How to stop feeling like shit – Andrea Owen

Introduction

INTRODUCTION
In early 2007 I found myself at my own rock bottom.
The man I was dating had convinced me to leave my job and my apartment
to move away with him. As we were planning our move, I found out he’d
lied about everything during our relationship, including fabricating a story
about having cancer to cover up his drug habit. He had drained thousands of
dollars from me, and that same week, I was holding a positive pregnancy
test in my hand. About a month after that, as I was completely out of
money, he left me. I had been conned.

I was humiliated, not to mention broke, jobless, had nowhere to live, and
pregnant. To add insult to injury, the year before all this, my husband had
left me for another woman.

The pity my family, friends, and colleagues had for me was unbearable. I
could feel the discomfort of them around me—they didn’t know what to say
or do. Some people even avoided me—it felt as if they didn’t want to get
too close for fear they would catch my defectiveness. I hated my life and
hated myself for what I had put up with that had brought me to where I was.
The loneliness and shame were crippling. It seemed like everyone I knew
was either happily married and having babies, or if they were single, they
certainly weren’t a giant hot mess as I was. I felt like damaged goods, not to
mention the dumbest woman who ever lived. I asked myself over and over:
How did I get here, and how could I have been so stupid? What is wrong
with me?