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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?
  The situation won't change beyond me having injuries. The feelings will probably subside, and my thoughts will stop swarming around in an exhausting mess that gets tighter and more tangled and louder.
• What will hurting myself bring to the situation? What will it take away from the situation?
  Does it really bring anything? It brings relief, I guess, it brings quiet. It takes away the feelings and the feeling of being overwhelmed and out of control without a mode of expression.
• 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 want to be content and peaceful. Hurting myself will bring contentment and peace for the short run, it will lead me further away from it in the long run. It's like the rational being vs the monkey of instant-self-gratification.
• 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 probably last until I fall asleep. Then I get to wake up tomorrow and do it all again. But it'll be daytime and I'll feel different maybe.
• 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 could try to draw, or just make a mess. I could use some of the pastels I have here which I've not been ale to access in termtime. If it doesn't go right I might get even more frustrated. I could watch Call the Midwife, but it might make me feel emotions. I could go through my notes from church last term and identify what I've learned, and questions I have, but that could be hard. I could continue on tumblr, but it's not really enough of a distraction right now. I've spent all afternoon online and caught up on my tumblr cravings. I could do one after another and hope the feelings and thoughts settle enough so I can sleep. I said I could contact someone and send a help message on Monday, but I had to do the weekend first. I've almost made it through the weekend. I can tell myself I'm allowed to say this is hard tomorrow, even if I don't let myself do it.
• How will I feel tomorrow if I hurt myself? How will I feel tomorrow if I do the other thing I came up with?
  If I hurt myself I'll feel angry and frustrated, and I'll be annoyed at having to deal with taking care of injuries and the implications of that for my holiday and swimming. If I do other things... if I draw I might feel better, but the feelings will be present when I wake up. If I write I might feel worse. If I watch I'll probably cry a lot. I'll be tired if I don't hurt myself because I don't usually sleep as well.
• 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?

I want to pack a bag, fall asleep peacefully, leave the house in the morning and climb on a train to my Uni town. I want to stay there in a certain person's house. Then I want to leave with various people and spend the vacation staying with various others in places which aren't this house. Failing that, I want to send messages telling people how awful I feel. I can't do those things.
I don't know what I can do really. I don't know how to help myself and I don't know what to do with these feelings.

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?
  I feel homesick for my Uni town, and I wish I was there having fun rather than here in this fucking house, alone waiting for my friends to return home. My feelings are too big for me to handle about that. My head keeps telling me that all my friends at University hate me, and I find it hard to believe anything different. I have 28 days in this house ahead of me, and I don't know if I can do it. I have adapted to kindness and gentleness and safety to be myself and feel as I feel. That has gone, and I need to adapt to survive again. Part of that seems always to have been harming my body to deal with big emotion and the badness inside of me. I saw a post on tumblr about "if my partner had scars from self-harm I'd kiss them before bed" and someone went on a rant about don't you romanticise mental illness scars are bad from a bad thing. Mixed feelings. Loud head. I feel so isolated and alone. I'm used to someone down the corridor to go chill with, friends in the other block I can hug and cry to, people at church to see throughout the week and go for coffee with.
• Have I been here before? What did I do to deal with it? How did I feel then?
  Last term... people were back at the same time as me. I didn't hurt myself, but it wasn't the same. I'd not experienced what I have now. I'd not told anyone about things and received regular support, I wasn't close to my flat, I'd not cried to people and bared my scarred arms. I don't know if I felt any better for not having hurt myself really... it doesn't feel like it matters if I do or don't, since it's inevitable.
• What I have done to ease this discomfort so far? What else can I do that won't hurt me?
  I lurked downstairs. I made spiced apple & camomile tea. I replied to my friend's text. I might get my sketchbook and watch something on iPlayer that isn't Call the Midwife. I might see where that takes me.
• How do I feel right now?
  Isolated, scared, hopeless, numb in a bad way.
• How will I feel when I am hurting myself?
  Numb in an indifferent way, relieved.
• How will I feel after hurting myself? How will I feel tomorrow morning?
  Frustrated at the mess, frustrated at having to deal with it. Ashamed at having posted this and then failed anyway. If I hurt I won't let myself message people because I'm bad and I don't deserve it. If I don't hurt I won't let myself message people because clearly can just get over it by myself.
• Can I avoid this stressor, or deal with it better in the future?
  It's inevitable, I can't avoid coming home. I could deal with it better by documenting what's hard (I'm doing that) and discussing specific plans to help with people at Uni and at home who I can talk to.
• Do I need to hurt myself?

"Need: require (something) because it is essential or very important rather than just desirable." (thanks, google).
I think the most honest answer I could give would be to say I don't know. Hurting myself is desirable as a means to an end. I don't know whether it's essential as a means to that end, or very important- I recognise there are probably other ways of reaching the end. I don't know if I am capable of using those other means, or whether I have the energy and personal qualities to do so.

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

if you could walk down the hall and talk to someone, cry with someone, what would they be doing/saying that helps? can you recreate any of that for yourself?

If I hurt I won't let myself message people ... If I don't hurt I won't let myself message people ...

it's ok to have feelings and talk about them with people. it sounds like the si helps you deal with things on your own, but it doesn't mean you have to be alone - you know that after being around the people at uni.

i hope you manage to watch some less emotional shows, and get to sleep.

treasure wrote:if you could walk down the hall and talk to someone, cry with someone, what would they be doing/saying that helps? can you recreate any of that for yourself?

That's a good question! Physical contact is a big one for me I think? I feel safer and grounded when I can be hugged, and I find it helps to be able to match my breathing to someone's. It helps to have someone rational outside of my head who can act as a counter-balance to the inside of my head. Sometimes, with some people, it just helps to have a dynamic distraction who forces me to engage with them instead of my thoughts.

I watched Call the Midwife, and cried, but it was good. Sometimes it's good for something fictional to destroy you so much because you know deep down it's not like, real? I know it's based on memoirs, but I think we're at the point now (series four) where the story arcs are beyond the memoirs... Jenny Lee has left, after all. I did some doodling, too, and watched the Comic Relief Bake Off Extra Slice.

I feel tired, but not sleepy. I'm going to try to sleep in the next hour or so though I think. If it's unbearable I'll get up again and read or something.

(by the way, thank you so much Treasure, I really appreciate you being here and responding, it means a lot. Thank you!)