Tempted

[KillerKing]

Hi,

This is kind of a late night post just to vent somewhere and tell someone, anyone, what's going on in my head. I just feel so lost in myself. I've recently moved away to Uni and I've never ever, ever even thought about abusing my own body. Not until the stress that is. I've punched walls a couple of times out of anger and that sort of thing but never had I been tempted to cut myself!!! To actually physically harm myself. It was approaching the final deadlines and there was work I hadn't done and I was so scared and stressed and upset that I don't even know where the thought came from. This was a couple of weeks ago now.

The point is, I did. It wasn't much. I just took my razor that I use for shaving and just ever so slightly pressed, and moved it across my arm. I was scared at the same time. I didn't even think it would do anything but it did. The pain was so slight, but there was a cut there. Two actually. Two very thin lines of blood.... and it felt good. That's the worse part. I felt like the bad emotions just had somewhere to leak out of. I think it's actually left a slight scar. Not badly. No one would notice unless I told them, and I alone know what it really is.

I keep getting thoughts to do it again. It wasn't as bad as I thought. It didn't take much and certainly didn't hurt. I feel... I just feel like I'm not who I want to be. I don't know anymore.

I don't even know what's keeping me sane. I just need to get it out there. I couldn't bear to tell my girlfriend this. I'm scared she'd dump me, and I don't really have any close friends either.

You don't have to tell me not to do it again. I'm not looking for attention either! (Because I feel like people would think that). If I'm gonna do it. I'll do it... and get caught in a cycle of regretting it, hating myself, getting over it and then doing it again. I just needed to vent.

Thanks

[Desuetude]

If I'm gonna do it. I'll do it... and get caught in a cycle of regretting it, hating myself, getting over it and then doing it again. I just needed to vent.
I know you've said you only needed to vent and don't want anyone to tell you to stop but I'm not, esentially it's your own choice whether you continue or not we're just here to help you in the right direction. Whether that's the one you pick is up to you.

Firstly, you've found the cause of what's making you want to harm yourself; stress. That's always the thing to look for when trying to stop. If you want to you can now look for alternatives to either prevent yourself from stressing so much or distract you from wanting to harm yourself when you do. Now we know the first isn't likely to happen because of your big workload however maybe by orgianising yourself better you can prevent the stress from building up. It's difficult but if you made a rota of when you were going to study, what you would get done during that time which you would then be able to tick off once you had completed it then it wouldn't be left until the final few days. This will take a lot of motivation, maybe give yourself an insentive to get it done like once you've finished ___ you allow yourself to play video games for an hour or whatever you're into.

However if you believe that that's not going to do you any good then self harm definitely isn't the way to turn to deal with stress. That's one of the reasons I started self harming 2 years ago and to this day whenever school, my parents, my friends, any small thing stresses me out I immediately turn to self harm. That's how you will end up if you continue. You could have a tiny argument with a friend and psychologically the only thing that will comfort you is drawing blood from your own skin. That's kind of sad, right?

The thing is, you know self harm is bad. You've stated that you'll most likely end up in a cycle that will repeat itself again and again yet you're willing to just go with it without even having looked at alternatives. The longer you self harm the more you'll rely on it, the deeper you'll cut and eventually you'll have so many scars that are noticable you'll feel even worse about yourself than you did when your body was 'clean'. You'll feel paranoid that people will notice, scared of taking your jumper off or wearing shorts, nervous that they'll all judge you. It will eventually ADD to the stress that started the whole thing off. Vicious cycle.

Now this can potentially be avoided if you stop, think and maybe research some alternatives. Distractions are key. If you keep your mind off it, eventually the feeling will subside. You could:
- Call or text your girlfriend
- Go for a walk or exercise
- Draw pictures or write about how you're feeling
- Draw red lines on your body to make it look like self harm
- Hold ice
- Have a shower
- Read a book
- The butterfly challenge is a good insentive to help stop and give you a reason not to continue, if you need me to explain it just tell me.

So yeah that's my essay on why you shouldn't self harm and other things you could do, even though you specified that you didn't want people to tell you to stop. I live in the UK too and it's pretty late so maybe try sleeping. You can't harm yourself when you're unconscious.

[thatgothgirluknow]

Hey dude I know u said not to tell u to stop but u need to its ur choice but I think u should know exactly what ur getting into people will judge they will find out often times self charmers withdraw from their family and friends (including me) witch makes it harder to talk and can cause sociology anxiety u will begin to relie on self.harm and it will cause more problems the only way u know how to deal with them is to self harm like u said its a cycle u can loose friends and family over it its not worth it it really isn't its addictive and u will end up cutting over the smallest things the cuts will get deeper and u could end up in the hospital witch is a situation u don't want to be in trust me

[Loner_97]

Everything seems like it is a big mess right? Eventually that will end. I cut myself too (completely different reason) and I don't know if I have the right to say anything about that. Just know if everything feels HORRIBLE then only the good can be expected.I get what you mean... I am in a similar situation... So lets just hope for things to fall into place.