Starting Over/Coping?
 

Hey. :)

I relapsed a couple days ago after being a little over one month free and I'm finding it really hard to start recovering again. I was wondering about possible coping methods to use in place of cutting myself. Distractions aren't really helping me anymore and not many of the alternatives to SI are really having any kind of effect on me. Snapping the rubber band on my arm isn't really working for me either.

I was wondering if any of you knew any coping methods that:

*Let you feel pain without actually hurting yourself badly (besides rubber band)
*Make you feel better emotionally and help to calm you down/put you at ease.
*Serve as motivation to help people stick with recovery.

If you know anything like this then please tell me.
Thanks. :)
xxxx

If you browse a bit around the site, you'll come across quite a few ideas :)

What about... sports? Not only a good idea in any case, but it helps to get rid of pent up tension, and (especially if you're as unfit as I am) it does hurt. In a good way.

As far as experiencing pain is concerned, they say holding an icecube and such helps. Never tried that though.

Not sure what you mean about the motivation part? There are good ideas around about how to track your progress, if that's what you're getting at.

Good luck to you.

for pain.... an icecube. like aimless said, excericising or doing situps or pushups can cause some discomfort and also help get some endorphins flowing which will help raise your mood....

what calms a person down is individual to them, so that means that you may have to try different things for a while before you find one that works really well for you. listening to calm music (if on itunes you can also put the visualizer thing on), writing, doodling, art, taking a walk, reading a book or watching a movie you know well (that isn't triggering)......

for motivation you could make a list of reasons to not harm that you could keep in your pocket. make them individualized so that they are meaningful to you. they don't have to be the things that everyone says. you could also give yourself a reward for being free for an amount of time. you could make some way of visually seeing how far you've come, like putting a stone in a jar each day you're free, and taking one (not all!) out if you slip up....