I have not self harmed for 7 months now. THis is the longest length of itme I have gone without harming. I thought as time went on that it would get easier and easier. However, I have found that to be false. The longer it has been since I harmed, the harder it is to not do it. This seems backwards to me. I don’t understand why it is so hard now. Did anyone out there find this to be true for them? If so, how did you make it through? I don’t want my stretch to end, but I am feeling that it is going to. The urges are getting so very hard to ride out and not act on. I feel very alone and scared I am going to mess up again. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
I think it very much depends on the situation. There were definitely times in my life when every day it seemed harder and harder not to act on the urge to self harm. Sometimes I eventually gave in, sometimes I stayed strong for at least a few more days. Now, I have been self harm free for six and a half years, and for the most part, it is MUCH easier to say no to self harm than it was at first. I still always have thoughts of self harm, but they are mostly just background noise that can be ignored. Sometimes (like right now), they become a little more intense, but so far I am still able to abstain. (I did have a brief say on the p-ward about a year ago, when things got REALLY bad. My meds were adjusted slightly, I got better and I left. It worked well for me. That was my first time in the hospital in many years–and I used to be in the hospital one week of every month!)
I think for me, whether or not it got easier or harder to ignore the self harm thoughts the longer I went without self harm had to do with whether or not I really wanted to stop self harm for ME. I always wanted to stop it for others–I hated the emotional toll it took on my loved ones, and how bad it made them feel etc. So, If stopping for them were all it took, I would never have done it more than once. But, for a long time, I didn’t want to stop it for my own health and well being. It wasn’t until I really wanted a life without self harm for ME, and I saw the benefits of living a self harm free life could bring to ME, that it became MUCH MUCh easier to ignore the thoughts. Every day would be easier than the day before.
Now, I have great friends, a job I like, a VERY SUPPORTIVE family (who always was supportive and always was there for me, and is a large reason I was able to reach recovery, and want to stop self harm for myself), and in general a life. A real live that is worth living. My life with self harm pretty much sucked. It was impossible for me to live a life when I was always in the hospital. At the time, I didn’t really care too much, but now I do. I hope that you too can decide to quit for YOU and find the peace that comes from knowing you don’t have to self harm to get your needs met. (that was a big lesson for me).