[DelusionsDaily]

Gawd, I am such a coward for not telling T about the SH I have been doing. Although I did tell her I need to learn/relearn coping skills for when I get the urges to hurt myself, but she glossed right over that and now I have to figure out the secondary gains I get from sabotaging my recovery. How the hell is that supposed to help me? I got really really frustrated with the session and felt like I had wasted it on pointless ****. So I SH'ed today...UGH!

[Asiablue]

Could the secondary gains from sabotaging your own recovery be that you gain some control back, you have been feeling hemmed in by the rules of the contract so maybe the S.H is a bit of a F.U to the contract?

[unaluna]

Like I don't even know what that means! I liked your idea the other day of just stopping. That's what I did. I couldn't do ANYTHING it seemed without effing things up and hurting myself more so I just stopped.

.
Why is it that you do not want to get a new treatment team?

You are not being helped. This is a simple example.
It is hard to change T's, but there are people trained in working with your issues. SH is not uncommon today.

You need to take control of your own destiny and find someone who is trained to work with your problems. Many people have to spend months looking for the "right" T.

You also need to take control and work on changing behaviors.
It is hard, but your statement under your name "that you want to SI more and not be forbid for doing it" shows that maybe you don't want to work on change.

[Victoria'smom]

Do you have e-mail, text privileges? If you do maybe you can write 'I was to scared to tell you that I've been sh because I don't want to be terminated. Please bring this up next session. (Only add this if it's true: but I'm safe at least until next appointment. )' but don't expect a response back.

[DelusionsDaily]

Actually that is kinda old just havent changed the update. Its more in anger towards the contract because if I cant talk about it how can it change? Nevermind I will figure something out.

[stopdog]

Stopping SI, in my experience, is not just a matter of having it be forbidden and then okay one stops - nor is it something that one can "just stop" doing. Having it be forbidden by some therapist would not stop it for me and would make it more present. It has been helpful to me to have a therapist (not the first one I see with whom I do not talk about it, but the second one) who will simply explore it with me. She has not commanded I stop, she has even said it is understandable, not desirable, but not alien or weird or wrong or so forth.

[unaluna]

To clarify - I didnt mean just stop si. It was more of a - stop the world, I want to get off, kind of attitude she wrote about last week that I was referring to.

I didn't mean "stop it" either, but clearly the OP realizes this is not helping her and in fact causing more harm. Take the step to fix that and find someone that can help.

SI is not uncommon and many T's are trained to work with it.

[Asiablue]

Originally Posted by stopdog

Stopping SI, in my experience, is not just a matter of having it be forbidden and then okay one stops - nor is it something that one can "just stop" doing. Having it be forbidden by some therapist would not stop it for me and would make it more present. It has been helpful to me to have a therapist (not the first one I see with whom I do not talk about it, but the second one) who will simply explore it with me. She has not commanded I stop, she has even said it is understandable, not desirable, but not alien or weird or wrong or so forth.

yeah being "forbidden" to do anything would only increase my likelihood of doing it. That might work for some, but not for me.

[stopdog]

I have thus far only found one who is useful and with whom I am safe discussing it. And I have interviewed a lot of them these past three years. The two I saw earlier in my life were awful at handling it - so I just quit telling them about it.
There are not that many who are good at handling it in my experience, regardless of whether they believe they have been trained in it or not. Some "training" focusses on crap no harm contracts like the one OP is dealing with. (I am not bpd and I don't have a psychiatrist nor have I ever been dangerously hurt by si - my viewpoint is just from my experience with it).

[anilam]

Are your T/Pdoc specialize in working with BPD?
BTW, if the contract really says she'll terminate you if you SH I'd find a new T.

[purplejell]

Originally Posted by stopdog

Stopping SI, in my experience, is not just a matter of having it be forbidden and then okay one stops - nor is it something that one can "just stop" doing. Having it be forbidden by some therapist would not stop it for me and would make it more present. It has been helpful to me to have a therapist (not the first one I see with whom I do not talk about it, but the second one) who will simply explore it with me. She has not commanded I stop, she has even said it is understandable, not desirable, but not alien or weird or wrong or so forth.

I have to agree with stopdog on this one... I have had contracts put on me to stop SI, and it was a miserable failure. Often it made me want to do it more. Or I just became more secretive. One place I lived used to search my bags when I came in, so I just hid the equipment under my clothes. I think it has to be your decision to stop and when you do SI, it is crucial to have an environment where you can talk about it and figure out why it happened. That is the only way I have found it changed for me - being able to explore the meaning of it and learning other ways to cope.

[Favorite Jeans]

In my experience focusing too much on SH itself just made me want to do it more. Talking or thinking about it made it almost irresistible. What was helpful was talking about coping strategies which was boring, so boring! But for me SH was very exciting, gave me a rush and made me feel alive (but paradoxically was also sometimes calming) so it was helpful to find other ways to feel alive or calm down or cope with an unbearable feeling. Also helpful was picturing who I wanted to be. I got to a point where I really, really didn't want to be someone who SH'd and had scars everywhere and had to feel embarrassed every time it was hot out or I went swimming or wanted to have sex etc.

So I don't think it's necessarily helpful to talk about SH all the time, every time you do it etc. Talk about the times you wanted to but didn't. Talk about a feeling that triggers your desire to SH and have your T help you defuse it right there in session. Have her breathe with you or go for a walk together or just talk about how you are not the feeling. Pretend your brain is a big screen in a movie theatre. The images are vivid but fleeting. The images are on the screen but they are not the screen. Your feelings aren't forever.

BTW Melissa, I think you're anything but a coward. You have dealt with this bravely despite how scary it's been for you. You are working really hard on it. Most people don't stop self-harming from one day to the next. You do it less and less frequently until, wow!, you've gone a day, a week, a month, six months, a year, ten years and you realize that you're dealing with your feelings some better way. You don't need to feel awful about yourself every time you SH. It's just a setback and that's okay.

[DelusionsDaily]

So I tried to get new coping skills and when I asked she skipped over it to figure out what gain I get from sabotaging my recovery. I can NOT make her talk about something but I am going to call her tomorrow so she GETS how much more important the coping skills are to me. I don't even remember how she got to that topic.

[Littlemeinside]

Originally Posted by MELISSSAD81

So I tried to get new coping skills and when I asked she skipped over it to figure out what gain I get from sabotaging my recovery. I can NOT make her talk about something but I am going to call her tomorrow so she GETS how much more important the coping skills are to me. I don't even remember how she got to that topic.

So none of the advice regarding coping skills people have tried to offer you in here were usefull? (The thread "struggling") Does the advice have to come from a T?

[stopdog]

I can certainly see how having the therapist recognize and acknowledge what is important and useful to client would be very important.

[Littlemeinside]

Originally Posted by stopdog

I can certainly see how having the therapist recognize and acknowledge what is important and useful to client would be very important.

So T´s are not just objects in the room any longer?

I think sometimes T´s try to do what they feel is useful to the client, when the client can´t see it in the moment.

[stopdog]

Originally Posted by Littlemeinside

So T´s are not just objects in the room any longer?

I think sometimes T´s try to do what they feel is useful to the client, when the client can´t see it in the moment.

I said I could see it, not that I wanted it.
To me, the one I see is an object in the room. Sometimes they can be a more useful object and at other times a less useful object.

And a therapist does not get to press an agenda on a client, in my opinion.
The OP here wants to focus on coping skills with the therapist. Focussing on what the client does not want is not useful in my opinion.

[Littlemeinside]

Originally Posted by stopdog

I said I could see it, not that I wanted it.
To me, the one I see is an object in the room. Sometimes they can be a more useful object and at other times a less useful object.

And a therapist does not get to press an agenda on a client, in my opinion.
The OP here wants to focus on coping skills with the therapist. Focussing on what the client does not want is not useful in my opinion.

Don´t get the extreme need to dictate ones own treatment ( if we all knew how to be safe, healthy and were fully functioning we wouldn´t need T) or view people as objects. IMO

[stopdog]

"Don´t get the extreme need to dictate ones own treatment ....."

Then it is a good thing I am not asking you to get my way of approaching therapy or therapists.

OP - I hope the therapist starts listening to you or that you can find one who will.

[Littlemeinside]

Originally Posted by stopdog

Then it is a good thing I am not asking you to get my way of approaching therapy or therapists.

OP - I hope the therapist starts listening to you or that you can find one who will.

Sadly I do.

The OP is not and has not been safe for a while. The need for control seems more important than someone WHO will help guide her to a safer place. Basically thats why the T ( IMO) is asking " what do you gain from this"?

[stopdog]

OP - I don't think you are a coward. i think the therapist has created an impossible situation for you with the contract thing and I understand frustration when the therapist will not listen to you. Good luck with it.

[anilam]

Originally Posted by stopdog

OP - I don't think you are a coward. i think the therapist has created an impossible situation for you with the contract thing and I understand frustration when the therapist will not listen to you. Good luck with it.

She could be asking because she doesn't know you're SH-ing so she doesn't feel the need to go over coping skills again? However, I think the client gets the final say what is discussed in the session. It's the clients life (and money ).
Honestly, the rule is absurd, you are forced to lie to her. SH is ussually a complex behaviour- needs to be discuss and not ignored. Giving ultimatum is not helpful - if it were SH would be healed in one session . I really think you need to discuss it with her, I'd understand her wanting you to go IP but terminating because of SH? Not helpful for you

[DelusionsDaily]

Im going to call and rage on HER voicemail and see what she does. How does that sound?