Setting myself up for a fall

[AmZ]

I'm setting myself up for a fall.

I am in the hospital all weekend and then Sunday and Monday it's a festival so there is no art room, individual or group therapies.

And all that is going around in my head is to self-harm.

The last time I self-harmed, I posted here and of course, rightly, your advice was to go and tell a nurse what I did. But I knew I'd screwed up and if I were to tell the staff then I would lose my place in the rehab program and be moved to the new women's closed ward (now separate from the men).

I know it's silly but what stops me more so is not wanting to go to the closed ward because there is a woman there that I was hospitalised with for 6 months and she drives me absolutely insane.

Then I think again, maybe I'll do it a bit, just to get it out of my system and not tell anyone.

But I know that's a bad direction to go in to.

I feel so stuck in between these states.

If I go to the nurse, he'll straight away offer me Clonazepam but it's just like a sugar pill to me now I think. The language barrier is difficult and anyway, I don't know how to make sense or explain this self destructiveness.

I can't screw up.

---------- Post Merged at 05:28 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 05:02 PM ----------

Damn this is really tough. I spoke with the nurse whilst I was getting my Seroquel and I said I don't feel well. He said he doesn't really want to give me Clonazepam now as then I won't be able to take it at bedtime and I've been taking it the last few nights to help me sleep. I can't calm down. What can I do?

---------- Post Merged at 06:42 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 05:02 PM ----------

I've got myself obsessed over what I want to do to myself and its not good. Worse than what I'd normally do. I can say goodbye to my place in the rehab program if I do this. I can't do it.

---------- Post Merged at 08:14 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 05:02 PM ----------

And that's all I can do is darn talk to myself. There's nothing to say. Just go to the nurse AmZ. I did that three times already. They say nothing.

I took a hot shower and the nurse just gave me Clonazepam.

Hand yourself over AmZ, go to the loopy closed ward and be kept awake all night by screaming patients. Go crazy yourself.

I tried to talk to my sister but she doesn't know what to say. That was awkward.

I'm alone with nobody.

 

[AmZ]

I could kind of see this happening. (Not that that is an excuse). I just self-harmed a bit and I want to do more.

I did it very impulsively. Just came across something that had been dropped on the floor and did it.

So I decide now. Am I ready for the rehab program? Do I need to give my place up? I didn't and don't want to screw things up for me.

At the moment, first and foremost is not to be moved to the closed ward. I know it sounds like the last of my worries but there is an American woman in there that drives me crazy and I seemingly can't get away from. She's in mania and psychosis and doesn't even realise it herself.

Damn, I've screwed up.

There's no rehabilitation program for me if I go and tell the nurses now.

I don't want to say 'its only mild, what I did' but regardless, I still want to do it more.

 

[GDPR]

Can't you do something instead of SI?

I sometimes wear a rubber band around my wrist and when the urge hits, I snap that sucker really super hard, enough to really hurt and leave a mark. Sometimes when I get that 'itch' in other places, like upper arms, I smack them a bunch of times. Sometimes I write on myself with a permanent marker, in spots where I want to do harm.

You really can fight the urges, but you really gotta try. Are you trying, I mean really putting an effort into not doing it, or are you doing it and THEN thinking you should try?

---------- Post Merged at 12:20 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 12:11 PM ----------

Sorry if I made it sound like it's easy to NOT do. It's definitely not easy and takes alot of hard work and determination.

 

[AmZ]

I put in my full effort today and still failed. I went to the nurses a few times. Received sedatives and an injection. Slept for three hours. Went for a fast thirty minute walk, had a hot shower. Sometimes these techniques just don't work for me.

If there hadn't have been that thing on the floor then I don't think I would have gone in to my cupboard for something else. I was just extremely impulsive.

I'm now messed up between what to do. Tell the nurses and be moved to the closed ward. That will mean that I will lose my place in the rehab program that everyone keeps telling me is great and I spent two months in and it's darn tough.

If I tell the nurses then I not only miss out on moving to the rehab program in a few days time but I will also have to stay in the hospital until something else suitable comes up which could take months.

Damn. And I think I'm going to do it again. It's like a darn addiction.

---------- Post Merged at 07:58 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 07:23 PM ----------

Just went to the nurse. I'm racing inside to do something again. Didn't tell her what I did but cried once again and told her my frustrations so she gave me a phenergan injection.

 

[GDPR]

Don't you think you should tell the nurses,even if it means going to a closed ward? If you seriously cannot fight the urges, then actually do something to help yourself. Do the right thing and tell the nurses. It all comes down to whether you truly want to help yourself,make changes and get better or keep dicking around over and over and ending up back at square one. Aren't you getting tired of this vicious cycle you're stuck in?

Sorry for being so blunt. I'm just tired of dicking around myself and ending up back at square one over and over, and I need to stop saying i'm going to do what I need to do and just start doing it.

 

[AmZ]

I see your point of view, I really do.

But I'm taking other things in to account and it's not so easy.

I was hospitalised for 14 months and then released to a rehabilitation program where I was for two months. I struggled a lot there. It's a very difficult place to be with difficult people etc. I started feeling worse and worse and self-harmed three times there and we made a decision for me to come back to hospital. I've been p*ssing around on psych meds for the last 2 1/2 years and they're still changing them. It appears as nothing is helping me.

I've since been back at the hospital for four months and have maxed out my time to be here. So I either go back to the rehab program in a few days or I stay for longer in the hospital getting fat and living a daily routine that hardly fills up the hours.

And the closed ward where they tie people down to beds and put them in padded isolation rooms. I can't be around sick people like that. I'll go crazy myself. And there is an American woman there that drives me insane, literally. I don't know how I can cope with all the screaming at night and general running around screaming and fighting that happens there.

When am I going to be able to stop dicking around and self-harming? Nobody is helping me with it. It's just one of these things they think will go away once the medications help with the depression.

They say I am still unworkable in therapy and I feel like a failure. I just want to lay here numb and block it all out. That's why I'm asking for as many meds and injections as possible so they can calm me down and so that I can
escape this hell of a world/life for as long as possible.

 

[David Baxter PhD]

When am I going to be able to stop dicking around and self-harming? Nobody is helping me with it.

That's not true. And that wasn't the question. When are YOU going to stop saying and start doing? That was the question.

They say I am still unworkable in therapy and I feel like a failure. I just want to lay here numb and block it all out. That's why I'm asking for as many meds and injections as possible so they can calm me down and so that I can escape this hell of a world/life for as long as possible.

When have you WORKED in therapy? You haven't failed. You just haven't started. Therapy isn't something you receive. You don't just show up and get "cured". It's hard work and you have not yet even started that hard work. You're still looking for the easy way - another medication, more medication, or a therapist that will do all the hard work for you...

Ain't gonna happen... That's not the way it works.

 

[GDPR]

But don't you think that "taking other things in to account" is just making more excuses?

And, on another note, I know I can be a negative person a good majority of the time, and when I read what you write, and all the negativity, I can't help but think "man, no wonder she keeps struggling". Have you ever thought that maybe you CAN get better? That you WILL get better?

Nobody can fix this for you but you. Nobody can help you unless you start helping yourself first. If you're looking for a helping hand, look at the end of your own arm first.
(btw, this isn't solely directed at you, I need to remind myself of this too)

 

[AmZ]

I'm doing everything that I can possibly do in therapy.

I don't know what else I can do.

You don't know me personally so how can you say that I don't put effort in to therapy?

Do you know how my therapists have said that I am doing all I can?

And they're all saying that I need more help from the medications. And regardless of that, I am still buying self-help books and memoirs of people who had BPD.

I feel like f*cking giving up. I honestly do.

I put my heart and soul in to trying to get better. I've just gone for weeks wanting to self-harm and have now gotten to the end of my tether and have done it. It sucks.

From what I can gain from what you're saying, I'm not going to succeed in the way I am doing things.

I try to put things in to action, like from these self help books and my therapist tells me, put your hand on your heart and feel your heart beating and your breathing. That's all she says to me. That's meant to stop me from self-harming? I've received no other tools from her.

I'm mightily p*ssed off.

You may find me in one of those isolation rooms if I let all this out.

 

[rdw]

Look at the title of this thread - "Setting myself up for a fall" That is a self-fulfilling prophecy - you did nothing to stop yourself from self-harming. Did you tell the nurses or the staff what you have done or planned to do? You have been given numerous suggestions and sound advice from others who have been in your situation however you repeatedly come back with your story - "thanks BUT" "I hear you BUT". And if you need to be in one of the isolation rooms or in the closed ward then have yourself placed there. That would be an improvement over repeating the same harmful coping skills you rely on over and over again.
Nothing changes if nothing changes.

 

[Banned]

You posted this in your other thread on mania:

That's what I want, is an addiction... Some place where I can go and escape to and get out of the reality of this world.

That doesn't sound like you're working as hard as you can.

Just sayin....

 

[AmZ]

I'm losing it, I really am. Just with the nurse for an hour can't stop crying. Maybe you guys are right. The more I carry on like I'm doing, I'm going to fail (and just end up dead.)

I'm trying. I want to get better. I don't want to carry on feeling like this. It's hell.

I can't stop crying I'm in so much pain.

---------- Post Merged at 10:50 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 10:09 PM ----------

Boo hoo AmZ. I know, right.

Just called my psychologist from the hospital who told me to call her at any time and she's not in till Wednesday. Spoke with her and cried some more.

Anyway. I've really had enough of some of the responses I'm getting and the stuff I'm getting edited put of my posts which are not removed from others posts. Or (of others) that are semi removed like one today with just the triggering content removed and post left on view.

I feel that nobody likes me here and I'm just annoying. Receiving comments from admin such as 'you're not the centre of the world' wow I don't think I feel any further from that. That's such a wrong statement. I'm just in a mess and calling out for help. If anything, I feel like I'm a useless piece of sh*t that doesn't deserve anything.

People say 'oh, I messed up today' (self-harming) and they don't get their posts removed. I said 'damn I self harmed. I messed up' and the content is taken out. Maybe if that is triggering others then what THEY are posting me is triggering ME?

 

[David Baxter PhD]

I get that you're feeling picked on here.

But you know what? True support is not the same as sympathy or pity or telling you what you want to hear. True support is telling you what you need to hear.

You have had a LOT of support (and advice) here. Most of it you ignore. What you want is false support, sympathy... "you're right, AmZ... you're just not getting the treatment you need... people just don't understand you".

If that's what you're seeking, you'll probably find lots of other forums that will give it to you. Maybe you already have.

But you know what? None of that will help you. The support you've received here will help you... if you'd only actually listen to it and act on it.

 

[Cat Dancer]

If you see something triggering to you then you can report the post. There's a little triangle with an exclamation point on it used for reporting. Admin will evaluate the post to see if it really is triggery and edit or remove it if necessary.

Also what do you mean by "unworkable in therapy?"

 

[AmZ]

I hear you Dr Baxter. I just don't really see where I am going against the advice I get here. I admit, now there has been two times where I self-harmed and didn't tell the nurses which was recommended for me to do. But you'd also recommended to go to them and talk and get medications, go for a walk, take a shower, take deep breaths and I did that.

But surely I'm not the only one going against or not following people's advice here. Plenty of times I've seen "why did you stop taking your medications?" And plenty of things where there has been debate between the advice given and the person at hand.

CD- all of my therapists have said that I need more help from the medications before I can really make strides in therapy. They said that if I am taking overdoses or self-harming, not wanting to live and have that bad a low mood then the medications are not helping enough. They're still saying I'm going to have bad days here and there but not to the extent of being frozen crying my eyes out in bed and so on.

On one hand I am going stir crazy in the hospital. I am bored out of my brain. But on the other, I don't think I'm still stable enough to leave. It's a very difficult thing to decide upon. But my psychologist here at the hospital has said she recommends that I give the rehab program a go and at the worst, I have nothing to really lose, just would have missed out on something to gain perhaps. But perhaps the place isn't suitable for me. So we'll see.

I woke up crying several times during the night. In all of these 2 1/2 years, I've never cried so much before. I'm out of control.

 

[MHealthJo]

Amz can I ask, if you go into the rehab program and then SI, do you lose your place in it?

 

[AmZ]

Amz can I ask, if you go into the rehab program and then SI, do you lose your place in it?

Yes. I was there for two months before and had signed to say no self-harming, alcohol and all the rest of it. Then I self-harmed three times whilst I was there so we made the decision for me to come back to hospital. Now I've been back in hospital, I've self-harmed once which they know about and twice that they don't.

If I go back to the rehab program and SI one more time then I need to leave and give my place up.

And I have to be honest there, otherwise I'll get nowhere. The same in the hospital, I know but I didn't want to tell them because the manager of the rehab program said even if I SI in the hospital, I won't be coming back.

It's very difficult to lie and not tell them what I've done. Only yesterday I SI and I so desperately want to stop it but sometimes I get caught out.

 

[MHealthJo]

So either way, if you be honest at this point, you're out of the whole program? Can't even go back to the closed ward?

If you went back to the closed ward, what situation happens then? Where would your next place be if you eventually moved on?

If you are in the rehab program and then mess up, what happens to you? Where do you go?

 

[AmZ]

Yep. If I'm honest about what I did then I'd be out of the program.

Every time I self-harm I get moved to the closed ward for a day or number of days. And I tell myself that I never want to go back and therefore never want to self-harm again and then another month later or so, I've self harmed again.

I can request to be put in the closed ward at any time I like. Even if I haven't self-harmed. I've been there before a couple of times because I was feeling extremely suicidal and felt like a danger to myself.

My psychiatrist can decide on the level of self-harming as to how long I need to be in the closed ward for. Both my psychiatrists before have said that the closed ward is not the place for me but I'd self-harmed so they had no other option.

If I go back to the rehab program and self-harm then it'll be a one way train back to the hospital. Then it'll take a few-several months until I'll find another framework to go in to. I spoke with my psychologist and she's said that she's already found another program for me that seems suitable so I don't need to worry if it doesn't work out at this rehab program.

I'm in a different situation here where all of my family live back in England asides from my sister so I don't have a home per se. Otherwise I could be living with my dad for example, have more support and attend a day program or something. But I have nowhere to go in the country longer than a weekend at my sisters.

It's very difficult to know what to do.

---------- Post Merged at 10:28 PM ---------- Previous Post was at 07:05 PM ----------

This is no good. I want to SI again tonight. Why am I self-destructive? I want to ruin things for myself? I don't understand it.

Tonight is different. I don't have any emotions. I feel as hard as a rock physically and mentally and want to SI and be in control.

 

[MHealthJo]

The "why" of it can be so confusing... I guess I know a small amount about addictions, in the sense that "relief from emotional pain" and "going away to a better place" via the endorphins (or whatever the full SI mechanism is) resembles addiction. The other motivators are trickier to understand for others I guess... the "grounding" thing, the sense of some sort of control... When others do not feel this terrifying out-of-controlness, extreme emptiness, or extreme unreality/disconnected sort of feeling...

I do really feel for these awful sensations of the disorder...

In the reading I've been doing, one part that also must be hard for many to understand is the thing where the action may also express the person's sense of perceived victimood and helplessness... The person feels the need to rely on high levels of care, support, and attention... Which we all need a little of for maximum happiness,but in this disorder, in a much different or more intense way... and so any sensing of withdrawal of these things or a sense of rejection (whether real or imagined) becomes terrifying/intolerable, and until new skills are learned and practiced over the longterm, and the person feels some confidence in those new skills and lessons, the SI can be like a "proof" of not being ready... not being "okay"... proof of still needing the high levels of what the person considers as support. Add the impulsivity... very complex, very tricky... If only there were a drug that magically removed impulsivity... I guess emphasizing the importance of making the environment safe, setting up for success rather than failure...

But that's not what the person will go for if they can't see an alternative yet to the SI... if they can't yet make that leap of faith or take that risk, of really facing life without it...

Urgh, apologies also, i accidentally tapped the "like" button above, earlier. I hate it when that happens - accidentally liking something sad or awful...
the pitfalls of modern communication filled with "Like" buttons. Haha