Family can suck.

They are the ones who are supposed to support you the most… and yet this never happens for some people.

I am one such person.

For the past year, I have been working on a book, From NOPE to HOPE: How I Overcame My Suicidal Thoughts (and How You Can Too), and my family did not support me at all!

To top it all off, my sister said I was not qualified to write such a book.

Then, to add even more fuel to the fire, NOT ONE PERSON in my family expressed ANY concern whatsoever about the fact that I had these thoughts in the first place!

No one asked if I was still feeling this way. Not once. Ever.

This hurt. A lot.

What’s worse is that sometimes, on occasion, these thoughts STILL cross my mind.

Fortunately, I have learned to depend on using certain strategies and techniques to help raise me up when I am down. I am also going to share some of these with you today.

Who Am I?

I am a rape survivor. I was raped when I was a 14-year-old virgin. I shared my true story in a guest post long ago… Rape, Drugs and Prostitution — One Blogger’s Journey to Success. Read it if you want the gory details.

I am a single mom. I had my son when I was only 18, and I raised him by myself. (My family kicked me out too, after learning I was pregnant.)

I am an ex-prostitute. I am an ex-drug addict. I was even a high school dropout when I was a teenager.

I am also a certified English teacher. I actually quit teaching to return to prostitution. I mentioned all this in a podcast interview I did.

Now, I am a writer, an editor, and a freelancer.

I am a blogger who is an entrepreneur that now has 9+ income streams.

I became an author in 2014.

Clearly, I have had period of success in my life.

But I suffer from depression. I was once diagnosed as being bipolar.

I have also been physically and mentally abused. And degraded. And shot at. And hit.

Basically, I have been through hell and back again more times than I can count, and I am probably going to be haunted with bad memories for the rest of my life.

However, I have learned not to dwell on them. I’ve learned to push them aside and focus on positive things.

Sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, simply to survive and get through each day… whatever it is! This may even include removing negative family members from your life in some way!

Family members are the ones who are supposed to be there for you, no matter what, and when they don’t, it can hurt tremendously.

Removing negativity – and negative people – from your life is one of the things mentioned in my recent book, From Nope to Hope. There is actually a whole chapter on it!

I also have learned to use certain coping strategies and techniques to make myself feel better and be a more positive person.

Today, I am going to share some of these with you so that you can help yourself when YOU feel depressed or rejected.

Who Can You Turn To and What Can You Do To Feel Good?

1: Turn to your friends.

I turn to my friends, both online and offline. Mainly, I talk to people on Facebook. My friends there are my Facebook “family” and they know just what to say to make me feel better.

I sometimes post status updates about what’s going on and how I am feeling.

Sometimes I simply message one (or more) of my good friends privately.

My online friends are some of the most awesome people I have ever known, even though I only know most of them virtually.

2: Ignore your family and remain positive… no matter what.

This is really hard to do. Fortunately, I have learned a few techniques to help me do this. The one that has the biggest impact on me, personally, is using positive affirmations.

Positive affirmations are statements that you read and/or recite to yourself every day.

They are explained well in my book, in Chapter 8:

“Affirmations are positive statements that are repeated on a daily basis that alter your current (usually negative) beliefs by sinking into your subconscious.

Even though these statements might not initially be true, the constant repetition of them eventually makes them a reality!

This is a strange phenomenon, but it is also a theory that has been proven to work. In a way, it is kind of magical!

How does it work?

If we continually feed our subconscious mind with thoughts and imaginary situations that depict our desired reality, our subconscious starts believing it after some time. Our subconscious then tries to make these inner scenarios match with our outer reality of life, thus changing our thought processes.”

I wrote a blog post when I first started using positive affirmations. I related them to my writing career.

You can read more about positive affirmations in the article Two Simple Things You Can Do to Kick-start your Writing Success.

Other techniques are mentioned in my book. (Buy it and you can find out what they are!)

3: Rely on yourself and be your own best friend.

No one ever really acts the way we want them to. No one truly knows us like we know ourselves.

That is why you need to learn to be strong and rely on yourself. Be your own best friend. Cheer yourself up when you are feeling down.

You can do activities that you enjoy doing alone, such as reading a book, watching a movie, playing a video game, etc.

You can take yourself out for a special dinner, pamper yourself in some way (take a bubble bath, get your hair done, give yourself a “spa day,” etc.). There are many different things you can do to make yourself feel better.

The key is to treat yourself better than anyone else treats you!

For additional tips, you can read the chapter in From Nope to Hope that explains how to improve your self-image.

4: Write out your thoughts.

Writing is very therapeutic. Writing helps you to release your emotions.

You can write random thoughts in a journal or diary (either using a pen and paper, your computer, or via a note-taking app on your phone) or you can write poetry.

You can also write a short story, or simply write how you are feeling. You can write about your day, about what happened to you, about what you did, or you can write about whatever pops into your head.

Just be honest. It will help you.

It helped me, when I was healing from being raped. Here is a screenshot from the link I just mentioned:

5: Release negativity from your life.

In Chapter 7 of From Nope to Hope, I teach people how to identify their emotions and release negativity from their life.

There are many different ways you can do this.

I provide you with 9 ways… and one of the ways is to remove negative people from your life.

Buy From Nope to Hope to learn the other 8 ways! 😉

Note that you have two purchasing options: you can buy it from Amazon or you can purchase it ON SALE via my website.

The PDF that my website will give you is actually the BEST OPTION because you get a document that you can type in, in the exercises at the end of each chapter! (Amazon’s book does not have this feature.)

Here are the purchase links:
India link – https://www.amazon.in/dp/B072L6846M
UK link – https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B072L6846M
USA link – https://www.amazon.com/dp/B072L6846M
AU link – https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B072L6846M
Or you can get it for 40% off via Wording Well: https://wordingwell.com/get-from-nope-to-hope-on-sale/

My Best Advice to You

My advice to you is to do whatever makes you feel better, and if others don’t like it, then tell them to FUCK OFF. (Sorry, I hardly ever swear online! But sometimes you NEED to have this attitude!)

Block them out of your life if you have to (this is easy to do on social media). They don’t know what you are going through. Only YOU do.

Also, use the techniques I use. They work.

They are outlined and taught to you in my book, From Nope to Hope.

So What DO You Do When Your Family Does Not Support You Emotionally?

I hope I have provided you with enough answers to this question today because this is a bit of a different question than the one posed in What Do You Do When No One Appreciates Your Work?

I hope you can find some comfort, somehow, someway, from my sharing my thoughts and experiences.

I look forward to interacting with you in the comments.

As you can see, I am very open and honest, and I will reply to any questions asked of me!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lorraine Reguly, BA/BEd, is an author and English teacher-turned-freelancer for hire. She offers 4 different services on Wording Well: writing/blogging, and editing. She also helps others become published authors! Check out her services and see what she can do for YOU. You can also visit her author site, Laying It Out There. And don’t forget to pick up your copy of 20 Blog Post Must-Haves today!

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