Therapy Session

Confessing My Bad Coping Habits

I have had many traumatic and life-changing experiences in my life, as many people unfortunately do, but what's more unfortunate is how people cope. The way I cope is no different in this way.
The negative effects of my experiences come in waves of unexplained hatred and dissatisfaction of myself, my life, and my accomplishments. I have so many regrets in my life and they consume me. I regret not being there for my friends, family, and pets who all died because of something preventable. I regret not telling my great grandmother I loved her before she died. I regret not spending time with my friend Ashley and Dewy before they killed themselves, and I regret all of the time I've wasted in my life. I hate myself for being so naive, weak, and foolish. I always believed that I could make a last second comeback for everything. I'm lazy and I'm foolish. Not once has anything worked out for me because of my profoundly ignorant view on life.
This is a confession of how I cope, and you might be wondering why I dragged it on with the son story. I only say the details to help me get everything related to the topic off my chest. I guess I'm trying to justify my stupidity, I dont know.
When I first started feeling depressed and the regrets, and negative feelings began piling up, I was horrible at coping. I remember I was 5 when I first started feeling horrible about myself and I'd go to my room and punch my face and punch my shoulders, legs, etc in hatred of myself. I did this quite frequently in fact and it got worse to the point my mother had to call in her mother to hold me down to stop me from hitting myself. I guess she didn't want child protective services to blame it on her. I'm grateful for that. My coping only progressed for the worst from there. Around late elementary school and middle school I was always angry. I'd lash out at everyone and fight everyone. I would beat myself up too! I even tried to stab myself in the heart with a pocket knife when I was 10 but I was stopped by a 16 year old boy who lived with us at the time and my mother. I tried poising myself many times, hanging myself, jumping in front of a car, and starving myself. I'm still feeling the effects of all that, especially the starvation to this day!
I think most of my suicidal behavior was prodominatley how I tried to cope in middle school and early highschool. I'm happy to say much of that has subsided for now and hopefully, for my sake, forever. So why confess if there's nothing bad anymore?
Well I still believe my main coping methods are still bad and that's why I'm confessing them. I still act out violently when I'm angry, albeit on inanimate objects and not humans mostly, but it still is a thin line that seperates me lashing out at a human and lashing out on equipment.
Many of the things I do include: punching walls, training without safety or protective equipment for several hours with no rest or water, punching a heavy bag until my knuckles bust, smashing my bones with a wooden rolling pin, punching myself, etc.
My problem is that I cope by destroying myself because I believe that my troubles come from my hatred for myself and my regret. The problem is that I don't know how to rid myself of these methods in favor of something far better. It's easy to contemplate what I could do instead but when the mindset is flicked on, hurting myself in one way shape or form is just instinct.
I find it amazing however that I've gone past the suicidal phase, but I can't seem to see this as better. It's almost like I want to live to suffer another day instead of trying to save myself from it all. And the funny thing as that I'm the only thing in my life making me suffer at this point. Most of the horrible things of my childhood either don't affect me anymore ore they are gone altogether. So why do I still always feel depressed? Why do I always hate myself as much as I do? What is it that immures me in this prison of negative emotions? Is there really anything keeping me depressed or is it just verisimilitude? The truth is that I don't know. Maybe one day I'll figure it out.

That concludes this confession. I appreciate everyone's time in reading this. Feel free to leave any thoughts you might have below. Anyhow, that's all. Until next time.