Exposure and Response Prevention for cringey memories
March 15, 2022 2:09 PM Subscribe
If I'm doing something that doesn't occupy my entire brain, it likes to randomly remember a minor and incredibly cringy error I did or said in the past. I find myself swearing or apologising out loud to "defuse" the feeling, particularly if I'm alone in the car. Have you dealt with something like this in therapy or otherwise? How does it work?
I've been reading about ERP with an issue my daughter is facing. I suspect that I need to "sit with" some of the cringy memories to defuse them, and yep I want to find therapy at some stage. The memories are mostly not huge trauma situations, many of them are just things where I'm upset at myself from doing something wrong.
I've been reading about ERP with an issue my daughter is facing. I suspect that I need to "sit with" some of the cringy memories to defuse them, and yep I want to find therapy at some stage. The memories are mostly not huge trauma situations, many of them are just things where I'm upset at myself from doing something wrong.
If you had done something different you wouldn't be the you right now asking the question and all the things that have happened since may not have. POOF! you vanish in a puff of logic. The past is gone, can't go back and change it, if you could you would vanish, you have no idea what would have happened if you hadn't done the things that you did. Don't mess with timelines.
posted by zengargoyle at 2:48 PM on March 15, 2022 [2 favorites]
posted by zengargoyle at 2:48 PM on March 15, 2022 [2 favorites]
I have ADHD and got a diagnosis in my 40s. One of the completely unexpected benefits of going on Ritalin was that such unexpected and ongoing visits from my brain (to beat me up about shit in the past) dropped dramatically. They did not disappear entirely but they stopped becoming an ongoing source of discomfort. I had never discussed these thoughts with the psychiatrist who gave me my medication or any of my therapists because (I guess) there were too many other things going on. Good luck in finding an approach that works for you.
posted by Bella Donna at 2:57 PM on March 15, 2022 [4 favorites]
posted by Bella Donna at 2:57 PM on March 15, 2022 [4 favorites]
I take a moment to acknowledge the cringey, squirmy feelings if I can notice them in time. And then ask myself "this thought again? really???" trying to conjure a feeling of being bored with it and wanting to move on to thinking something different. Ideally something with some of the same people or context.
Like, instead of remembering That One Time I Said Something Dumb, how about That Other More Fun Time We All Had Dinner?
I could probably also use therapy
posted by SaharaRose at 2:59 PM on March 15, 2022 [3 favorites]
Like, instead of remembering That One Time I Said Something Dumb, how about That Other More Fun Time We All Had Dinner?
I could probably also use therapy
posted by SaharaRose at 2:59 PM on March 15, 2022 [3 favorites]
Seconding the ACT. And I'll share something that I read literally the other day that resonated with me (no idea of attribution:
Don't kill the part of you that is cringe; kill the part of you that cringes.
The sense I made of this: self-compassion is everything. Chances are the cringe-inducing thing you did was an honest and well-intentioned mistake by an earlier version of you that didn't know what you do now. Find some love and compassion for that person. And for things that don't quite fit into that category, like plain old dorkiness, a lot of the problem isn't the cringe-inducing act, it's a world that can't handle awkwardness or vulnerability. That's not your problem, that's the world's. Be on your own side. Love the part of you that is cringe.
posted by Miko at 3:14 PM on March 15, 2022 [15 favorites]
Don't kill the part of you that is cringe; kill the part of you that cringes.
The sense I made of this: self-compassion is everything. Chances are the cringe-inducing thing you did was an honest and well-intentioned mistake by an earlier version of you that didn't know what you do now. Find some love and compassion for that person. And for things that don't quite fit into that category, like plain old dorkiness, a lot of the problem isn't the cringe-inducing act, it's a world that can't handle awkwardness or vulnerability. That's not your problem, that's the world's. Be on your own side. Love the part of you that is cringe.
posted by Miko at 3:14 PM on March 15, 2022 [15 favorites]
About seven or eight years ago I was in a Trader Joe's browsing the seeds and nuts aisle and had one of those moments. I did a fuck out loud and may have mumbled some other stuff, definitely shook my head. A woman near me glanced over and asked if I was ok and I said thanks, yeah, just cringing at an old memory, ha ha. And she said "well whatever it was, you're probably the only one who remembers it," smiled, grabbed her pepitas, and walked away.
I haven't stopped recalling cringey moments, but when I have them (or pumpkin seeds, funny enough) I think about my Trader Joe's self forgiveness fairy and just let it wash over me.
posted by phunniemee at 4:37 PM on March 15, 2022 [32 favorites]
I haven't stopped recalling cringey moments, but when I have them (or pumpkin seeds, funny enough) I think about my Trader Joe's self forgiveness fairy and just let it wash over me.
posted by phunniemee at 4:37 PM on March 15, 2022 [32 favorites]
In this scenario, the swearing or apologizing would be the response that you want to prevent. If this is too difficult to cut out entirely, you can start by doing things like delaying the response, then gradually lengthening that time.
I am someone with OCD that also has a bit of a problem with this, though my responses are a little different. I definitely notice it gets worse with stress. I find it helpful to practice responding to myself with self-compassion (a la Kristen Neff) when these thoughts come up. It can also help, instead of doing my typical response, to pay attention to the uncomfortable body sensations I am trying to defuse with the response. They typically change and pass quickly.
posted by ceramicspaniel at 4:39 PM on March 15, 2022 [1 favorite]
I am someone with OCD that also has a bit of a problem with this, though my responses are a little different. I definitely notice it gets worse with stress. I find it helpful to practice responding to myself with self-compassion (a la Kristen Neff) when these thoughts come up. It can also help, instead of doing my typical response, to pay attention to the uncomfortable body sensations I am trying to defuse with the response. They typically change and pass quickly.
posted by ceramicspaniel at 4:39 PM on March 15, 2022 [1 favorite]
I do this and have always, in my mind, called it Stress Tourettes. I have managed to replace fuck fuck fuck with I love you, though, which at least meets embarrassing intrusive memories with compassion for myself.
posted by DarlingBri at 6:22 PM on March 15, 2022 [12 favorites]
posted by DarlingBri at 6:22 PM on March 15, 2022 [12 favorites]
I made up a vivid mental scene to “process” these kinds of thoughts - like a machine that takes the memory as an input, analyzes it for value, and then stores it away as the output. This has been a helpful practice for me and now I don’t need to run through the whole thing anymore to make it work. So, you know, while I’m betting a giant crystal/laser shooting spider wrapping up a ‘still’ of the cringe moment and lifting it into the ceiling of a Superman style crystal cave won’t exactly work for you, maybe another visualization could? And ditto upthread if it helps at all most people have truly low memory capacity and are unlikely to retain your off moment or pass judgement on you about it.
posted by this-apoptosis at 6:31 PM on March 15, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by this-apoptosis at 6:31 PM on March 15, 2022 [1 favorite]
You may want to check out this Reddit discussion about the same issue you described.
posted by akk2014 at 6:44 PM on March 15, 2022
posted by akk2014 at 6:44 PM on March 15, 2022
Previously on the Green. See also this other discussion. Charlotte Brontë might have been a blurter.
An interesting aspect of some of these discussions is that lots of people say, "Oh my God, I thought I was the only one who did this."
posted by JD Sockinger at 7:09 PM on March 15, 2022 [4 favorites]
An interesting aspect of some of these discussions is that lots of people say, "Oh my God, I thought I was the only one who did this."
posted by JD Sockinger at 7:09 PM on March 15, 2022 [4 favorites]
-vividly imagine that my past cringey actions were interpreted super positively or generously even if that seems unlikely to me (eg “I love how you genuine Gravel is” instead of “what a weirdo”)
-sit with it like you said and look for whatever is under it that’s painful and hard to accept (eg “I wish I was the kind of person that always knows how to respond to bad news so my friend felt loved and supported, but I’m not that person right now. That sucks and it hurts”)
I have this issue pretty intensely and those are a couple tricks from therapy in addition to all the useful ones mentioned above.
posted by Gravel at 8:25 PM on March 15, 2022
-sit with it like you said and look for whatever is under it that’s painful and hard to accept (eg “I wish I was the kind of person that always knows how to respond to bad news so my friend felt loved and supported, but I’m not that person right now. That sucks and it hurts”)
I have this issue pretty intensely and those are a couple tricks from therapy in addition to all the useful ones mentioned above.
posted by Gravel at 8:25 PM on March 15, 2022
I have Tourette Syndrome and use this phenomenon as an example of a tic that most people can relate to, even those who are neurotypical.
That being said, I struggled with this intensely as a child, and then later realized I do have Tourette Syndrome.
TS, OCD and ADHD are very neurologically similar, which is why we are all in this thread saying we relate! It might help you to read up a bit on impulse control, and realize that there are differences in different people’s abilities to suppress unwanted behaviors.
It’s not a moral failing, or a willpower isssue — the part of my brain that says “DON’T curse in the Trader Joe’s when you remember something mortifying” just doesn’t work as effectively as someone else’s might.
posted by Juliet Banana at 9:41 PM on March 15, 2022 [3 favorites]
That being said, I struggled with this intensely as a child, and then later realized I do have Tourette Syndrome.
TS, OCD and ADHD are very neurologically similar, which is why we are all in this thread saying we relate! It might help you to read up a bit on impulse control, and realize that there are differences in different people’s abilities to suppress unwanted behaviors.
It’s not a moral failing, or a willpower isssue — the part of my brain that says “DON’T curse in the Trader Joe’s when you remember something mortifying” just doesn’t work as effectively as someone else’s might.
posted by Juliet Banana at 9:41 PM on March 15, 2022 [3 favorites]
I spend an INORDINATE amount of time in these, my latter years, apologizing to myself and pretty much everyone I can remember ... if I am not, of course, cursing out myself and everyone I can remember.
posted by Chitownfats at 1:31 AM on March 16, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by Chitownfats at 1:31 AM on March 16, 2022 [1 favorite]
Name how you feel out loud.
Go to the bathroom and whisper if you’re in public.
Name the exact thing you did, the year you did it, and drill down and name the real thing you’re afraid of - which usually is negative opinions from others.
“I feel embarrassed and sad because in 2010 I criticized a piece of writing Erica had done, in a way that wasn’t constructive, sounded dismissive and probably hurt her feelings and made me look mean and rude, and since it was my first week at the new job, I feel it influenced other people’s perceptions of me right out of the gate and made them dislike me.
Now, thinking of it again today, my body feels tight and tense because I’m still embarrassed and insecure about those people not liking me and possibly saying bad things about me to others.”
Then give yourself a bit of context:
“Realistically, I’m usually not a mean person so those people had several other years worth of interactions with me to balance that one situation. Most people don’t go around saying bad things because a person said one mean thing at work. It’s possible those people don’t like me, especially Erica and her best friend Mary, but I don’t really interact with them and their opinions of me actually don’t matter in the grand scheme of my life. Most people who meet me will form their own opinions of me. That was a mistake in the past and I can learn from it and let it go today.”
Then take that learning into today’s situation:
“Today my task is to give feedback to Angie, and I will take what I learned from the Erica situation to make sure I am sensitive to Angie’s feelings and praise the strong points of her work. I will remember to give feedback kindly and constructively, and focus on areas of strength and ways to succeed. After I talk to Angie today I will also send her an email to further build the relationship and make sure I have emphasized the positive, given actionable areas to work on, and left a good feeling after our feedback session.”
Say it all out loud and then move forward!
posted by nouvelle-personne at 6:53 AM on March 16, 2022 [2 favorites]
Go to the bathroom and whisper if you’re in public.
Name the exact thing you did, the year you did it, and drill down and name the real thing you’re afraid of - which usually is negative opinions from others.
“I feel embarrassed and sad because in 2010 I criticized a piece of writing Erica had done, in a way that wasn’t constructive, sounded dismissive and probably hurt her feelings and made me look mean and rude, and since it was my first week at the new job, I feel it influenced other people’s perceptions of me right out of the gate and made them dislike me.
Now, thinking of it again today, my body feels tight and tense because I’m still embarrassed and insecure about those people not liking me and possibly saying bad things about me to others.”
Then give yourself a bit of context:
“Realistically, I’m usually not a mean person so those people had several other years worth of interactions with me to balance that one situation. Most people don’t go around saying bad things because a person said one mean thing at work. It’s possible those people don’t like me, especially Erica and her best friend Mary, but I don’t really interact with them and their opinions of me actually don’t matter in the grand scheme of my life. Most people who meet me will form their own opinions of me. That was a mistake in the past and I can learn from it and let it go today.”
Then take that learning into today’s situation:
“Today my task is to give feedback to Angie, and I will take what I learned from the Erica situation to make sure I am sensitive to Angie’s feelings and praise the strong points of her work. I will remember to give feedback kindly and constructively, and focus on areas of strength and ways to succeed. After I talk to Angie today I will also send her an email to further build the relationship and make sure I have emphasized the positive, given actionable areas to work on, and left a good feeling after our feedback session.”
Say it all out loud and then move forward!
posted by nouvelle-personne at 6:53 AM on March 16, 2022 [2 favorites]
I had a bunch of those memories that would hit my hard and make my shout "Green!" (I don't know why, possibly because it mostly hit me while I was driving). I didn't have access to health care, let alone mental health care. I started to realize it was a way to avoid and recoil from the memory. I spent some time actually thinking about them, acknowledging them, owning them, and forgiving myself for them. It hurt! But it also helped almost immediately. I can barely remember all the different things now, they're just normal things that happened now.
If you have access to mental health care, you might try that? Note: my things were not traumatic, just exceptionally cringe.
posted by Garm at 9:10 PM on March 16, 2022
If you have access to mental health care, you might try that? Note: my things were not traumatic, just exceptionally cringe.
posted by Garm at 9:10 PM on March 16, 2022
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-ERP: I made a "ladder" of related situations in order of how much anxiety they caused me. The goal is to work your way up the ladder from least-distressing to most-distressing (the exposure) and avoid doing the response. The theory is that your ability to withstand the anxiety without leaning on the response as a crutch gets stronger as you work your way up the ladder. So in your case, you might (and this isn't meant to be therapeutic advice, just a rough example so you can kind of picture what you might expect ERP to look like) choose a memory that isn't cringy at all to start, think about it, and sit with it. Let's say that's easy. You then move to a barely-cringy memory, think about it. You might get the urge to apologize out loud - you resist it even if it feels uncomfortable. You do this with increasingly cringy memories until you can successfully sit and experience the distress without resorting to the swearing/apologizing/whatever else your response is. (Sometimes responses can be mental, too, like thinking a certain phrase.)
ACT: ACT is acceptance & commitment therapy, and it's the one that's newest to me but I'm finding it super valuable. It's roughly about figuring out what your values are and defusing yourself from your thoughts. So I've been working on techniques in therapy to get better at mindfully noting, like, oh, there's a thought, I'm not going to engage with it right now. It's been super helpful to me in situations where my thoughts feel "sticky" and in the past I would not have been able to move on from them. It's pretty different from ERP in that - in my experience - ERP encourages you to dig deeper into the feeling of distress, and ACT encourages you to mindfully note it and continue about your life. Both have been useful to me in different ways.
CBT: Cognitive behavioral therapy. When I've used CBT to deal with similar issues, it's looked like trying to logically argue with the thought to expose its irrationality and unpracticality. CBT is described in a lot of detail in the book Feeling Good, if you're curious, and probably lots of places online for free as I think it's pretty popular. Personally I've had more success with ERP and ACT.
Meds: I'm not advising you to look into these, just mentioning for the sake of completeness that they've been a very helpful part of my own approach to dealing with intrusive thoughts; I'd say ERP got me like 70% of the way there, ACT another 20%, and meds (which I added last) are making up the last 10%. But my situation may totally be different/more severe than yours.
posted by chaiyai at 2:46 PM on March 15, 2022 [5 favorites]