Are you a depressed Highly Sensitive Person with a harsh inner critic? This blog’s for you.
Something that has really stood out to me in my work with highly sensitive people, and in myself, is how empathic we can be with others, and how critical we can be of ourselves. It’s as if all our compassion and empathy is turned outward, and perhaps, to protect everyone else, we make everything our fault and criticize our tender selves to pieces. This sort of process lends itself to depression, body tension and pain, perfectionism, relationship dysfunction and overall unhappiness. In all our efforts to treat others with compassion and kindness, we may not feel able or entitled to set appropriate boundaries for ourselves. Anger can become repressed, turned inward, and result in toxic shame and depression.
Depression
The main symptoms of depression include feelings of sadness or numbness and loss of interest or pleasure in activities once enjoyed. Other symptoms of depression might include:
Sleeping too much or too little
Changes in appetite
Feeling tired or run down
Agitation
Difficulty concentrating
Excessive guilt
Feelings of worthless or shame
Thinking about death or feelings of wanting to die
Depression can be situational or chronic. Sometimes after a stressor or a series of stressors, depression can set in. Other times depression is an ongoing battle. Either way, it’s treatable. For highly sensitive people, it’s incredibly important for us to understand and accept our sensitivities and take good care of ourselves by honoring our limits. This can be extremely challenging when we have developed a pattern of pushing ourselves or attacking ourselves for not being able to keep up with internal and/or external expectations.
The Inner Critic
At some point in our lives, it felt necessary to attack ourselves to preserve our relationships and feel in control of our lives and ourselves. We may have experienced some form of neglect or abuse in childhood that made us feel scared and alone. If we can just make ourselves “good enough,” maybe then we’ll be loved, accepted, and safe. It’s such a paradox, because later in life the only way to ever feel good enough is to love and accept ourselves, to respect and honor our sensitive limits, and to set appropriate boundaries with others. Healing from the inner critic and depression requires an “undoing” of the repeated self-abandonment we once thought was required to survive and stay connected. All the criticizing we do of our highly sensitive selves to preserve our safety and security and to feel in control is keeping us miserable and in the wrong relationships, careers, or life circumstances.
I have put together the following suggestions for healing from depression as an HSP and working with the inner critic over time. If your critic is extra harsh, or your depression is more severe, you might need the support of a therapist to help you soften the critic and work through the depression. Healing is sometimes impossible to do on our own. Please reach out if you would like support with this process.
1). Make sure your basic needs are met. Basic needs include food, sleep, shelter, movement, touch, and community/companionship. Tend to these first. If you need help meeting these basic needs, reach out to friends, family, local mental health professionals, online groups, or organizations for support. It might be a good idea to see your medical doctor to rule out any medical issues that could be causing depression or exacerbating it.
2). Expand on your basic needs. Boost nutrition and make sure you eat throughout the day. If you need the support of medication or supplements to sleep, make sure you contact your doctor or psychiatrist. Set up your home or living space so that it feels the best it can to you. Make a nice environment for yourself. Take walks each day, stretch, and if you can get your heart rate up, that can really make a difference in your mood! If getting a hug from another person isn’t feasible, pets can offer affection. Weighted blankets are fantastic as well for helping the body calm down and relax. Have a list of numbers you can call when in need of connection and contact. Join online groups you can reach out to. Be sure to include a local hotline for emergencies.
3). Minimize the use of caffeine, alcohol, nicotine, sugar, and other drugs. If you have an addiction problem, make sure you see a medical provider who can help. Even though substance use can be relieving in the short term, in the long run it can make things much worse.
4). Limit news exposure and screen time. Bring awareness to your interactions with certain people who might drain you or weigh you down. Stay away from stressful TV and movies which can activate your nervous system and continue the release of stress hormones in your body. Stick with comedies or light entertainment.
5). Get into your senses. Go into nature, listen to uplifting or soothing music, give yourself small treats throughout the day (like chocolate, herbal tea, nuts and/or fruit), put on or diffuse your favorite essential oils, wear comfortable loose-fitting clothing, make your bed as comfortable and cozy as possible. Take baths or hot showers and if you can add some Epsom salts and good smelling soaps even better!
6). Begin to work with your body and your breath. Your body might be stuck in “fight, flight, or freeze” in response to stress. Practice progressive muscle relaxation. Use your breath to regulate your nervous system. If you make your out breaths longer than the in breaths, this triggers the vagus nerve to slow the heart rate and calm your nervous system. Your breath is an incredibly powerful tool that you can turn to at any time to soothe yourself. There are wonderful guided visualizations and breathing exercises on the internet. Find some that resonate with you and cultivate a daily practice.
After making sure your basic needs are met, tending to your body, and ruling out medical issues; it’s time to work with the inner critic to start healing from depression as an HSP.
7). Bring awareness to the critical voice. Notice when it’s there. Observe it. Become familiar with it so that you can identify it and work with it. At first, you can just let it be there without trying to change it.
8). Practice mindfulness and present moment awareness. When our critics get activated, often that means that we are scared or triggered by something. Remind yourself that in this moment, you are safe and that your life is not in danger. It’s okay to use distraction when your critic gets loud. You might have to engage in another activity to quiet the critic.
9). Validate your need for boundaries and limits. This is a big one. Highly sensitive people are especially prone to overwhelm and overstimulation. You do not have to endure mistreatment, including from yourself. It’s okay to cancel plans, take some space, say no, leave relationships, or place limits on your time and energy. Learning how to honor and assert boundaries can be an antidote to depression and shame.
10). You have spent a long time believing your critic’s worst-case-scenarios were real and true. Notice black and white thinking or eternity thinking. Even though things might feel endless that doesn’t make it a fact. Develop ways to counter what your critic says to scare you or make you feel bad about yourself. See if you can cultivate a new kind, reassuring voice toward yourself. Talk to yourself the way you might speak to a small, frightened child.
11). Make a list of your positive qualities and memorize it. Use it to counter the critic when it gets loud. Start embracing, honoring and loving your sensitive nature.
12). Make a commitment to stop abandoning yourself. As highly sensitive people with harsh inner critics, we learned long ago that we had to abandon ourselves to survive or belong. This can be a difficult core belief to work with since we might believe abandoning ourselves keeps us safe or connected. It doesn’t! It keeps us imprisoned in self-attack. Re-direct the anger to set a boundary with your inner critic. Refuse to hate yourself.
13). Allow yourself to grieve. Your critic likely developed a long time ago. When we start to be kinder to ourselves, sometimes we realize how long we’ve done the opposite. You might begin to see how scared and lonely you’ve been for so long. Transform the sadness into self-compassion and the anger into self-protection. This process will likely heal your depression.
14). Be patient with yourself. It takes time and effort to undo a life-long relationship with your critic and to develop a new relationship with yourself and your body. If you experienced neglect in your childhood, it’s very natural to resist caring for yourself and to engage in rescue fantasies. Healing from depression and a harsh inner critic often (but not always) requires a therapeutic relationship with another person. Remember that despite how terrible you might feel, depression is treatable, you feel the way you do for a reason, and you don’t have to do it alone.
I offer therapy for highly sensitive people in Oakland, CA, and virtually throughout California.