bus

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.
  yes
• what had happened just before?
  gf told me to burn/die in a fire. told me to fuck off. told me to shut the fuck up. told me she wanted to commit SU.
• what were you thinking and feeling?
  hurt, betrayed, used, confused, afraid
• 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?
  she's treated me badly before but this somehow was the last straw. maybe because of all the financial stress i'm under, and how i feel like i've failed in so many ways. maybe because she told me to burn in a fire when she knows i've been struggling with resisting urges.
• 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.
  nothing i could've done would have prevented her from saying this to me. unless maybe there was something. maybe i'm the problem. idk.
• were there outside factors like drugs, alsohol, being off your meds, lack of sleep, etc? can you address those in the future? how?
  i forget if i took my medication today or not... but i don't think that was it. maybe? i forget if i took them and i know ODing on them is bad.
• what other ways of coping did you try besides self-harm? how well did they work?
  i wrote out my feelings and cried... tried to contact a friend. it didn't take the edge off
• in retrospect, are there coping methods that you now realize might have helped? what were they?
  i don't know
• 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?
  nothing is resolved except now i hurt physically instead of emotionally
• are you likely to be in that emotional place again? how will you recognize it when you're in that situation?
• 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.

hi pelagic. those sound like really horrible things to hear, esp from someone you care about. has any more conversation happened with your gf about what she said, why she said it and how it affected you?

i feel like i've failed in so many ways

there are probably witty and nice ways to put it but i don't have the brain power right now...what i'm thinking is that failing is normal and necessary, a part of growing and learning. if you tell yourself a mistake is bad and you are a bad person for making a mistake, you make it harder to take risks and harder to get to where you want/hope to be. you are not a bad person or a failure. even if you don't believe that.