At 64 years of age I should have realized this before.  Why has it taken me this long to be so aware of at least one of the issues plaging me.All my life I have felt weird and different, always swimming against the tide alone, no one to say "I got your back".   It is a heavy burden that has dragged me down a lot.But I was driving home last week from a session I had with a counselor and suddenly this one thing was so clear and days later I still believe it was like a blinding flash of light into who I am.I don't know how much good it will do to know this.   But I will tell you what it is if you care to know.   Maybe you can identify.Sometimes when I was growing up kids would tease or bully me although back then no one was aware or talked about it like now.   Anyway someone would say something like YOU ARE UGLY.  And it didn't take me long to realize that they always wanted to see the look on my face of pain or hurt their words caused me, that was the PAYOFF for their effort.I knew I was powerless to stop these people tormenting me so instead I decided that  I would not give them what they wanted.   That look I almost did at first, like I would cry or be hurt.   I made sure I didn't give them what they wanted.   But in order to accomplish that I told myself, inside me, everyday "you are ugly".    That way when someone said it I could say, more or less "Ha!  I already knew that so what you say means nothing to me and it doesn't hurt me.How sorry that is - I carried their message inside me everyday - they did have to say it anymore because I knew every minute of every day I was Ugly.Now what to do about it.    How do I stop doing their work for them?   I do think I am different.  But I think I'm not as ugly as they say I am.   Sometimes I look back at my pictures during my school years and I think I wasn't really so awful to look at.But those voices are still with me, they have been my entire life.  I have felt second-rate, unworthy, because of what they did plus emotional abuse or neglect in my home.   I have been searching for someone to be WITH ME.  Someone who will stand up against the people who say I'm ugly.Its very hard to feel different and its just as bad or worse to know you are alone.   Its very lonely swimming against the tide alone.How do I lay this burden down?

I have always been ashamed the way I looked. So I put up with abuse or being used I thought maybe its all I deserved or maybe it would cause someone to like me. So I will take a chance now and put a picture of me here. One of the SCHOOL PICTURES I hated to see because my classmates traded pictures and no one ever wanted one of mine.

I hope you don't think I'm so ugly. I have been ashamed all my life, I won't take chances fearing I would look stupid but I missed alot that way. It is scary to do but I will leave my picture that I always hated every year.

We did not have a lot of money so I didn't have the nicest clothes – another reason to feel second class and to not like me. My mother always made my hair all curly which is natural no permanents. I fought my curls my entire life till recently. I wanted my hair long and cute in pony tails like the cute girls had but she would never let me grow it out. So remember all that please when you look at me, at the picture of the ugly girl.

https://plus.google.com/photos/116617454152165708454/albums/5942996251223054721