Self Harm: An Intimate Addiction

Recovery

This isn't a movie, alright? So you've decided to put down your blades, great, good for you, good luck. Unfortunately, you don't get a time skip to a year from now, when you're healthy and happy and living on a ranch in Kansas. You have to get to your ranch, and you have to live every second of it.

The first thing you absolutely have to do, non-optional, is getting rid of all your blades, or other instruments of torture. I'm serious, alright? They're not a comfort, they're not a security blanket, they're fucking assholes and you need to toss them. Safely, though, please.

From here it gets wonky, and I'll remind you that I'm no professional. From here, all the steps are more-or-less optional, I'm really just telling you what worked for me and what I think I could have done better.

You have to find something to replace cutting. Be it time spent, emotions vented, or punishment earned--you've gotta swap it out for something, or else you'll be staring at the wall thinking about bleeding. Not cool. For me, well, I took up writing. I'd write with pens and paper, I'd type on the computer, I'd write stories in my head. I made a journal devoted to trying to get better at writing with my left hand--I'm not kidding, why else do you think I'm ambidextrous now? I started counting the coins in my piggy bank, I'd clean my bathroom and my room and organize my books. I'd put in ear buds and crank the B-52's, I fell in love with Panic! at the disco and Twenty One Pilots. 

I used to sit on my bed and snap a rubber band around my wrist to the beat of 'I write sins, not tragedies'. I used to write really shitty poems about cutting and being clean. That's the fun part of quitting, I think. Because you don't think about how you're coming across--and if you are thinking about how you're coming across, turn up your music and drown your thoughts in sound.

You be cringy, you be stereotypical, you be melodramatic and depressing all you like because it's just you and the fact that you're not cutting. Depending on who you are and what you're like, you might find that writing down every little detail about self-harming and hurting yourself and hating yourself is useful (I did). Or, you might like writing about your favorite things and sunshine and happiness, like my friend did. Find a routine, a topic, a distraction that works for you. This is how you will get through the first few weeks of not cutting.

There will be side-effects. You will be bitchy, you will snap at your mom, you will cry very easily, you will loose your appetite and gain it twice over. You might get too fat, you might get too thin. You might notice that your friends are distancing themselves from you. Your grade might go down, and you will feel overwhelmed. You will feel like you are drowning, like you're broken, like nothing is right and recovering isn't worth it.

But oh, my god, it's so worth it. You're so worth it. You don't deserve this, I don't care who you are or what you've done. Stop doing this to yourself. Don't hurt yourself. You are a princess, regardless of your gender, you are a magical fairy princess and you shouldn't be fucking up your lovely self.

So, okay, let's talk about feeling overwhelmed. It's going to feel like the world is rallying against you, and you've got too much to do, and everything is pressing down on your back. My suggestion? Don't knock it until you try it--make a list.

Sit down, get out a piece of notebook paper and your absolute favorite pen. Write down all the things you have to do that month, that week, that day, whatever you want.  All the things. All your daily chores, all your homework, all your social obligations and all your hobbies. Write the things you want to do, the things you don't want to do, and the things you hope you'll get to do. Then, take out another piece of paper, take out six more, and make a daily schedule.

This sounds strange, I know, it sounds boring and repetitive. But if you're anxious, or worried, or stressed, you take control over your life where you can get it. Start with the first day of the week, and go to the last day. Write down every trivial little thing, write inspirational notes in the margins. Fuck, email me the list of things you need to do and I'll make you a schedule, and I'll write helpful things on every corner of the paper. Make your schedule pretty, make it sexy, make it your best friend. Cross things off as you do them. Feel accomplished.

Another tip I found helpful: plan your outfit before you go to school. Another time-filler, another distraction, something else that's helpful. Pick out your favorite clothes and lay them out for the next day. Cross that off your list, you adorable thing.

Do little things to make yourself happier, reward yourself for no reason. This isn't self-love SJW culture, this is for you because you've been treating yourself like shit and you owe yourself. Even if you don't believe it, say nice things to yourself in the mirror. Think about things that make you smile, and smile. Don't try to be cool or anything, if something is funny to you, force yourself to laugh. Let it become real. What do you call an alligator in a vest? An investigator. Laugh at that. Laugh until you're tired of laughing. Smile when you laugh, and show everybody your teeth. 

Something that I did a lot was sing. Patrick Stump told me to sing until my lungs gave out, and I did. When my parents were home, I lip-synced very animatedly. 

Do the little things that make you happy, and don't think about cutting. It's hard, I know, but repetition breeds familiarity. Get on a schedule, wake up at the same time every day, and go to bed the same time. Eat dinner at the same time, shower at the same time. After a while, you'll get used to it. After a while, you'll get used to the fact that cutting isn't a part of your daily life. Argue with your brain when it makes you think about cutting.

Cutting? Oh no, I don't have the time to cut, I have to organize my socks while listening to a podcast. And I'll enjoy that a fuck ton more than I'll enjoy showing the sky my blood, that's for sure.