Close Call

Yesterday I wanted to cut all day long. I was just obsessing about cutting, sometimes talking myself into and sometimes talking myself out of it. It's such a roller coaster ride. My PHP therapist asked me to bring in my razors, and I did. But yesterday I tore apart another razor. There's a strange sense of safety knowing that I have the razors. I have to bring in the new razors now. I don't want to. Like I said, there's a safe feeling knowing they're there.

I'm so reluctant about giving them up. Cutting has always been a kind of "friend" to me. It's always been there when I've needed it. I never use cutting as a suicide attempt. To me cutting is too sacred for that. I'm more inclined to take pills for those attempts. I know my thinking is really distorted, but it's the honest truth. People have always left me alone...in the darkness of my own pain. They turn their back on me, but never has cutting turned its back on me.

You're probably wondering, "did she cut?" No. Just tearing apart that razor calmed me down. I didn't need to cut. I feel like I'm inside a tornado of emotions when I want to cut, and when I was tearing apart that razor I became centered and focused, my whirlwind of emotions stood still and I was calm. That's how I feel when I cut, but I didn't even need to cut this time. I think that's a little progress.

I think that is a lot of progress that you didn't cut. It is hard getting rid of something we have grown so attached to, I know I still have a feew hidden, but I have put them in places that are difficult to get to so I rarely even find them, maybe you can try msking it hard to get to until you can let go completly. I'm not really great at giving advice so take it for what it's worth. And congrats on not cutting thats always a good thing.
Chippie

Thanks Chippie. Your advice is helpful to me. Any advice will do. I agree with you that not cutting is progress. Sometimes I don't get the due "good job" that I sometimes need. Mostly people are breathing down my neck at my PHP because I have the razors. I don't think they know how hard it is.

Here is another "Good Job!" for you. When I am at my T the focus is often on the fact that I did hurt myself rather then all the times that I didn't. All the close calls, all the not so close calls but living with the craving all day without acting on it. If those moments are celebrated I think quitting would be a lot easier.
Carrie

<font color=green>But the implicit and usually unconscious bargain we make with ourselves is that, yes, we want to be healed, we want to be made whole, we're willing to go some distance, but we're not willing to question the fundamental assumptions upon which our way of life has been built, both personally and societally.--Bill Plotkin, Soulcraft