bus

I wanted to get myself to do a before post each time I came close, and an after post each time I overcame or slipped, so I could get practice thinking and writing about my feelings, regardless of whether I felt like failed or not. This has not turned out. But I'm doing an after post now, because it's the best I can do to clear the backlog as best I can. And I think I can learn something from after posts, even if they're like a day later.

After:

Questions to Answer After A Slip
slips are chances to learn. you figure out what stresses are still too hard for you and you can work on how you'll deal with them next time you run into them. so instead of beating yourself up, take action.

• have you taken care of your physical wounds? if not, go do that now. we'll wait.
  
  Yeah. Again, they're pretty minor. I don't tend to do much damage. Sometimes I get frustrated during because I do relatively little damage, but overall, I think that's a good thing. Not the best thing (the best thing would be no SI) but a good thing.
• what had happened just before?
  
  I can't remember anything specific immediately before. I drank too much fairly soon after a slip, I know.
  
  Earlier that day, I'd done the good kind of after post about resisting urges. Nobody responded. It's not pleasant thinking how much of this might be about attention seeking (or proving myself 'worthy' of attention by being needy and messed-up enough). I had an idea of the mods ignoring me because I was too much trouble and too much attention seeking. It's not fair to have those ideas, because I don't want other people thinking they need to validate me or I'll fall apart. But I try and frequently fail to not have ideas and beliefs I consider unfair or excessively needy. I don't know good answers. Never talking about them is not a good answer, and dumping them on other people so they feel they need to meet my needs or I'll SI is definitely not a good answer. I need to work out a way I can talk about feelings I consider needy without dumping them on people in a "Help me or I'll..." way, and without feeling like I am.
• what were you thinking and feeling?
  
  Guilty. Sort of whiny. Sulky. Like I wanted to do what I felt like doing no matter what, and be difficult. Very guilty about this. Kind of sad. There was a lot of feeling like I wanted to cry and not knowing why.
  
  I'm probably too reluctant to cry, but it does tend to make me feel worse, so it's hard to not be somewhat reluctant But suppressing too much can make me feel like doing other, more unhealthy things to deal with the feelings.
• 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?
  
  I had some wine, with the idea in the back of my mind that I could get drunk and SI. Then I had more, with the idea still in my mind. I should avoid drinking while alone and urgy.
• 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.
  
  I could have gone to the gym again. I could have said more on the forum before SI. I could have put my tool in the freezer in a block of ice. I could have drank less or not at all.
• were there outside factors like drugs, alsohol, being off your meds, lack of sleep, etc? can you address those in the future? how?
  
  Drink. Short sleep, but I'm nearly always short on sleep. I'm bad at sleeping; have been since at least puberty. Which is where I started getting SI-SU urges. That's probably significant.
• what other ways of coping did you try besides self-harm? how well did they work?
  
  Posting something to the forum, I think. I couldn't nerve myself up to say what I felt I needed, and no one replied. Telling myself not to SI, in suitably positive terms. None of that worked very well. I see where I went wrong with the forum thing. With the telling myself not to SI in positive terms, I think I need to try until I find a way that works consistently. SI is bad for me, but not as bad for me as forever piling on guilt and crushing any self-esteem I have to get myself to not SI. So one thing I definitely did wrong, and one thing I need to keep tinkering with.
• in retrospect, are there coping methods that you now realize might have helped? what were they?
  
  Be more specific on the forum about wanting help and being urgy and having trouble coping RIGHT THEN. I'm afraid to make those posts, but sometimes I SI when I'd be better off being all "I have a hard time not doing SI right now. Please talk to me."
• name at least two things you will do to help yourself remember those coping methods if you end up in this situation again.
  
  I don't know. Right now I really don't know.
• 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?
  
  It was bad, but not as bad as it could be. At least I learned something by messing up. Better to learn something and not mess up, but better to mess up and learn than to mess up and not learn.
  
  I need a better word for 'self-indulgence'. Because some of it was "I don't need to, but I really want to", and I need a way to put that which doesn't make me think "I'm a spoiled brat!"
  
  I should not drink when in such a mood. Especially when alone. A glass of wine with dinner alone is okay when I'm not in such a mood, but I shouldn't even start when I am.
• are you likely to be in that emotional place again? how will you recognize it when you're in that situation?
  
  Again, I don't know. Don't drink when I'm moody. Especially when hormonal. PMS makes that whole business way worse.
• 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.

Attempt to get exercise.

Try at least one healthy distraction.

Post as explicitly as I can make myself on here if I get close to SI, regardless of whether previous posts have had replies or not. Even just finding words is good for me, and I need to overcome the whole "They all hate me!" irrational negativity.

About Opportunities to SI
Opportunity to Self-Harm seems to be a common theme. Think about why opportunities are important to slips and learn why opportunity is important to you.

• What made that opportunity more appealing than any other?
  
  I was drunk and in a mood.
• Did you make an opportunity or was it there for the taking?
  
  Made it. Drank, got the tool close, and drank more.
• What would you have done if there was no opportunity, how would you have handled your urge?
  
  I don't know. Maybe cried. I don't like crying, and it makes me feel worse than SI does, but it's supposed to be healthier. I don't know what to do about that, because my instincts and feelings are fighting my logic and intellect.
• If there had been no opportunity would your urge to self-harm have increased or decreased?
  
  I don't know.
• What consitutes opportunity for you? Being alone? having new tools? waiting for the right feeling?
  
  Alone. Especially with tools. Especially while drinking. And mood, up to a point, but not a narrow and specific mood. Nearly anything bad, when in the wrong mix of the other things.
• If your opportunties were taken away, how would you feel?

Still really frustrated. Probably inclined to SI out of sheer perversity.[/i]

Drinking is bad for me when I'm urgey also. It's a good thing to be able to recognise, cos otherwise disaster strikes when you're not expecting it.
The sleep thing is significant, changes in sleep patterns can be parallel with mood disorders, and a good thing to look into with a doc or T. Plus, not sleeping sucks so bad.
Asking for specific help on the forum is a good move. My mum always says 'No-one can help you if you don't tell them what's wrong,' and it always irritates the hell out of me, but she's right.
I don't have anything constructive to say really but well done on trying to sort out these slips, it's really positive

Thanks. Having someone say something so I know someone hears and cares makes a big difference.

I know that sleep has been a problem for me as long as I can remember. A lot of my SI issues started around adolescence, and I know that even before then I had trouble falling asleep and problems waking up at weird times. I got a prescription for sleeping pills temporarily once. I used them to stabilize my insomnia, and it helped with a potentially bad patch before I got seriously bad.

More might be good, but I think I'd need them in extremely small quantities again, just in case. I mean I probably wouldn't have trouble with having too many around, and I'd do my best, but I'd much rather not have the temptation hanging around, you know?

Yeah for sure, temptation is a killer. (No pun intended there )
It might be good to see someone who can look at the whole picture for you, and suss out whether sleeping pills will help to just simply regulate your sleeping a bit, or whether anxiety is at play and you need more of a lifestyle change, in terms of decreasing anxiety generally. (I can't figure out if I'm making sense or not, sorry.)

I know what you mean. I have fear issues about doctors, though, and only managed the last one because she did the generally-a-bad-idea thing of shoving some pills at me the moment I mentioned a problem. Not a great doctor, but even a stopped clock's right twice a day. I don't know if I could go through a whole assessment.

I know they're a great temporary leveler when things get out of whack; I also know they don't solve my tendency to get my sleep cycle out of whack easily. If I were going to guess the best course, it would be getting them sometimes to rebalance things, while learning how to manage better. But I can hardly think about learning better ways to manage my sleep cycle, without thinking of all of the good sleep hygiene websites I read, and telling myself I'm bad for not sticking to the behavior suggested entirely on my own.