Before

[brknflight]

• How will this situation or feeling change if I hurt myself?
I’ll feel more in control of myself. I would feel like I have expressed my feelings
• What will hurting myself bring to the situation? What will it take away from the situation?
It would bring a new wound to care for. It would take away all the days I have gone without SI. It would bring a feeling of control and a temporary calmness. My shaking would stop.
• 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 meet S. without any fresh wounds tomorrow, and I don’t. I want to feel healthy which this would take away from. I want to prove I can be healthy without work to my parents, which this would take away from. I want the emotional pain to go away which this would help for a while.
• If hurting myself seems like my best option right now, how long will the relief it brings last? What will I do then?
The relief would last through the night and then after whenever I feel the scar.
• 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 call Breann. That would last until the conversation is over.
• How will I feel tomorrow if I hurt myself? How will I feel tomorrow if I do the other thing I came up with?
About the same, save perhaps some disappointment/temporary relief when I feel the scar.
• 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 want to be healthy, dammit. But I also want to feel better. And those two don’t match up quite yet. Being healthy just leads to feeling worthless more, fat, and stuck. Being unhealthy brings about feelings that I can control some of my environment.


More Before Questions To Answer
• Why do I feel I need to hurt myself? What has brought me to this point?
I was triggered, then all the feelings I’ve been trying to get past this week have all come up on me now. I can’t stand the thought of going downstairs again, yet I know I have to. I don’t want to eat dinner, and I don’t want to face saying no to another meal. I keep remembering when S. told me that my feelings on my body weight were silly. I trusted her and let her know what was happening recently and she said it was silly. That’s one seriously messed up thing for a T. to say. And I had to say goodbye to all my co-workers today which was tough. Right now I just want to go to a hospital and have a "week off” and get some help; but if I do that then they will say I need to go back to work. And I can’t. As much as I loved the kids and my co-workers I was dying having to work. Now I should feel relief that that’s over, I have to a point, but everything else is up now. I feel worthless. I feel fat. I feel so alone.
• Have I been here before? What did I do to deal with it? How did I feel then? \
Usually when I’m at this point, I cut. But I’m filling this up instead hoping for some reason not to cut.
• What I have done to ease this discomfort so far? What else can I do that won't hurt me?
I’m doing this. I can call B. I can call the after-hours line.
• How do I feel right now?
Like I’m falling into an abyss and no one can help me.
• How will I feel when I am hurting myself?
Calmness
• How will I feel after hurting myself? How will I feel tomorrow morning?
Tomorrow, I’m going to feel excited about seeing S. again no matter what I do tonight. Tonight, it would just feel like a relief.
• Can I avoid this stressor, or deal with it better in the future?
Not really.
• Do I need to hurt myself?
I feel like it. But I’m going to try not to.

[brknflight]

Well, I'm proud of myself. I got through the night without any cutting. I don't feel nearly as bad.