First let me say kudos to those of you who are willing to take a chance and work on trying to stop. For those of you reading this who are not ready to stop, keep the information handy, as there will come a day when you are ready. If that day is not today, don't beat yourself up. Do what you need to do to survive.

I am not one to advocate a 'cold turkey' approach to stopping self injury. For me and many others I have spoken with, it simply doesn't work. Everyone is unique, and if you can stop 'cold turkey', great! If you have tried to do that and failed, you are not the only one. I look at it this way: if someone takes away your only way of coping with emotional stress, you are left feeling even more desperate and vulnerable and now have no way to cope with those feelings. To me, this isn't a way to help someone learn better methods of coping (although not everyone would agree).

I see self injury as very cyclical behaviour, and the way to stop it, in my opinion, is to interrupt that cycle. For me, what worked was putting measures in place that helped me to interrupt the cycle, even if only for a few brief moments. Slowly, those moments of interruption will become longer and longer, leading to a break in the cycle completely. Here is a picture of the cycle of self injury:

Each of the numbers represents a point where you can interrupt the cycle. Let's look at what can be done at each of these points. Keep in mind, I am not saying you can't self injure, just that you try something else before you do.

1. STEP ONE: This is usually the first place I would recommend you start when working at delaying/breaking the cycle. What this involves is doing something else to try and discharge what you are feeling before you resort to self injury. Keep in mind, the delay doesn't have to be long at first. Even 1 minute is a success. If you need some help with trying to figure out what to do when you feel like self injuring, check out some alternatives here. The trick is to increase the amount of time you delay the self injury each time you feel like self injuring. Again, this doesn't need to be huge amounts. Start with 1 minute, then 2, then 5, then 10. Don't increase the delay until you are able to handle the current amount (ie don't go to 10 minutes if every time you try 5 minutes you only last 2). Small steps are GOOD! Once you have achieved at least 10-15 minutes delay before you self injure, you can proceed to number 2.

2. STEP TWO: Once you have been able to delay your self injury for approx 10-15 minutes, you are at a place where you can start to work on what feelings are causing you to self injure. I have found that most people who self injure have trouble expressing or even identifying feelings. The first step to this is identifying what you feel. I used to feel very overwhelmed when it came to actually feeling something, and would do anything I could to avoid feeling things. For me, as soon as I felt something uncomfortable, I would immediately self injure. I thought that if I endured certain feelings for too long (ie. anger) I would explode or go crazy. I was totally overwhelmed, and that felt unbearable!

I found it helpful to actually have a list of feelings on paper in front of me to look at. You may not know what you feel, but you can at least look at the sheet, and pick 2 or 3 that come close. Once you have identified what you feel, work on figuring out what you feel in your body when you feel certain feelings. For example, when I get angry or anxious, my stomach tightens up and I feel almost sick to my stomach. I never used to know that that meant anger, but once I did, it didn't seem as overwhelming. The trick here is to identify what you are feeling. Once you can identify a feeling, you can try specific alternatives to target those feelings and eventually, express them in a healthier way. Hopefully, the amount of time you take to identify and try an alternative for a specific feeling, likely you will have delayed the self injury even longer.

3. STEP THREE: Since can now at least identify what you are feeling (even some of the time), you can now start to look at other ways to express these feelings. This mainly involves being able to recognize feelings, what triggers them, and how you can tolerate and express them without self injuring. By now, you may have also started to see some patterns within your own self injury. If not, try creating a log of what happens before, during and after you self injure. This can include what events took place, how you felt at the time, and what thoughts went through your head. After about a week of logging these kinds of things, you should notice some similarities. There is usually something that happens right before you feel like self injuring. I call those triggers: events that trigger an emotional response that makes you want to self injure. Once you have identified your specific triggers (ie. getting into a fight with someone you love, failing a test, etc.) you can plan for ways to be ready for them.

So....just how to you prepare for a trigger? This involves having a list of alternatives handy, and seeking out extra support if you are likely to be triggered (ie. have a friend come with you somewhere, have phone numbers of people you can call for support). Knowing what situations are likely to set you off means you can bring in all of your back up plans, and at the very least delay any self injury.

Once you have been able to identify you triggers, and delay your self injury for at least 15 minutes, you are ready to try stepping things up a notch. This will not be easy, and you are likely to have setbacks. Don't let them discourage you! Self injury is one of the hardest things I have ever had to quit in my life! You CAN DO IT! Now, instead of just delaying, we are going to try to not self injure. This again, doesn't mean you CAN'T, just that you are committed to REALLY trying not to. You have learned to identify you feelings, delay self injury, and identify triggers. Now comes time to use all of those skills together to ride out the urge to self injure, until it passes.

Riding out the urge to self injure is easier said than done. Here are a few pointers that may help you use the skills you have already learned.

1. Don't forget what you have already learned!
2. Start by identifying what you are feeling, and how it feels in your body.
3. Remember that you have delayed these urges before, and now all we are really doing is delaying it long enough that it goes away.
4. Consider creating a no harm contract with yourself, and have your alternatives listed on this contract. Having something tangible right in front of you in a crisis makes it a lot easier to use.
5. When you feel an emotion, try to just sit with it, and feel it, knowing that eventually, it will end. No one has died from sitting with a feeling and feeling it (from what I know!).
6. If you are having trouble sitting with that feeling, try expressing what you are feeling to someone or something. This can be verbally, orally, or even through art. This is a lot harder than self injuring, as it challenges you to truly experience what you are feeling. There is no right or wrong way to express what you feel on paper, that's why I tend to choose this one. But feel free to talk to a friend, a pet, a door, write a nasty letter to someone and don't send it, paint or draw something. Anything that gets to naming and verbalizing your feelings.
7. If you are STILL having trouble sitting with that feeling, try doing something to 'self-soothe'. This means try to do something nice for yourself, instead of a self injury alternative. (FYI-Some alternatives may also double as self-soothing activities). This can be anything from taking a warm bath, drinking a warm cup of hot chocolate, playing a computer game, calling a friend who is supportive, holding an object that makes you feel comfortable. WHATEVER works for you! I would also suggest making a list ways you can self-soothe, and keep it with your alternatives list. Instead of hurting yourself, I am challenging you to try loving (or even just liking) yourself. If you don't have any ideas on how to be nice to yourself and self-soothe, ask friends/family what they do to take care of themselves. Personally, I eat chocolate, or drink a fancy cappuccino, and write in my journal, but whatever works for you is great.
8. If THAT doesn't work, go back to your alternatives list and try some of those. By this time, you should be getting tired of all of the steps I am asking you to go through, and maybe you just want to go to bed and forget the whole self injury thing!!! (that's my hope) If not, try a couple of alternatives before you self injure. At this point, I want you to honestly try EVERYTHING before you self injure.

I can't say enough that stopping will likely be one of the most difficult things you have ever done. Take time to celebrate your successes, and give yourself a break if you fail once in a while. Keep at it, and I know you will get there. I never though I could, but I can say that I am now 'self injury free'. Let me know if these suggestions help or hinder your goal of stopping. Don't forget, any progress is good progress!