You know, I have been injury free for a very long time and I think that is great for me, but there is a but. Like today when I was in therapy I kind of checked out for a few minutes and I could see myself injuring. I used to see stuff like that a long time ago and this has happened several times now mainly when in therapy. I know that I have issues with my T but I have been working on that. But if I don’t feel like I’m in charge, like today, I start feeling like I’m being punished. Still working on that though. I just didn’t like that my mind flashed back to when I was injuring. I have to say it scared the hell out of me. I told her eventually and that helped, but at the time I couldn’t even talk. It bothers me because it really hasn’t been an issue for a very long time.
Does anyone experience that too? I know to do the impulse logs if I need, but by the time I leave my appt I’m fine. Just something irritating me I thought I would throw out to the alumni.
My advice would be to log when it happens to see what the triggers are. My thought is that thinking about self-injury is a bit like self-injuring, and that if you are able to log it and identify the triggers and start using alternatives you’ll get to the point where, like with self-injury, you will be using alternative coping behaviors before you actually visualize yourself injuring.
For me, my recovery is mainly faith based — so with this in perspective in mind, let me give my answer or suggestion.
Control is something I really don’t have and that is what I am learning through my recovery process. Self-injury makes me feel like I am in control, however I have intellectually accepted that I cannot be in control if I am to recover. The only thing we really have control over in recovery are our thoughts and reactions — everything else we must give over control of. We have to accept that we might slip up and accept the road to recovery isn’t perfect.
Impulse logs are a great way to clearly identify the feelings of wanting to re-establish control and wanting to self-injure. They make us identify exactly what we are thinking and feeling. By writing down these things, we can see what is going on inside our of heads — we now have something to hold onto, something concrete, and it is a way for us “to get things out”. If anything, we can always rip up our thoughts after we write them down. I like writing things down because they give me a physical representation of my thoughts, emotions, and feelings.