Before and After

[Butterfly.]

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 will be a mix of relief and numbness. It will reduce the intensity of feelings that have surfaced, and numb them a bit, which will in turn give me distance from all these feelings. I will get relief from the urge I have been fighting for days.
• What will hurting myself bring to the situation? What will it take away from the situation?
  It will bring a change in the feelings (see above). It will bring a sense of calm around everything.
  It will take away the possibility of coping 'well' with these feelings.
• 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?
  I don't know how I want to feel about this in the long. I don't even know how I want to feel about this tomorrow. This is something so much bigger than just my feelings today, or this moment. It is so much more than that. It's been a mix of coping well, and coping badly, so it doesn't really matter in that sense.
• If hurting myself seems like my best option right now, how long will the relief it brings last? What will I do then?
  I don't know. I don't know what effect it will have on anything. If it doesn't bring much relief, I'll probably just hurt again.
• 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 had thought of going for a run, but I don't think it is a wise choice (its getting darker and I'm not fit enough). I don't know if it would change anything anyway.
  I could try any number of other distraction stuff, but its just distracting and putting off. I don't think anything will help me deal with the feelings or the urge. I am just delaying.
  I could take a valium, to try and take the edge off, but it might not work.
• How will I feel tomorrow if I hurt myself? How will I feel tomorrow if I do the other thing I came up with?
  I'll probably be in a better head space tomorrow if I do hurt myself. I'll have some distance from the feelings. If I do something else, its just as likely I'll be back in this same spot tomorrow, as I will just have been distracting and delaying.
• What do I really want to do right now? How can I best honour the self-protective instinct that has me wanting to self-injure right now?
  The urge is trying to get me away from the intense feelings. If I'm going to honour that I need to find a way to reduce the feelings. The only way I know is to hurt myself, or try and drink myself into oblivion. Both of which are destructive. I don't know anyway to deal with these overwhelming feelings in a healthy way.

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?
  These overwhelming, intense feelings that have surfaced. They are too much, and I can't process anything while they are this strong.
• Have I been here before? What did I do to deal with it? How did I feel then?
  I've experienced strong emotions, but not this sort of mix of feelings. This is new.
• What I have done to ease this discomfort so far? What else can I do that won't hurt me?
  I've not been able to find anything ease the discomfort. I've been delaying, hoping they might subside on their own - I've stayed out in the living room with Mum, I've been browsing the net and bus, I've done a few other things on the net, I'm currently making my dinner (while multi-tasking to do this). I've tried having a cry (using music to trigger). Nothing has helped so far.
• How do I feel right now?
  Intense mix of feelings (that I can't distinguish from each other), I'm shaky, I feel edgy from the intense feelings.
• How will I feel when I am hurting myself?
  The physical, tangible pain and the resulting shift from the feelings.
• How will I feel after hurting myself? How will I feel tomorrow morning?
  Relief, distance from feelings, some numbness. Everything will be less intense. I'll be less wound up.
• Can I avoid this stressor, or deal with it better in the future?
  I don't think I can avoid it. Things will happen at various times that stir up feelings. I don't know how to deal with strong emotions or mixes of strong emotions - so I could look at working on that (IRL support is out, but there might be something on the net)
• Do I need to hurt myself?
  I think its a yes. I don't have any other way to deal with this.

Remember you don't have to answer all the questions if you don't feel up to it.

[treasure]

hi Jem. i hope if you si'd you took care of yourself and are doing ok

sometimes writing down feelings can help you sort out what you are feeling and why. in trying to express it in words it can also lessen the intensity a little. for me, there is often anger mixed in with other feelings and i am ashamed and afraid to either feel it or express it (because i don't want to have irrational anger like what i was exposed to as a kid), but once i figure out that i'm angry i am often able to put it into context. feelings are usually there for a reason, a reaction to actual events or to thoughts, they are not bad or wrong even if they hurt a lot.



*slightly challenging*


you wrote "It will bring a sense of calm around everything."
"I don't know what effect it will have on anything. If it doesn't bring much relief, I'll probably just hurt again." and
"I could take a valium, to try and take the edge off, but it might not work."

is si more likely to work than valium? is si maybe the default action even if it doesn't actually help in the way you want it to?

[Butterfly.]

I know I've been avoiding coming back to this, but I know I need to. I ended up SI-ing and drinking a substantial amount to try and make everything go numb.

Thanks for your reply treasure.

I have a really hard time with emotions. I really struggle to identify and express the feelings. I've started to work out some of the trigger for the feelings in this case, but I have no idea what those feelings are. I can't put names to them and I can't draw what they feeling like/ I don't even know if its important to know what they are... But I don't know how to express them at all as a result.

is si more likely to work than valium? is si maybe the default action even if it doesn't actually help in the way you want it to?

Valium often doesn't do much. It will relax me physically, but often doesn't do anything to calm my mind, or emotions. I'm not even totally sure why I mentioned it in the before questions... I think it was a thought that crossed my mind while I was doing them.
SI is often a default thought, but doesn't tend to be the default action any more, not since I managed to stop the last time. Although it comes to mind quite quickly, I tend to sit with the urges or the feelings, or try something else before I let myself consider hurting myself.

I can recognise the shift in it being default as an improvement. I'm starting to fall back into using SI a lot more, but I am trying to prevent myself going back to where I was. I think the biggest issue is I have never replaced it with a healthier alternative. I tend to delay and distract as an alternative, which helps things to pass, but isn't a way of actively coping. Which is why the bigger things become an issue and a bigger trigger.

[Butterfly.]

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.
  It was the night before last, so they're all taken care of and fine.
• What had happened just before?
  I was listening to music, and had a couple of drinks.
• What were you thinking and feeling?
  Feeling - I don't have a way to describe it.
  Thinking - Not much. I was pretty blank. Mostly just feeling.
• 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've been fighting off urges for about a week or a little longer, so I was already worn down. The afternoon had brought on a lot of emotions. Both 'good' and 'bad' ones (I know feelings aren't necessarily good or bad, but more in the sense of some are comfortable and some aren't). I'd been fighting very strong urges for about an hour. Parents were in bed, so I was safe from being caught, there was nothing to stop me, so I caved.
• 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, alcohol, being off your meds, lack of sleep, etc? Can you address those in the future? how?
  There was alcohol, although not heaps at that point (that came later). I was trying to numb the pain that way.
• What other ways of coping did you try besides self-harm? How well did they work?
  I was distracting and delaying all evening - surfing the web, listening to music, reading. Then I decided to have a few drinks, and see if that helped. None of it worked.
• In retrospect, are there coping methods that you now realise might have helped? What were they?
  No. I don't have an methods of coping except to distract and delay.
• 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?
  The situation was intense feelings. They have subsided. I'm still working through my thoughts in regards to the trigger for those feelings. I'm starting to get somewhere and plan on sharing them with a couple of people once I've got my head around things, including the person they are linked to.
• Are you likely to be in that emotional place again? How will you recognise it when you're in that situation?
  It's most likely I will be in a similar place again, as I have to work through things that are all related. It won't be hard to recognise.
• 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.
  I don't know. I don't really have any tactics, besides to distract myself which mostly involves the internet. This is something I need to work on

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?
  It had been a case of putting off and putting off. It was late at night, parents had gone to bed, there was no one to catch me out. I hadn't managed to cope with the emotions to that point, and they were only getting more intense.
• Did you make an opportunity or was it there for the taking?
  It was there for the taking.
• What would you have done if there was no opportunity, how would you have handled your urge?
  I probably would have created an opportunity. Or used more subtle ways to hurt myself until I could do what I really wanted to.
• If there had been no opportunity would your urge to self-harm have increased or decreased?
  Increased, a lot.
• What constitutes opportunity for you? Being alone? Having new tools? Waiting for the right feeling?
  Being alone, ideally once my parents are in bed or at least Mum is. I think feelings play a part in it too.
• If your opportunities were taken away, how would you feel?
  I don't know what would happen. I would create opportunities or means of doing it.

Remember you don't have to answer all the questions if you don't feel up to it.

[treasure]

not sure if this will help exactly, but remember in dealing with strong feelings, people around you might have suggestions or be able to help, particularly if they have had relatively sane and helpful childhoods that taught them those sorts of skills.

also possibly unwanted, but i didn't have a "real" answer, so i asked the internet:
- Using Distraction as a Way of Coping with Emotions - Distraction Techniques Can Help You Keep Strong Emotions in Check
- How to Manage Emotions More Effectively
- Manage Your Emotions