I'm so excited!  The CD treatment place where I've been volunteering and doing my internship hired me!!  They're actually going to pay me to work fulltime, and I'm going to make enough money to support myself doing it--plus health insurance and benefits!  I feel more like an adult than I ever have.  I never thought anyone would hire me for a real, professional job--this is so awesome!  My therapist has been working on me, convincing me that I was worth being paid.  Actually, I kind of started realizing that, but I was scared to ask the director if she'd hire me, because I was afraid she'd say I was worth it as a volunteer, but not good enough to actually get paid.  I finally listened to what my therapist was saying--I have 2 years of education and experience in this field, and I help people all the time, which is what the other counselors get paid to do.  So I asked the director, and she said she was already working on it, and just had to get approval from the board.  She was already going to offer me a job without my asking!  I'm a real professional now!  God, I hope I don't blow it.  Nah, I'm just going to keep doing what I've been doing, and it's going to keep being good--even get better as I keep learning more.  It's amazing that I actually believe that now.  It used to be I wouldn't really believe it even if other people said stuff like that to me.  Now I can actually see it myself, even without people trying to convince me.  My therapist taught me when people give me a compliment, just to say "thank you," and nothing else.  It was really hard at first, because I'd always want to say something to deny what they were saying--or at least distract from it.  But I practiced it so many times, that I do it automatically now, and don't even have to listen to myself dissing myself when people compliment me.  I actually think about what they are seeing, and understand what they are responding to in me.  Then I can really appreciate the compliment, and I can add it to my file of good things about me.  It's such a different perspective on me from the one I always had before!