I was 21 years old when I visited a local Doctor who was well known as the guy to see if you wanted anabolic steroids. I explained to him how I had been training and trying to change my body as I had no confidence in the way I looked. I explained how I was not confident enough to ever have a relationship or go on a date. He asked lots of questions and I admitted to having panic attacks when I would go out to clubs with friends on a Friday or Saturday night. I felt like everyone was looking at me and judging me and I would become short of breath and start to sweat until I couldn’t tolerate anymore and I’d have to leave.
My Doctor told me there was a medication that I could take that would help me feel more comfortable when I went out in public places. I wouldn’t be getting the prescription for anabolic steroids that I had wanted but I felt better knowing that there was some medication that might make me feel better when I was out in crowds. He wrote me a script for a drug called Prothiaden. I had never even heard of anti-depressant drugs back then. When I got out of my chair to leave the Doctor began talking about my mood and he stated that he thought there was something else that might make me feel better. As I waited for him to announce the name of another drug, he just moved close to me and wrapped his arms around me and hugged me for what seemed like a very long time. I didn’t know what to do. Was this even appropriate for him to be doing this?
When the Doctor let me go, he asked, “When was the last time someone hugged you?” I didn’t know how to reply. I couldn’t even try to think, I was in shock that he had just hugged me. I just said, “Yes, it’s been a while.” Then I left. I started thinking about why he had done that. Did I really look that depressed or that needy? When thinking about why he would have done this, I realized that I couldn’t remember ever being hugged. I really can’t remember my childhood but I assume I got affection or hugs from my parents but I know my parents are not the kind to express affection as they have never told me that they love me and I have never told them. It would just seem too weird, I wasn’t raised to be like that and they obviously were not either.
This same year when I visited this Doctor was when I first forced myself to overcome my embarrassment and to go with a prostitute. My desire for sex, my desire for feeling like a normal man and my desire for human touch all ended the same. Laughed at, degraded, humiliated and told how totally worthless I was because as a sexual being I was inferior. I had no right to be considered a sexual being and I should be ashamed of myself for having a micropenis. I’ve never managed to have intercourse and I developed a humiliation perversion after years of being degraded and humiliated but these occasions when I was with a prostitute have been the only occasions in my life where I have had skin to skin human touch. I have never been hugged by anyone since that Doctor hugged me when I was 21 and I’m now 49.
Over the years I have gone through periods of craving human touch to periods where I avoided all touch and felt very uncomfortable even getting my hair cut. I have been thinking about this recently because I have been trying to work through some of my problems using different aspects of psychology such as Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. It is so difficult when my Psych wants me to strive for everything on the “Esteem” level when I have so much conflict at the lower levels where my basic human need for touch has been affected to the point of having an aversion to touch. Not only touch but the entire “Love/Belonging” level is non existent in my life but I am expected to be motivated to seek out the “Esteem” level.
After almost 30 years of the only human touch I’ve experienced always relating to disgust and repulsion. When every person who has touched you was being payed to touch you and was disgusted and repulsed, it is difficult not to hate something that the human body naturally needs and craves. Can we as humans just ignore some of our basic needs and still hope to achieve anywhere near optimal psychological health?
Today is day 4 of not leaving my house, day 4 of not showering and day 4 of not getting out of bed. It is so difficult to just exist when you have no motivation to do anything.
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The Maslow pyramid thing is nothing more than a structured, educated guess. It could also be seen as a control mechanism, and i do have to point out that the only “real” way to make it work would be building a personalized pyramid on a case to case basis (as always i could be wrong in this one). Yes, you can generalize and use it in lots of cases, but not everyone is wired the same way. For example, several of the physiological items (which i’m lacking, like sex, sleep and at times food) mean little to me, and i can remember happier times (heck, i should say happy times instead of happier) when i had some of the top items, yet almost none of the lowest/mid ones.
In your case, you sort of validate it yourself, self esteem, confidence, and respect from others seem to care a lot more to you than the actual touch or sex itself. According to the Maslow theory you wouldn’t care about getting the top ones if you didn’t meet the lower ones first.
From wiki: “While the pyramid has become the de facto way to represent the hierarchy, Maslow himself never used a pyramid to describe these levels in any of his writings on the subject.” So… take it with a grain of salt. As for the doctor, heh, i don’t think he saw anything real bad about you… some people are just perceptive or overly friendly. A couple of times a phonoaudiologist that was treating me called for coffee for both of us and usually we talked about both our lifes (or whatever thing came into topic) before getting into therapy, and a couple of times i think we even went like almost 2x over the session time just because of the chit chat, so i wouldn’t read that hug like a bad thing.
Those things on the esteem level don’t mean anything to me. I have little respect for the human race due to how I have been disrespected and I have no interest in trying to change that. I have no self esteem or confidence and could care less about ever achieving anything in life. I’m just waiting to die.
That’s the point I want my Psych to see. I have no interest and can find no motivation to strive for any of those things. I can’t find the motivation or drive to get out of bed. Maybe if my life was more fulfilling and some of the lower levels were filled, I’d have some interest in the higher levels but I don’t.
Then i misread your situation completely, i’m sorry about that. I do know why some of the lower levels are not fulfilled for you from reading your other posts, and… well, i can only say that i really feel for you man. I do hope your psych gets it one way or another, and even if he/she can’t find a solution for it, at least a way of making it less difficult is there to be found (at least until your waiting is over… it’d be hypocritical of me to argue with you on that one). Goes to show how the pyramid thing is highly subjective tho, i have little interest for the lower levels, but other than health the mid-highest ones (mainly at an internal/personal level, not so much at a social level) are my downfall… and i’m kinda just killing time as well.
It is all only a theory but it makes perfect sense. Some people can have the Love/Belonging and Esteem things their entire lives and struggle with the Physiological and safety things but the theory is that you will not necessarily find the drive or motivation to strive for those upper levels if they are missing, whilst you are struggling with too many lower level things. If someone is homeless and starving then it’s unlikely they will be motivated to find a p@rtner if that is infact missing from their life, We tend to prioritize things.
Yeah, i agree with that part, but priorities are different from everyone. I usually tend to defend pretty backwards/opposite ideas tho (no idea why), and i do have to mention that i’ve seen homeless starving people bust their asses out of poverty just because they found a partner, lol. Different strokes for different folks i guess.
Into moderation because i used a prohibited word, heh. What i said was that yeah, i agree with part of that theory making sense, but priorities are different from everyone. I usually tend to defend pretty backwards/opposite ideas tho (no idea why, and usually people hate me for it haha), so i always say: take my opinion with a grain of salt. I do have to mention that i’ve seen homeless starving people bust their asses out of poverty just because they found a p*rtner, lol. Different strokes for different folks i guess.
Yes, that’s the point I’m trying to make. Sometimes things will simply fall in your lap, like getting a p@rtner and that can motivate you to fix lower level things but if you have always struggled with getting a p@rtner, you may not be overly motivated to put all your effort into getting one when you have no food or shelter. Not saying that it might not just happen but one would not likely be putting all their effort into searching for a p@rtner when food and shelter is lacking .
I’ve known people who would not know what it is like to struggle with the “Esteem” or “Love/Belonging” because it was just always there for them but they struggled to keep a job and pay rent. Then everyone is different, so nothing fits perfectly for everyone.
I’ve run into people like you mention. My guess is that at some point they did struggle with one of those points, but… lately i’m doubting that. In my head it’s sort of like an absurd concept, i mean, someone that is always confident and never struggles with love or belonging somewhere? i’m more inclined to believe that santa claus and the eastern bunny are real, lol (but i do know that happens, not santa, but the always-believe-in-themselves-people).
Not that it matters, but next time i see someone next to me that is about to have things fall into his lap, i’ll push him and take his place, lol. Doesn’t it seem at times like that sort of thing happens to everyone next to you except you? haha.
Maslow pyramid is just theory.
The hierarchy of needs is very interesting. I think my ordering would be quite different, but I suppose it could change a lot from person to person. I can also imagine it changing quite dramatically with a person’s situation. But generally I think it could be applied to a lot of people, especially the basic categories and their order.
Generally I think fulfilling the basic needs is highly important to a person’s psychological health. In some instances though, I think if someone seeks qualities from the upper levels it can make up for some more basic needs not being met.
I only saw a psych for a brief amount of time once, and she also tried to push me further than I could go at the time. Have you mentioned the pyramid to her? Whether it applies to everyone or not, it’s clearly relevant to you.
I can understand that conflict between needing something and starting to hate it. And I’m sorry you have so little motivation at the moment. I’ve always found that not leaving the house, not leaving bed etc only leaves you with more basic human needs not being met, and it can become a really painful cycle to be in. I hope it gets easier.
Hi, seems like i always end up hijacking your answers, lol (sorry about that). You mentioned something that occurred to me the last time i saw the Maslow pyramid… the ordering of things. Maybe that has some sort of relation with mental issues? i was wondering that because back then i remember thinking “my ordering is nowhere close to that” and most people around me did agree with the ordering presented to them and… well, i’m usually the only disturbed individual in the class room, lol (this was early this year). Not that it makes any difference for any of us but found it kinda interesting.
Hey Mf, that’s pretty interesting. I kind of want to test that on everyone I know now, haha.
LOL. After reading that i have to start doing it haha. Maybe eventually we’ll compare info and realize there’s a connection after all! haha. But seriously, it’s pretty baffling. My guess is that at some point a part of you gives up on the basics and just turns its attention into what you need the most, which should be the physiological level… but from the looks of it that’s not always the case (except for breathing water and food), turning Maslow’s theory into… a cute little rainbow colored pyramid, which is still nice for decoration.
It is interesting and with me trying to relate it to my life I am just left struggling to find any motivation or drive to reach for the “Esteem” things. Where I am in my life, these things just don’t even seem to concern me. My Psych has suggested doing volunteer work to try and improve my feelings of being respected by others but having a social phobia and feeling like people are repulsed at the sight of me, makes me feel like people would not want me helping them.
My Psych is only seeing things from her perspective, the esteem things appear very desirable to her because they can add further happiness and value to her life. They all mean nothing to me when I have no reason to get out of bed. Anything I wanted from life is not achievable. I’ve been a millionaire, money fixes nothing.
I don’t know why she refuses to just help me to give up my false hopes and to just find ways to function whilst accepting that this is how my life will be.
Maybe it’s time to switch doctors.
Maybe it’s time to give up on Doctors again. Embracing my worthlessness and indulging in my humiliation perversion and cutting myself to cope with my emotions every day was working fine. It was only my Doctor freaking about my severe anemia from so much blood loss that caused him to refer me back to another Psych. I was never really expecting any help. No one has ever helped before.
I don’t like Maslow’s hierarchy. But 5hat is just my opinion. Its antiquated and doesn’t take modern technology into consideration. I would argue that many human needs are met by online friendships and relationships. Maslow never intended for this to be a pyramid it just gradually morphed into one. I view human needs as more of a w ed b of interconnected things that can be fulfilled in any number of ways.
I do wonder what Maslow would say about it being abused, and yeah, it’s been what, like 50+ years or something? (my memory is fuzzy on that one). Like you say it wasn’t even a pyramid, what if he wanted a circle? or a hexagon? poor guy. Maybe it was a rubik cube for all we know.
These formulas about how humans function were written by old dead white dudes. If this world were primarily populated with autistic people then owning chickens and solving math equations would be at the top of the list and people touching you and getting in your space wouldn’t even be part of it. But tgat is just my opinion.
Being placed in a diagram as a pyramid was just the easiest way for people to teach it and for people to understand. It is just a normal progression of what the majority of people would strive for but obviously many things will affect it. It does not work with my life. Technology and social media simply makes it easier for people to fulfill their needs of relationships. I don’t think any technological advancements have made it any more difficult in striving for or reaching any of the levels. It was only Maslow’s theory and has changed over time with a new level at the top now added. It doesn’t fit with my life and obviously not with many others. I would bet there are starving, homeless, sleep deprived people living in a mud hut in Africa who have all their Esteem needs met.
I also wanted to add that the last person I ran into who claimed to have achieved all of these levels was an insufferable bastard and it took all my adult composure not to punch him in the nose.
Oh, so you do know some of my classmates!
Yes insufferable asshats every one of them.
Haha that made me laugh because i read it now that i had to come to college, lol. Thanks for the nose picking offer too, if you have loads of free time check back sui_rc post, pretty much wrote the whole situation there and id appreciate any feedback (positive negative or neutral)
Your colleagues were pretty much immature douches. What is this fucking middleschool? Nah I would have walked away as well. Plus the whole we forgive you is utter bullshit imho. I have little tolerance for bullshit irl.
Thanks for sort of reassuring me i wasn’t exaggerating things. Funnily enough… nope, i’m 33. It’s a college career for older people (classes three times a week, but more hours than regular careers), so all of my class mates are 25+ (some are even 45-50), which made it a lot more weird to me. They all pretty much have other degrees already, so i’m guessing it’s a “we all know more than everyone else because we’re old” sort of situation. I do have a lot of tolerance for stuff (but a short fuse at times), but meh, my belief is that if you’re studying psychology you should analyze situations and consider other people’s opinions, not just act on half assed beliefs.
In any case, thanks again for taking the time to read what i wrote, if it wasn’t for sp in general i would have most likely been mad for a good amount of days (and that does me no good).
Age just makes for bigger degreed douchebags, not smarter more enlightened humans.
As much as i’ve always wanted to be against that belief…in some cases sadly it does. Good thing that’s not the norm tho (and hopefully that won’t happen to me… or maybe it already happened and i don’t realize it! haha!). I do know some old degreed enlighted people, so maybe there’s hope after all.
I promise to beat you with a pillowsack filled with soap should you begin to show signs of douchebaggery.
“The Passion of the Dove®”