bus

Before You Self-Harm
write down the shadow that's hiding behind the urge. look at it. ask yourself:

• how will this situation or feeling change if i hurt myself?
  It won't be as overwhelming, I'll feel like I'm better to equipped to handle it for right now.
• what will hurting myself bring to the situation? what will it take away from the situation?
  It will be some focus and yet, I know that it's actually making everything worse rather than better. But still... it makes it better in my head at the moment.
• how do i want to feel about this in the long run? is hurting myself likely to get me closer to or farther from feeling that way?
  No. it'd probably be more effective to start chipping away at the work that's piled up, but I can't get ... there's too much. I just need a starting point and to calm down enough to find it.
• if hurting myself seems like my best option right now, how long will the relief it brings last? what will i do then?
  It'll last a day or two at most until I feel like i need to do it again. In which case I'll be back at square one but with a day or two of relief and considering class is tomorrow, it should be okay. I'll be better equipped to handle this in two days.
• what is something i could do now instead of hurting myself? how will it change the situation i'm in? how long will that change last, and what will i do then?
  I'm listening to music and I'm writing this and posting in place and reading through older threads to try and keep myself distracted, but I just feel guilty for not working on the logo or the sketches or anything else I need to be doing. The change won't last much longer before the guilt either gets to me or I decide a sleeping pill's in order.
• how will i feel tomorrow if i hurt myself? how will i feel tomorrow if i do the other thing i came up with?
  Um. Ashamed, probably. But not groggy like the medication will make me, which will ultimately make catching up tomorrow much much harder.
• what do i really want to do right now? how can i best honor the self-protective instinct that has me wanting to self-injure right now?

I really really want to SI. I'm going to sit here instead and I'm going to put on a playlist of music that makes me feel not alone and try to ride it out the best I can. I really want to sleep. But it's too cold and the tv in the apartment is too loud and I can't sleep when there's people I don't trust hanging out.


urges aren't necessarily the enemy. they happen for reasons, and they're an expression of a desire to stay alive and stay sane and keep coping. remember that.

More Before Questions To Answer

• Why do I feel I need to hurt myself? What has brought me to this point?
  Because I think it helps. Placebo effect. That's what it's gotten me. I mistakenly believe that I won't be this stressed out and panicking and uncomfortable if I give in.
• Have I been here before? What did I do to deal with it? How did I feel then?
  God. Yes. I didn't deal very well before. I'm quite good at bottling away and if I can turn the lights out and force myself to lie there and listen to music until I'm absolutely too exhausted to do anything else but cry, I do. Sometimes I can't get to that point and I SI.
• What I have done to ease this discomfort so far? What else can I do that won't hurt me?
  Music. Found some blankets, trying to relax. Sometimes I think working through the questions actually makes it worse because sometimes my reasons just don't feel like enough justification. I shouldn't want to, but I do. I could go lose myself in the distraction thread. Could try to find a book. I keep reading red markers help. I've never had luck, but hey, practice makes perfect?
• How do I feel right now?
  awful. It's been a really long trying day and I'm overstressed and low and he's been dead for two years and I didn't even realize it. How selfish is that?
• How will I feel when I am hurting myself?
  In control. Everything else will just fall away and it's just me and something I know how to deal with for a few minutes and maybe just a tiny breather is all i really need.
• How will I feel after hurting myself? How will I feel tomorrow morning?
  Shaky. Better. Embarrassed. Paranoid. .... the really fucked up part? It's kind of comforting. I haven't SI'd in a few weeks (before this one), a few months before that, it's something familiar. It shouldn't be comforting, but when everything else is changing, it's just a fact that it's comforting to have something that doesn't. Even if it's a bad something.
• Can I avoid this stressor, or deal with it better in the future?
  Um. Not really. My place of higher learning prides themselves on being an accelerated track and it's really really not the greatest thing for me to do, but I'm so close to finishing. I just gotta stick it out. The stress is taking a toll though. Disgustingly enough, I'm starting to get homesick on top of it all.
• Do I need to hurt myself?
  Need is such a strong word. Of course I don't need to. But I really want to. I'm going to give myself at least another hour of just listening to music and hoping my roommates decide to go to bed and send people home and I can just, hopefully pass out. I'm gonna try anyway. Maybe go reread the list of distractions to see if there's new things that I haven't tried.