after

[chero]

have you taken care of your physical wounds? if not, go do that now. we'll wait.

yes

what had happened just before?

i tried to follow my counselor's advice and stand up for myself but i ended up making my best friend cry.

what were you thinking and feeling?

what a terrible person i am. i shouldn't have made her cry. i'm the one that can handle pain. i should have just dealt with it.

why did you end up hurting yourself then instead of some other time? was there an event that was the final straw? what was it?

making someone else cry because of my words hurt me so much. i should never have stood up for myself.

how did the situation get to the final straw stage? trace it back through the events that led up to the last event. look for some point at which you could have made a different decision and not arrived at the final straw.

?
were there outside factors like drugs, alsohol, being off your meds, lack of sleep, etc? can you address those in the future? how?

no

what other ways of coping did you try besides self-harm? how well did they work?

i tried to call my pastor but they were too busy and didn't call back.

in retrospect, are there coping methods that you now realize might have helped? what were they?

no no no

name at least two things you will do to help yourself remember those coping methods if you end up in this situation again.



how do you feel about the situation that led to self-harm now? is it resolved? if not, what are some steps you might take toward resolution?

i feel worse. it's not resolved. i want to SI again and again and again

are you likely to be in that emotional place again? how will you recognize it when you're in that situation?

no, i can't put myself there again.

what will you try before you resort to self-harm if you're in that situation again? list three specific things you will commit to trying.


What made that opportunity more appealing than any other?

it would cause me the most pain and make me feel the most real

Did you make an opportunity or was it there for the taking?

it was there

What would you have done if there was no opportunity, how would you have handled your urge?

i'm not sure

If there had been no opportunity would your urge to self-harm have increased or decreased?

maybe decreased...but there is usually opportunity

What consitutes opportunity for you? Being alone? having new tools? waiting for the right feeling?

feelings of self-hate. those feelings are there all the time. this is the first time i've SI while i wasn't alone in the house. there are people in the next room.

If your opportunties were taken away, how would you feel?

trapped

[LBC]

Hi Chero

It sounds like you're under a huge amount of stress right now (I read your "Before" post as well), and that seeing your friend cry was the last straw. Does that sound right?

Standing up for yourself is not a bad thing, and sometimes it really needs to be done. I don't know what your friend did...but if you felt that you needed to stand up for yourself about it, I think that it's probably a good thing that you did. Hearing something like that is often enough to make someone cry. It doesn't make you a bad person.

However, given your stress level earlier, what was your tone when you talked to her? Are you also regretting the way in which your words came out (I can't tell from your post)? I ask because I know when I'm under stress and pushed to my breaking point, I sometimes speak with more anger than I'm actually feeling about the situation...it's the rest of the "stuff" that's going on that's impacted how I've come across, you know?

Have you looked into ways to keep stress lowered when you're busy - meditation, journaling, exercising, even just taking time out to talk to a good friend?

I hope you're feeling a bit better now. Take gentle care.

[chero]

I don't regret what I said to her because in my heart I know it was the right thing. But then I think how can it be right for me to hurt her.

My tone with her was so normal it was odd. I just stated what I felt and left it at that. Then she hung up on me and called back crying.

I don't know what else to do. The only reason I talked to her was because my counselor has been trying to get me to stand up for myself so I tried and it didn't go well. I felt worse than I would have if she had walked all over me.

I'm just stressed all the time. There is so much to deal with all the time.

I don't know. Maybe I'll feel better tomorrow.