I am probably just a freak... and I know that but I had to ask - does anyone else do this?
As an example - the first time my ex sold me it was not long before Christmas in an alley near a bar where I could hear a particular christmas song. He had a knife to my throat and caused some injuries both on my neck and elsewhere. Now whenever I hear this song I feel the need to cut in the exact areas that I got cut during the event, there are still scars and I sometimes end up reopening them. There are other things a bit like this too, there are just certain things/smells/sounds/words that make me sort of "zone out" (not switch, and not total dissociation but sort of like I am there but not there and I just loose all understanding of what I'm doing - sometimes this is accumpanied by flashbacks sometimes it's not) and end up causing injries which mirror the ones caused by the abuse (not just cut wise, but brusies, and other thing that will not go into too).
I have no real idea why I do this... am I total freak? DOes anyone else do this? Does anyone have any theories/ideas as to why this happens?
It's been playing in shops and on TV... Last year I ended up having to essentially never go out to avoid it as several companies used it in their adverts and so many shops kept playing it. Don't want to have to shut myself off again
I...kinda do that. My situation is different to yours, but I still put myself in a situation where I kinda...mimic...what happened to me. Not sure why. But anyways...if it's in stores and stuff, take your iPod or MP3 player or whatever you gt with you. Just avoid it on TV wen you can. But maybe it'll just get easier to deal with in time? You never know. But yeah, if it's making you feel like that, I'd suggest finding ways around it.
Perhaps you could try to associate it with something else? I do understand fear of a song, or the connotations that it holds because I go crazy if certain songs start playing. However, if you can try to associate it with something else, that might work, especially as Christmas time is drawing nearer. Otherwise, is there a way you could engage your brain differently when the song comes on? Like blank it out or something. I try to form a mental block against my songs, or hum another tune. This might be impractical and might not help but there's no harm in trying, right? I think that avoiding the song in its entirety might end up coming back to hurt you in the future. By building up a tolerance now, this might make it easier in the future.
Ye, I do think that I need to leanr to cope with it rather than avoiding it... but I'm just not sure how, and to be honest I'm a bit scared... I like the having a music player with me idea though, I will try to remember to carry my MP3 player with me. My partner thinks I should get a copy of it, and listen to it in "safe" places/siturations in order to try to take the power out of it
I think your partners idea is very good but you could only do it on your own terms and it would be really important to make sur eyou had put measures in place for when you were finding it hard to deal with.
It is understandable you are scared and you can put something off forever because you are scared, at some point you need to decide that you feel there is a possibility that you could deal with and work through it rather than just avoiding it for the rest of your life because it is obviously impacting on your life and your ability to function.
