Toxic Shame: What It Is and How to Manage It

We all feel ashamed of ourselves now and again—maybe we turned in a project for work that we knew could have been better, or we were unkind to someone we should have treated with more patience. But these understandable and relatively short-lived feelings of shame are very different from toxic shame.

Toxic shame is the chronic feeling of worthlessness and self-hatred, often cultivated in childhood or adolescence in response to trauma, abuse, neglect, or other instances of poor treatment by those around you. Read on to learn more about toxic shame, its causes, and what to do about it.

Causes of Toxic Shame

Toxic shame usually develops in childhood or early adolescence, when our opinions and feelings about ourselves are still forming. It is often a trauma response—when something traumatic happens to you, like child abuse, neglect, or some kind of attack that makes you question your worth, you internalize the feelings of worthlessness that those around you are projecting onto you.

Repeated emotional and/or physical attacks teach you to absorb and accept the feeling that you are worthless and that you should be ashamed of yourself, whether or not you have actually done anything wrong. This is how toxic shame begins. Those around you teach you that you should hate yourself, and so you do.

What Toxic Shame Feels Like

Feelings of worthlessness and self-loathing are at the core of toxic shame, but it can come with many other signs and symptoms as well. These include:

• Constant self-criticism: You’ve internalized the criticism of others, and are therefore much harder on yourself than you realistically need to be.
• Perfectionism: You feel as though nothing you do is good enough unless it’s perfect and therefore immune from negative reactions or criticism.
• Low self-esteem: You’ve been taught that others don’t value you, so you don’t value yourself. 
• Depression and anxiety: The trauma you’ve experienced makes you more prone to mental health challenges and mental illness.
• Procrastination: You believe that nothing you do will be good enough, so you put off doing it to avoid the negative feelings you’ll inevitably feel.
• Extreme sensitivity to the opinion of others: You’ve grown to expect that others’ criticism of yourself will be harsh and even abusive. This can rise to the level of rejection sensitivity, which means you are so sensitive to the idea of being rejected that it affects how you behave on a daily basis.
• Sleep issues: You might sleep too much or not sleep enough.
• Eating disorders: Your extreme feelings of worthlessness might translate into how you feel about your body; you might also be seeking a way to control things in your life because so much of your life feels out of your control, and food is one thing you can control.
• Substance use: This could serve as an escape from your feelings.
• Codependency: You feel as though you need to constantly please others, especially romantic partners, because otherwise they won’t value you or stay with you.
• Somatic symptoms like stomach pain: Your internal issues might manifest into physical problems.

It’s important to note that toxic shame does not necessarily mean that you are feeling shame all the time, 24/7; rather, it’s more about how triggered you get when faced with something you feel you should be ashamed of. It is this dramatic and inordinate reaction that signifies toxic shame.

Coping Strategies for Overcoming Toxic Shame

Although toxic shame might feel impossible to overcome, there are coping strategies that you can use to attack your shame at its source.

The first step is identifying what is triggering about the situation and seeing what is in your control that you might change. For example, things like your their inner dialogue, boundaries, communication, and distress tolerance. Avoiding things that create shame can make someone with toxic shame isolate. It is important, however, to identify people who are shaming you or are highly critical and set boundaries or avoid them.

It’s also important to acknowledge your feelings and thoughts of shame and insecurity. If you pretend like they’re not there and like nothing’s happening to you, you’ll never be able to change those feelings and thoughts. Allow yourself to feel these things rather than trying to block them out or ignore them. Then, you can work on finding a way out.

Therapy can be helpful when dealing with toxic shame because it can teach you how to recognize and reframe negative thoughts and feelings. Approaches like DBT and ACT can be helpful for toxic shame because they teach distress tolerance, while an approach like CBT is more focused on changing those behaviors and thoughts.

Building Resilience and Finding Support

First of all, if you have friends or family whom you can trust, talk to them about how you’re feeling. Chances are they do not feel the same way about you as you do about yourself. Hearing positive feedback from others and letting yourself experience their love for you can go a long way when you’re trying to build up your self-esteem and combat toxic shame.

Support groups can also be helpful. There are plenty of support groups out there for victims of trauma, abuse, and neglect, both online and in-person. Listening to how others in similar situations dealt with their shame can help you tackle your own, and getting support from others who have been where you are can make you feel less alone. 

Be compassionate with yourself. Change doesn’t happen overnight, especially not when you’re dealing with such difficult and intense feelings and internalized hatred and self-judgment. Be prepared to work hard as you face your issues and combat your toxic shame.

Final Thoughts

Toxic shame can cause feelings of worthlessness and self-loathing, but with hard work and support and help from friends, family, and mental health professionals, you can overcome these incredibly challenging feelings and learn to love and respect yourself.