Where did my life go?

[AntoniaB]

I agree with Snodderly. It's not YOUR life that is trashy. Certain people around you are choosing to act trashy. But that's not a reflection on you unless you take the blame for their actions. There are very few people, for instance, who think my XH isn't trashy/with a trashy woman and living a depraved and defiant life. And those people are all people I'd say have a pretty weak moral compass. The rest see him for what he has done and don't want anything to do with him.

I think the same is happening in your life--and the fact is that anyone who would think YOUR life is trashy because of what others have done, your XH or now your son's friend, are people who have no sense of right and wrong. In some ways I feel like the fallout of MLC almost makes it easier for us to see who is worth having in our lives and caring about. It makes it easier to draw that line.

Don't you blur that line. You're in the right, you're a good person who has persevered in the midst of horror, and the people who count would never in a million years say your life was trashy, so don't you start saying it.

What's that phrase? "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." Think about that when you feel yourself being pulled into self-blame/judgment.