First, about your title - that has to do with your posting status (how many times you have posted). Since you joined almost a year ago, you started as "visitor" but I don't think that that one is used anymore. "Visitor" changed to "member" I think after 5 posts, so see if your title changes after you have posted 5 times. If it doesn't, there was someone else here whose title stayed at visitor and she had over 100 posts. I think that what happened was, since "visitor" isn't used anymore, the software didn't recognize that it was supposed to advance someone from "visitor." If you feel that the same thing is happening to you, send a PM to docJohn. He can change it.

The desire to cut does persist after you stop, and I think it gets more persistent for a while, but eventually it will quiet down and fade into the background as you stop acting on that urge. It can be pretty rough for a while, and having the support of someone like a therapist can help a lot. And you really have got to have some other way of dealing with the feelings that make you want to cut, hopefully somethign more constructive.

I can stop cutting any time I want to, but if I do, I replace it with something else that is also destructive. How can I say this in a way that isn't triggering? The more I resist the desire to cut, the more I want to later, and I am afraid of it getting out of control, and I don't have the support of a T right now so I am essentially on my own. My T never directly addressed cutting anyway - I used to think that was a good thing, as cutting is a way to cope, not the real problem itself, but now I'm not sure about the way he handled that anymore.

Anyway, I think that the support of a therapist is important when you are trying to overcome self-injury. I don't know that there is any such thing as quitting the wrong way, but this is something that runs deep, and if you don't deal with the underlying issues, they will only get covered up and healed over the top, so it looks like you are better, but the wound is still there, inside, and you can still feel it.

<font color=orange>"If a light beckons to you, follow it. If it leads you into the quagmire, you'll probably find your way out of it again; but if you don't follow it, you'll be plagued for the rest of your life by the thought that perhaps it was your star." Friedrich Hebbet</font color=orange>