Yeah its funny I was doing it for a while, nearly a year before I had the "breakthrough", it took a long time to let go of the negative emotions, I had this misguided sense that these emotions were justified, that I was entitled to be angry and depressed about my past and what had happened to me, that I didn't have a right to stop being ashamed about the things I'd done.
Scary too because I didn't know what would I would be without them... I guess its like all addictions, when you're in the grip of them you think you can't live without them, on the otherside though you realise they couldn't live without you.