I think self-injury is like a boomerang. No matter how far in the past Iapos;ve left it, it always manages to come back into my life at the most inopportune moments.
Believe it or not, I havenapos;t thought about self-injury in a day or two. Iapos;ve been so busy with other things that it literally hasnapos;t crossed my mind.
Until today.
When someone asked me about my scars.
Again.
Itapos;s true that theyapos;re fading, but theyapos;re not completely gone. I have finally reached a place in my life where I donapos;t "see" them like I used to, so it continues to surprise me when others do.
Iapos;m not ashamed of them. But itapos;s hard to move on sometimes when the past continues to crop up in the present.
I wonder if there will ever be a time when I will be able to say that self-injury is 100 a thing of the past? Emotionally? Physically?
Or maybe thatapos;s an illusion.
Perhaps self-injury is as much a part of my make-up as my being left-handed is.
I want to understand self-injury and help others understand it too.
But at what price?
I continue to learn a lot about this disorder and its impact on my life. When I stopped injuring almost three years ago, I thought that was it. I underestimated the power of the urges, the rational of the inner dialogue that led me to injure in the first place, and I erroniously negated the release that self-injury provided.
I thought I could just walk away without consequence.
How short-sighted.
Just because an alcoholic goes into treatment and no longer drinks doesnapos;t mean they arenapos;t an alcoholic anymore. The sense of "once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic" rings true to self-injury too Iapos;m finding out.
And like any other addiction, I believe I will always be someone who, given the right set of circumstances, could run right back into the arms of self-injury.
Thatapos;s why itapos;s imperative that I stay the course. Ignore the urges. Resist the temptation.
Iapos;m in recovery, plain and simple.
I thought Iapos;d be cured by now. But what is that, really?
I wonder if addicts ever miss their drug of choice? I wonder if they think about their "good apos;ol days" as often as I seem to?
But the reality is the old days werenapos;t good and hurting myself is no way to get through life.
But breaking the cycle has turned out to be a more difficult task than I first imagined it might be. The same lie of "I can stop any time I want to" seems to apply to everything from eating disorders to addictions to self-injury.
The truth was I couldnapos;t stop at any time.
The sad part is, I didnapos;t want to.
The reality is I had to. Had I not, I would have killed myself by accident.
Anyone who has seriously self-injured knows what Iapos;m talking about. When the anger, fear and frustration is so great, the power those feelings create can be fatalistic.
I know what itapos;s like to be so mad I could put my hand through a wall.
I also know that doing so doesnapos;t take that feeling away...for long.
Itapos;s funny how my life has changed over the last many months. No longer can I use self-injury to cope.
Instead, I am coping by other means to control the urge to self-injure.
When people ask me about my scars, it reminds me of how far Iapos;ve come. Most of them time I think I forget.
Iapos;ve managed to leave behind a behavior that I engaged in on an almost daily basis for more than 30 years.
To expect to fully leave it behind at this point is incredibly unrealistic.
I continue to get messages from all over the place asking me "how I do it?"
And I can say is one day at a time.
Maybe I wonapos;t ever be able to leave self-injury in the past. It may forever be a part of my present because of the marks Iapos;ve left on my body and peopleapos;s interest in them.
I guess thatapos;s okay. I am a survivor. No one, and I mean no one leaves this world unscathed in some way.
I just happened to mark myself instead of letting the world make its mark on me.
One day, I hope to understand why.
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