spent a long time perfecting the skill of not really caring what other people think about the way I look and I almost have it down pat. It is a rare day now when I worry about it, no one is really going to say 'god you look bloody awfull today' and when they do give you a compliment on the way you look it's a bonus.
 
 
suds
14:15 / 22.08.02
i have the same problem. i don't like meeting new people and i have not gone to job interviews before because i feel i can't leave the house. going to therapy helped me very much, as well as talking with friends about it. good luck.
 
 
Justin Brief
14:27 / 22.08.02
I often feel that everyone else is so ugly it isn't worth going out. Does this mean I suffer from Body Dysmorphia by Proxy?
 
 
Turk
19:44 / 22.08.02
Avoidance sucks, end it ASAP. I have charts I could show you.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
21:59 / 22.08.02
Ever have that feeling you're too ugly to go out?

Yes, everone. At some time or another. Any one else is lying to wind you up (except for completely deluded sad sacks, like the guy that runs the local Job Club. The one who doesn't think you've noticed his eyeliner or the food-stains on his tie; the one that assumes that teenaged girls will be really, reall impressed that he played drums for a covers band in the 70's, and is, in short, deluding himself.)

I've met you. You look great. Come out and play, eh?
 
 
Tryphena Absent
23:24 / 22.08.02
I think this all the time - it's amazing that sometimes I'll go out and look in a mirror halfway through the night, wonder who the rank cow looking back at me is, when I get home I'm perfectly fine again. Sometimes I have days when my hair is positively the worst thing in the world, it won't go up, it looks bad down and I just want to tear it out. The next day it behaves, bodies are just evil, maybe if we were all just pieces of pretty coloured clouds we'd be OK... nope I doubt it. On the bad days the best thing to do is just not look in the mirror.
 
 
Laughing
03:11 / 23.08.02
Everyone feels ugly. Everyone's fucked up to some degree. Some are just better at bullshitting their way through it. -shortfatdyke

And thank god for my amazing powers of self-bullshitting.

Sometimes I stand in front of the mirror and flex. Other times, I cry. Since I look the same every time I attribute my different reactions to mood swings. When I go out in public I just flash the #1 smile and remind myself that I'm a hell-of-a-guy. It usually works.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
06:13 / 23.08.02
I'm getting better at this as I get older (peversely). If I can't make it to "babelicious" I can usually get as far as "ruggedly handsome".
 
 
Nessus
14:51 / 23.08.02
The worst part is when I think I look like aged roadkill, I defiantly let myself get worse. I don't shave for days, wear crumpled clothes, and scowl down innocent bystanders for "my" low self esteem. What a perfectly vicious circle.
 
 
Little Mother
15:27 / 23.08.02
I've often felt like that, the way I started of was by working out that the way I saw myself was not necessarily the way other people did, without trying to change either viewpoint. Therefore, I might still feel ugly and awful but I know that other people don't think so, even if they might seem wrong. It's a start and will do as a temporary measure to get you out of the house which is an even better start. Even going down the corner shop is a trumph when you feel like that so rememebr to tell yourself how brave you are each time you manage it. Good luck
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
16:26 / 23.08.02
It's getting better all the ti-ime. It was never so bad that I would hide indoors but there's very much the insecurity issues which people who've met me will notice in the way I stutter, drink too much too quickly and spend the rest of the evening shouting. I guess it's sort of Dorian Gray-syndrome, the outer shell is okay, but inside is a big squidgy mess of mental tics and peculiarities...
 
 
Ellis says:
20:38 / 23.08.02
I felt like this for three years- in college with no friends and then at numerous temp jobs with no friends.

Its a phsyical/ mental circle, I am not sure whether I was depressed first and then became bothered about my body, or whether my body made me feel depressed and other issues (no one wants to be my friend cause i look lie shit) got on top of that.

I dealt with it by leaving home, leaving everything behind me, new city, new job, new life plan, new friends.

Although- when I do feel down, my body is one of the first things I usually pick on even though I know it is my least important part of me.

And when I just can't bear to go outside I phone a friend and make them come with me. I still can't manage to go to a pub on my own!
 
 
Cherry Bomb
09:25 / 24.08.02
Sometimes I feel like I'm the sexiest bitch in the place, and sometimes I feel like a big ol' frumpy frump.

I think everyone feels that way from time to time. But have you ever looked at a picture of yourself from like maybe five years ago and thought, "I look really cute! And at the time I thought I looked so BAD!" I have. It always makes me think maybe I don't look as bad as I think I do sometimes.

Remember, you're your own worse critic. The faults you see when you look in the mirror, most people don't even notice.

Most people are a lot cuter than they realize.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
09:37 / 24.08.02
Most people are a lot cuter than they realize.

True.
 
  
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