obsessing on SI

I haven't cut in a while. Like, several months, I'm not sure how long.

However, the past few days, I've been thinking about it. It's like I can feel it ramping up, I started having fleeting thoughts about SI about a week or so ago and now I can't quit thinking about it.

I want to do it because I know it will feel good, and I know it will hurt. I equally want to numb my emotional pain and cause myself physical pain. It's like this love/hate thing with myself.

I'm doing trauma therapy and I'm sure this is related. I feel really really horrible about talking about my trauma and want to punish myself.

I left a message for my T this afternoon, but I thought maybe posting here would help let off some of the pressure until she calls me back.

I can see how having feelings surface from past trauma would send you thinking about SI for relief. Please don't start okay? Did your therapist call you back? Are you talking to your T about the feelings that you have about telling? Did abusers tell you not to tell? (Or is talking about it more about feeling guilty about exposing your T to it?)

hugs zooey.please talk to T about these feelings .maybe things are going to fast for you and you need to take a step back and just breathe with T a bit

Has your T called you back yet zooropa?

I've been doing some obsessing myself, and it's really hard to stop once you start!

I think the trauma work probably is a big trigger, it is for me too. It's kinda natural to want to punish yourself, especially when talking about trauma stuff. I go through times where I want to make the trauma I've experienced WORSE to validate the fact I'm a horrible person, etc.

Try to take care of yourself, use the HEALTHY coping mechanisms that you've learned to use to stay away from cutting, and try to keep yourself safe.

I talked to my T yesterday. Sometimes it really helps to have her just say "don't self injure". I also looked back saw that it's been almost exactly 6 mos since I last cut, that milestone really helped me not want to lose all that time.

I think that a lot of the self-hatred I'm feeling right now comes from talking about the trauma. Yes, the abuser told me not to tell, but more than that, I told MYSELF not to tell. I made a very strict rule for myself to not talk about it, to not think about it, and I lived by that for 20 years. So, opening up now, talking about it, it feels very, very wrong and weak and like I'm betraying that part of me that held the secret for so long.

Anyway, I do feel a little better today in terms of not obsessively thinking about SI. My T said "don't hurt that beautiful body of yours" and I keep trying to hold onto that feeling when I start thinking about SI.

I'm glad that you are feeling a bit better and I'm glad that you talked to your T. Have you talked to your T yet about this "not telling" and how you are feeling about it right now?

((((Zoo))))

Take care of yourself. You deserve to be taken care of. Please don't hurt yourself. You have been through so much already. You deserve to be safe. Please take care of yourself. We are here to listen when you need to talk.

Sannah, we talked about it once a while ago (a month? two?) on the phone. It was after a really hard session and I called her told her how guilty and dirty and BAD I felt. She said she thinks a lot of it is because I had such a strong rule against telling for so long.

Anyway, we haven't talked about it in session but I would like to. Sometimes when I have something super specific to say in session then I will get too much anxiety about it ahead of time, so I'm not going to promise to myself or anyone else that I'll talk about this at my next session. I'm going to just have to hope it comes out.

I think I feel pretty numb right now. The early part of the week was all huge emotions and a big jumbled up mix of yuck. The last couple days, I feel calmer. Not happy, but not horrible. Not looking for something, anything, to change how I feel in the moment.

I know this stuff is there, though, bubbling away under the surface. I didn't sleep last night, for instance. Not at all. I went to bed, and laid there, and finally gave up and got up at 4am. So, while I feel mostly ok or numb emotionally, something is obviously going on. I think I will be okay, though.

Sounds like you are handling everything really well Zoo. Good Work!!

(((( zoo ))) I hope that today is better for you. And I do think that the trauma healing work does bring up SI issues. Sometimes there are parts of us that were hurt too young when we didn't have words. The only way we could get help was to cry. So now when we SI, it is our young mind that is so injured and it doesn't know how to use words to describe the agony it is in. Doing the trauma work will uncover those old wounds. Be very careful right now to stay as close to your T as you can stay - to stay safe. Even if you just have to call T or email T to vent in a way that makes no sense to anyone at all.... just to process THROUGH the pain without causing harm to the body.

You can make it through this.