All I hear…

More than once I have been told:

You are not badly ill, overall you are a healthy young woman.

I know it means, that I can become fine, without loosing myself in the process. It is supposed to mean that I can and will get better. But that is not what I hear. All I hear is:

I am not sick.

And there are a number of consequences to that. If they do not think I am sick, well can I stop trying to get better? Because if I am not sick there is no need for me trying. There is no need for me working. Do I have to stop being proud of myself if I resist the urge? Can I stop trying to distract myself. Stop trying to find alternatives? Can I stop keeping in mind that I cannot drink too much, because I might slip? Because substance abuse is just another symptom for an illness, that I do not have?

Or does it mean I am imposing? Do they really think I would be faking the pain? As a matter of fact I have acted hurt before, which hurt me in return. But really… no human happily physically hurts him-/herself. I do not know if it is even possible to fake being in pain to this point.

Am I creating it all myself. Am I suffering from nothing but an idea, that I created myself? Is it all the exaggeration of a drama queen. A normal reaction of a young woman to extreme fields of tension?

That is not what they are saying? Well… If I am not that sick, then what is that pain I am feeling? Why am I cutting? Why do I hurt myself? Why do passions fade away. Slip away under my hand? Why do I feel like crying might help, but all it does is leaving me more empty and more fatalistic than before.

I know. no one is trying to invalidate my emotions. No one is trying to say the way I perceive the world is untrue. But that is all I hear. If I am not terribly sick, then why did I even put up with therapy? And why am I tossed around on emotions? Why do I feel fine one moment and the next I just… wish for it all to end?

And if this is normal… please tell me how everyone puts up with it. How can one live without breaking if this is the norm? How? How is not everybody addicted to alcohol and other drugs? I am supposed to shut up and deal with it? I will gladly. If I am told how the fork this is possible.

I know it is never meant to mean any of this. I know it with my head. But it is not how it feels. Because, frankly I wish I was not sick. And when I am not spiraling down, I appreciate the efforts to cheer me up. And I am even sure, that when someone says something like that they are telling the truth. And I know that there are a great many times, where I can see that truth myself. Moments where I feel fine. Moments of happiness. But there very same statement can be so devastating when I am at my worst, because it questions my perception of things. And the issue with that is, that there is none better at doubting me than myself and that is not something that should be enhanced in any way.

I am not saying I cannot handle the truth. I am not saying that no one should ever tell me that I am mostly healthy. Because it is the truth. But sometimes what I have described is all I hear. Maybe… because it is all I want to hear.

Emotional Violence

Where is the point where we actually are sick? When is our suffering “big enough”? When is it real? Is it enough if we break down and cry on a daily basis? Do we have to hurt ourselves? Be deprived of our sleep? When does “Pull yourself together!” turn into “Ah you poor thing!”. When is it time to stop trying to push through and admit that we hurt?

There is not a lot I can say. Because pain is subjective. If you feel like crying. You are not making it up. If you feel like screaming and tearing down the place in anger. This is a valid emotion. Sure there are places where such emotional outbursts are plain inappropriate. But for the majority of the time this is our reality. This is how we feel. And it is exactly as real as we feel it. There is one thing I can say and that is that there is no point in making it worse by putting the blade to our skin. Because the people around us either support us for what we tell them we feel or they will not get what the cuts mean either. Someone who really loves us will never need bloody proof of the pain we are going through.

And we shouldn’t either. We should not be questioning our own emotions to the point where we just want to put a label to it. To the point where we cut ourselves, just to justify that we are not feeling alright. Just to prove how awful we feel. Just to prove how worthless we feel. How misunderstood we feel.

We are not sick the moment we cut to know and prove we are not alright. We are sick the moment we consider doing it. It is not about whether or not we have the strength to withstand that thought. We always feel that we have to be strong and that we need to fight it. And I agree, we do need to try to get better. But that does not mean, that if we feel down we are worthless. Because our emotions are absolutely valid and anyone how does not see that does not belong into our close circles because they are bound to hurt us.

I know I am a person who always tries to explain and justify anything I feel. And sometimes I get mad at myself for getting frustrated by something as little as a messed up nail-polish. But isn’t this kind of mindset just an emotional act of violence against us? And can this not even lead to us cutting? Because we want a label. Because we want to stop justifying why we hate ourselves. And we cut to make it obvious. By this logic cutting can start with emotional violence against ourselves.

If someone tells you “You are to harsh on yourself.” They may have seen exactly this. And most likely have a valid point. The thing is: we cannot expect that we just flip a switch and are in total love with ourselves. And again: we are not expected to. But I think that the first step to healing. Really healing. Not just stopping to cut, but healing on the inside, is to start acknowledging our emotions and allowing ourselves to have them. To be kind to ourselves.

Memories and their impact on us

Determinism. According to Wikipedia “Determinism is the philosophical belief that all events are determined completely by previously existing causes”. I like to hate on Determinism. Why? Because I had a very good friend who used it to justify anything. And even though he denied it, it felt to me that he was not taking responsibility for anything. To this day I still remember. And I remember that I have chosen to not use Determinism to be able to do whatever I want. But I also know that our past and our circumstances have an incredible impact on us.

This is just one example. I will always associate Determinism with that friend. And I will always remember the conversations we had about how we hardly have any free will and how helpless and sad that made me feel. But it is not the only thing that I associate with Determinism. Because I have seen that point of view, I was able to make up my own mind. And Memories are a perfect example, for how our past is part of us, but not what defines us.

We have memories. Maybe we associate a song or a movie with a certain person or situation. And every time we get confronted with said song or movie we remember. But the thing is: if that memory pains us we can do something about it. We can reprogram our brains to associate the movie or song with something else. It is like we are overwriting the memory. It is called learning. And yes, we may never forget anything that once was correlated with that song or movie. But that is actually a good thing. This memory is part of us. And we learn something with everything we experience. But just because we do not forget, does not mean that we will always remember that certain person or situation with the particular song or movie. And it will definitely not make us loose ourselves, just because the song was played in the mall.

When we look into our past, we will find things that we consider mistakes. And there is no use in denying anything. Just because we wish something never happened, we cannot simply forget it. Those memories are part of who we are today. And coming to terms with those things means admitting our mistakes. Sometimes even regretting them. But we cannot dwell on them. Because our past does not define our future. Our past may be an explanation to certain things, but do not let it be an excuse. We must learn how to rewire our brains such that we do not suffer an emotional reaction every time we think of certain chapters of our past. (Don’t get me wrong, emotional reactions are nothing to be ashamed of. But there are certain times, when we’d rather not show them, because they would be plain inappropriate.)

We cannot deny our past. But we can decide how we react to it. We can decide what we take from it. We can decide how we want to live right now.

I do not know if some day I will not feel triggered every time I run across a craft-knife or a classical razor-blade. But I know that I have not cut in a month and that this is something I can be grateful for. Every time I see those blades I can remember the pain of this world. And I can be grateful that I have experienced some of it. Because it means that when I say “I understand, what you are feeling.” I am not lying. I know that my cutting has given me a totally different approach to addiction and I dare say I understand it better now. And if all it did, was teaching me how to be less judgemental, I am grateful.

I do not deny that I have the urge to take a blade and just run it over my skin, especially in the evenings. Especially when I am alone. But whether or not I do is not predetermined. Just because I have cut in the past, does not mean, that will do it again in the future.

A totally different aspect of memories is, that I believe it is, what ties us to people. Because if we could not remember, we would never get close to anyone. We would never learn to value or fear the people in our lives. And this is important to keep in mind, when we want to interact with people. When we wish to get close to someone. Sharing memories is probably one of the strongest bonds there is. And the friendships that can grow from those bonds is precious beyond words.

Forgetting someone we share a lot of emotional memories with… I do not think it is possible. We come across people in our lives, that we may wish to forget. But chances are we will never get them out of our heads. Because we do not simply forget memories. We can do the same as with anything: Reprogram. But we will never really forget. And I wish I could say I am okay with that. And some day I think I will be. Everyone who we across will teach us something. And we do not want to forget those lessons. The pain will fade with time. But the memory will stay. We will remember. And thinking about it is beautiful, because sharing memories with someone we may not engrave our names in their heart (huh this line is cheesy) but we will engrave the lesson that we taught them in their brain. Which is worth so much more.

All in all: we cannot forget our mistakes. We cannot forget people. But we can choose our future. We can choose to learn from the past. And to not make the same mistakes again. And this way even when we cannot get rid of the painful memories, we grow. We learn to understand the world and ourselves. And those memories will keep the lessons alive. This is forgetting is not even that desirable. We want the pain to fade. I get it. I really do. And it will fade. But there is no need for us to fight the memories. Fight our past selves. We just need to have the courage to accept who we were and who we are today. And then we can decide who we will be in the future.

-Positivity- Why even bother?

When we are in tough spot and we feel like the world is ending there are always those people who are going to tell you to “stay positive” and all you want to do is punch those people in the face. Because they really have no idea what they are talking about, do they? I have a counter-question for you: Does it matter if they understand? Isn’t all that should matter, whether they are right or not?

Why should we try to stay positive? I have quite a simple answer for you: Because it is easy to fall into self-loathing. And when we fall into that pit, getting out is hard. So hard, that our recovery process will become an immense challenge. This is why I think, that we should try to focus on the positive at least once a day. And while positivity may not directly contribute to our getting better, negativity will do the exact opposite: make us worse. And if we do not “try to stay positive” for positivities sake then at least we do it to not fall into negativity.

In my eyes this is, why we should try to put positivity into this world. In thoughts and actions. It is not only that the people around us will thank us for it, but also, we ourselves, will benefit from it. I am not saying we need to have a big smile on every second of the day. I do not say that we may not feel our pain. I just say, we should not forget that there is something else than our pain.

The very first step

The first step in recovering from anything is probably the hardest, but it is also very simple: it is admitting to ourselves, that we are not as fine, as we like to make everyone (including ourselves) believe. With a mental disorder it is just so easy to deny that we are sick and push through everyday life.

The problem is that we cannot fight something, that we do not even admit is there. And fight we must, because those things, they don’t just disappear. Who are we kidding, when we say: “It’s just a rough patch, it’s gonna get better.” No, it’s not. But that is not a problem. Because we can and we will get better, once we stop living in ignorance.

But, why do we choose to live in ignorance? Why do we lie to everybody? Why do we prevent ourselves from actually getting better? There are many reasons. (In fact I believe nothing in context with self-harm is simple.) One of them is being afraid of being judged. The little sister of that one is being ashamed. Then there is the hate we feel for ourselves and the idea that we deserve to suffer, because we are a failure. The idea that we cannot be helped. Or the thought that it is not a problem. That it will resolve itself. That we are just making it up.

All of those are reasons keeping us from seeing the truth. For me personally it was the thinking that I was just being a drama queen in search for attention. And I did not want to reward that by giving my problem any attention. I was ashamed of myself, because I did not understand one thing: Even if we are doing it for attention, there is everything wrong with thinking that is a reason for not being worth to treat our self-harm. There are so many other ways to gain attention, hurting ourselves is not something that we are naturally drawn to. In fact it is what we are trying to avoid at all cost. So, there is no way that we “just want to get attention”. There is definitely something else going on. There is a good reason, we are yearning to be seen. And we need to deal with that. Not hide it.

No matter what we feel, self-harm is a problem. And we are allowed to view it as such. We do not need to be ashamed of it. We did not ask for it. And no matter, what it is that makes us think, we are a failure. We are not. And we do not deserve to suffer. We deserve to be helped, to overcome this. We deserve to be loved. We are loved. In our darkest hours we tend to forget this. But we are loved. So we deserve to love ourselves. With all that we are. Including our self-harm. The goal is not to hate ourselves for it. The goal is to help us get better.

And in order to get better. In order to believe ourselves, when we say, that we suffer from self-harm, I find it helpful to talk to someone about it. Because most of our reasons for not admitting what is going on, is a hate for ourselves, and a fear of being judged. So the experience, that other people do not hate and judge us for our self-harm is so helpful in actually seeing how it is may be a problem but it is nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing to hide. Trusting someone with our issue shows nothing but great strength. And honors the person we trust. I have made the exprience that those people highly appreciate our trust and faith in them and will try everything they can to help us get better.

But before we can get better, we need to view self-harm as a disorder that we have. A disorder that is not our fault. That does not lessen, the wonderful person we are. So please, if you are affected, allow yourself to have those issues, without hating yourself for them. Because you are an inspeakablely precious person, no matter what you run into!