lacking

I haven't SIed in about a week and a half....you know why? I haven't had the urge.

I know, you guys are all thinking "Wow...that's great!" No, I don't think it is...I go through cycles with my SI. There's always a period without urges, and I may go as much as months at a time without doing it, and without having an urge. However, when the urges come back, and they inevitably do, they come back stronger. After a period without cutting, it is always significantly worse when I do it again. There's no telling how long this will last...I'm just scared for the time when it comes back.

YOU ARE DOING GREAT.

You CAN break the cycle of relapse, it just takes a LOT of work and willpower and support. Be easy on yourself, and do something good for you. Perhaps while you don't have the urge to harm yourself, you can think up plans to deny the urge when it comes back?

Wow, I can relate to that, not months but weeks can go by. Here is what I am learning about that...I am learning how to start to recognize the signs and listen and learn from them. My T has me doing IFS and EMDR - finally something that makes some sense. A form of therapy.

When you say "There's no telling..." that is my like my life and a huge fear. But, can you talk to your T if you have one about it. It's a great realization on your part - a VERY BIG DEAL. The urges are going to be there but I am starting to talk to them and find out what they want. Sometimes it's not possible b/c I go into that "focus and state" of SI'ing. But today the urge was there and I just listened and realized how scared I was of not measuring up and feeling insecure. It seemed to work, at least for today.

It's so weird for me...i found myself in a situation today where normally, I'd go running for my razors. But today when i was in that situation I thought, "You know what? I don't even WANT to cut right now." It felt good, knowing I would have usually cut, but it just sort of warns me that it's going to be worse when I do again.

I feel so stressed out, because I want to talk to T about this before it has time to come back, but we have SO much else to talk about...things that I feel are, at the moment, more important than this. I never feel like I have enough time to really get through everything. So right now, I'm not sure if we'll get a chance to discuss this or not. I'm hopefully going to get a phone call from her tomorrow, so maybe I can bring it up then...maybe start to figure it out before my session next week. I don't know...

you are doing soooo well!!!! - and you didnt hurt yourself when you got triggered - yeah!!!!

Dont forget to celebrate your success's and when/if the SI demon returns come here for support if you canttalk to T ok - you can do this cos we are all in this together

I hope the phone call goes/went well and you are figuring more things out. It really sounds like you are taking amazing steps to find tools. It's scary at least for me, b/c I'm terrifying of facing life and that is what it feels like I am doing by trying not to SI.

Please post and let us know how you are doing - or pm me.

Thank you all for your replies and support!

I didn't really get to talk to T about this on the phone...I got to mention that a normally triggering situation didn't get out of hand, and she said how glad she was, and how proud she was that I resisted. I told her "I didn't resist...the urge just wasn't there, and I know why...but that's a whole other story..." She mentioned that we will discuss that when I see her next week. Given the pressing issue I'm going to discuss this week, I suppose we will talk about this if we have the time, or she may briefly bring it up at the end. We'll see how it goes...

Good luck with T