My Battle With ‘Self Harm’

TRIGGER WARNING

 

The feelings come suddenly swooping down and descending upon me, the darkness hits me when I least expect it. I’m use to my mood changing, it fluctuates quite often as I switch from one alter to another but this is different. A part of me is clearly struggling and her mood is more lower than usual, she feels despondent and so negative and I am finding it difficult to know what to do.

This alter, this part of me has never been so evident until now and yet suddenly the emotions and feelings overwhelm. She loathes herself and it’s seeping slowly into me and whilst I try to not feel so negative it’s in built in some weird kind of way. I was never good enough as a child and it’s clearly influenced my thinking and now I’m more aware of just how self critical and self loathing I am prone to be. So it’s no wonder my feelings this week have been far more negative than in recent months and it’s impacting upon life.

I wrote earlier this week about the desire to self harm being strong, I thought it might be helpful to explain what that’s like for me. The urges come from nowhere suddenly appearing and so powerful and strong, they start often without any warning and they catch me by surprise.

The other night I couldn’t sleep, no matter how hard I try it just wasn’t happening and I felt on edge and agitated. I couldn’t explain why I was so anxious or agitated I really didn’t understand, however I did know I felt a dark cloud hanging over me. I tried distraction, relaxation techniques and even the hot drink that I knew my crisis worker would suggest yet nothing worked. As the time ticked by once again and I felt exhausted but still couldn’t sleep my feelings towards myself sank lower and lower. I guess I get illogical at these times in some kind of way and soon everything bad that ever happened in my childhood was my fault, I was bad, I was to blame. Then began the urges, I found myself searching for objects that I could use, I haven’t done that in a while. A few years ago I wouldn’t have had to search, the blades were close by and all I had to do was take a few paces to find one.

Now I have a somewhat different tactic I try not to have any blades in the house, yes there are knives in my kitchen but they are usually not great ones more blunt than anything. So I had begun looking at things and deciding what to use, I was logically working out where I would cut to avoid it being seen by others. My children are far more sharp eyed these days and I can’t just hide a scar like I use to, as all these thoughts raced through my mind the urge to cut was growing stronger by the minute. My head was a whirlwind, voices raced away in conversation some clearly urging me on whilst others condemned me. Meanwhile others mainly my protector alter were stating quite clearly that harming wouldn’t help and telling me I didn’t want to do this.

The feelings of confusion kept growing and tears were streaming down my face, in truth when I’m strong and coping with life I don’t want to harm, but I know I might and that is something I have to accept. You see harming is my default position when emotions become too strong too much to bear and when I feel I’m bad it’s even harder. I looked at my arms and I saw my veins and began thinking of the her DNA, her blood running through me. I can never escape the reality that my Mother made up half of my genetic code and without her I wouldn’t be here. Years ago I wanted to just cut her out of me, but of course that isn’t possible and I found out that after years of cutting and harming it didn’t eradicate her from me. So today I know that deep down I can’t take her away by hurting me, maybe that’s why I worked harder than ever the other night at trying to stop myself from giving in to the urges to harm and eventually resorted to extra medication yet again to help numb my pain.

The desire to harm has continued at a pace this week often linked to feelings of anguish and turmoil and the pain of years ago suddenly overwhelming me clearly demonstrates that healing hurts. I think feeling such self loathing and negativity; it’s been stronger than ever recently, hasn’t helped either as I feel I need to be hurting physically not just emotionally.

This evening I had been doing ok and then it swooped out from above and descended like a thick heavy cloud squishing me. I felt like my heart was being ripped in two and tears began to stream once more down my face. The feelings of self loathing grew instantly like a huge crescendoing wave battering me as if I’m being tossed in a storm. I realised I was scratching my arm, desperate to self inflict harm, desperate to hurt me for being so pathetic and so definitely to blame for my past. I want to somehow express in a physical sense the emotional hurt I am feeling, but I know self harming isn’t going to stop this pain well not for long anyway.

I am surrounded in lots of ways by a loving family and tonight my daughter and eldest son have been a big help. They have phoned me often, made me cups of tea, distracted me, reassured me and generally badgered me. Telling me how good I am, how it’s not my fault and reminding me of the words my psychologist has said about not being to blame. It hasn’t stopped the urges far from it, but it’s helped me reach into my tool box of resources and work at trying to stay safe.

Earlier this week my psychologist kindly emailed me and I have re-read his email over and over, slowly the words are sinking in. Slowly all the stabilisation work we have done in the last year of therapy is coming to the forefront of my mind and I’m able to use it to good effect. Internally parts of me are hurting, others though are rallying to help and yes my protector has been telling me I deserve better and reminding me who was to blame in the past. My teen alter has also been present and using her way of communicating to reassure me, I know my distress impacts upon her and I don’t want to hurt her. It’s strange how getting to know my parts, my alters has meant I care about them more and as such I don’t want to cause them more distress.

I’m still here and I’m still trying to not self harm, but if I do please don’t look down at me or think I’m attention seeking or bad. If you only knew how hard it was, the anguish and the pain we go through, then maybe you’d understand why it’s difficult to not self harm. Why I’m in the midst of a battle and I’m not sure if I’ll win.

Copyright DID Dispatches 2015