Toxic Shame: What it Is and What it Isn’t

“Shame corrodes the very part of us that believes we are capable of change.” ― Brene Brown

Shame has become a hot topic in psychology and the discussion of mental health and wellness, especially over the last decade. The concept of shame and its meaning often depends on the context.

For instance, the common dictionary defines shame as a “painful emotion caused by consciousness of guilt, shortcoming, or impropriety” and lists synonyms such as guilt, regret, and remorse (Merriam-Webster, 2022). But in psychology, shame is distinguished as a more concrete self-perception of being unworthy, defective, broken on a deep level, not simply regret or guilt about a behavior.

Toxic shame is another layer in which shame has impacted your view of yourself to the core of your self-perception (Raypole, 2020). The way we perceive ourselves impacts all our perceptions, relationships, and overall health. Understanding and healing from toxic shame makes a tremendous difference in your life.

Understanding toxic shame

Understanding what sets toxic shame apart from guilt and regret is crucial for holistic health. As stated, often the words shame and guilt are used interchangeably. However, guilt is defined as “a feeling of responsibility or remorse for some offense, crime, wrong, etc., whether real or imagined” (Burgo, 2013)

Regret is tied to the feeling of sadness about an event or loss. Thus, guilt and regret are centered on events, behaviors, or losses, while shame is tied to a core belief about one’s lack of worthiness and brokenness beyond a single event or behavior.

Furthermore, shame is concentrated on the belief about oneself, while guilt often focuses on others or how your behavior impacted other people in your life. Guilt is often resolved by making amends, apologizing, and accepting consequences, while shame can be ongoing and harder to repair because it isn’t based on a lone thing (Gonzales-Barrios, 2022). It is possible to feel both guilt and shame, but they are different in their origin and focus.

Toxic shame is when shame has become central to one’s self-perception and is foundational in daily life. It is especially corrosive to change, hope, and health because toxic shame is shame without repair or healing. It becomes the way you interpret your worth and how you believe others view you.

Instead of being able to move forward from a mistake or behavior you don’t want to continue, toxic shame often keeps you stuck believing that you are incapable of change, worthless, and focused on how you are wrong or bad, not simply the behavior or action. Toxic shame can strip you of your ability to have self-compassion and to embrace your common humanity – the belief that you belong and that you don’t have to be perfect.

One author relates that shame “opens the door to anger, self-disgust, and other less-than-desirable feelings. It can make you feel small and worthless. It can trickle into your inner dialogue like a poison, locking you into a painful loop of negative self-talk” (Raypole, 2020). Since toxic shame is so central to your self-view, living with it has many implications.

Origins and implications

Living with toxic shame often begins in childhood. Negative words about your worth spoken by adults, such as your parents or caregivers, or others around you shape the way you view yourself, and when this is done over time, they can become the way you see yourself.

For example, if you wet the bed, your parent might have reacted in one of two ways:‌ They reassured you that it was all right and cleaned up without making a fuss. [Or] they lashed out at you and said things like, ‘Why do you always do this? What’s wrong with you?’ The second reaction would probably have led you to believe that there was something wrong with you. The feeling of shame can turn into toxic shame when the second scene keeps repeating. – Brennan, 2021

The words that you hear spoken about you as a child have tremendous power to impact how you develop your self-perception. In the first instance, the behavior is separated from the worthiness of the child; in the second, the behavior is seen as a symptom of their unworthiness and flaws. Toxic shame can also be caused by trauma, abuse, and neglect not just in childhood, but throughout life. The ramifications of living with toxic shame go beyond self-perception.

This condition also impacts physical and mental health. For instance, believing you are unworthy may correlate with self-neglect such as a lack of personal hygiene, lack of a healthy and balanced diet, and insufficient exercise. Inversely, individuals with toxic shame may become hyper-vigilant about their health and wellness, such as excessive exercise, extreme dieting, and perfectionistic to “fix” themselves.

Similarly, some people with toxic shame develop narcissism, which is a grandiose view of themselves often overinflating their importance and ambitions, and controlling others (Cikanavicius, 2018). When toxic shame is the foundation of your self-perception, it has many implications for your wellness.

Believing toxic shame is the truth has many implications for health and relationships. Research has shown that individuals who have toxic shame also struggle with substance abuse, alcoholism, self-harm, anger management issues, and eating disorders, to name a few. In relationships, they may withdraw from others (believing they are unworthy of friendship or intimacy and love) and struggle with perfectionism in the workplace (Brennan, 2021).

In addition, toxic shame can make it difficult to receive constructive feedback at work and in relationships because it is interpreted as another “sign” of unworthiness or imperfection. These behaviors and patterns not only reinforce their negative self-perception because of the guilt and impact on their health and relationships but are often coping mechanisms to avoid feeling their shame.

While it is adaptive to not want to feel shame, these behaviors only mask that pain rather than processing and resolving the core self-believe to one that holds hope and the possibility for change.

Healing from toxic shame

Thankfully, there is hope and many ways to heal from toxic shame. Often, treatment begins by healing from the negative beliefs that are tied to your overall toxic shame. There are many therapeutic avenues for identifying these core beliefs.

One clinically proven treatment process is Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

The general overview of the treatment includes, “(1) First, the past events that have laid the groundwork for dysfunction are processed, forging new associative links with adaptive information; (2) the current circumstances that elicit distress are targeted, and internal and external triggers are desensitized. (3) imaginal templates of future events are incorporated, to assist the client in acquiring the skills needed for adaptive functioning” (Insitute, 2022).

Since toxic shame negative beliefs often begin in childhood and with trauma, EMDR is one way to heal from them.

Other ways to begin to heal from toxic shame include practicing mindfulness-paying attention to your self-talk and recognizing when you begin to feel shame. Likewise, incorporating compassionate self-talk through reframing such as: “Acknowledge the thought. ‘That’s one way of seeing things.’ Explore where it comes from. ‘My parents always looked at me like I was a failure when I didn’t meet their expectations.’ Consider evidence for or against it. ‘What about the things I’ve done right?’ Consider other perspectives. ‘I made a mistake, but I can fix it  –  and now I know what not to do next time.’” (Raypole, 2020).

Most importantly, and with a long-lasting impact, is working on toxic shame through a biblical lens. This starts with looking at each thought and overlaying it with trustworthy truths from the Bible. Seeing how these thoughts measure up to God’s Word is the underlying work that chases away the darkness because it cannot stand the light.

More ways to begin healing from toxic shame include professional support – finding a counselor and developing social support with friends and family.

Toxic shame has many origins and impacts on life. It often begins in childhood through the words spoken by adults and experiences such as trauma, abuse, and neglect. Toxic shame is foundational to self-perception, relationships, and quality of life. It is not something you have to live with forever.