Self-destruction

[sorcyress]

Mild trigger-warnings for self injury and alcohol consumption

One of the many things playing havoc with my mind right now is the ways in which I do and don't self-destruct. Because right now, I've done a rather impressive job of fouling up my life, and getting out of that, as cleanly as possible, is a fascinating challenge.

Because I mostly haven't been wanting to hurt myself. There've been a couple of broken moments, but really, for the last week or so, I've been very productive, and in a very non-damaging way. Oh sure, I'm pushing myself in a lot of ways that are foreign to me, but being this stressed and broke almost feels more like mySelf than otherwise.

I really am a creature of the eleventh hour, aren't I?

At any rate, one of the things I am finding more necessary than usual is sensory drought/drown. I don't have a better word for this, only that it is a thing that happens in my life --when I get to a certain level of off-balance, I need *something* to spring me back. And usually, that involves appealing to the basic senses, and either cutting them off entirely or overwhelming them.

(This is what led to my ill-fated attempt to dance squares blindfolded on Tuesday. Hint: it does not work, at least not without more preperation on the parts of both myself and the square proper.)

So here's some sensory stuff I do to help my brain work:

Visual: Almost always drought. Closing my eyes at the very least. Sometimes I'll makeshift a blindfold, or press my eyes into my knees or hands to get things darker and less present.

Aural: Almost always drown. Silence is all very well and good, but the LOUDER THE MUSIC the more it snaps me back to self. There's a line in Dar Willams's "As Cool as I Am" --And as long as she's got noise, she's fine.

As long as I've got NOISE, I'm fine. Because I reflect memories so thoroughly, this usually means music that I've heard a hundred times before. One of the first things on the "fix Kat" checklist is "apply ipod" for precisely this reason.

Scent and taste: I don't tend to use these. I comfort-eat sometimes (which is a thing I'm aware of and am working on, but damn, it's amazing how much blood sugar matters, and there's a lot of times where I really well find more cope by eating a candy bar), and I self-starve sometimes (because I don't want/shouldn't have any of the quick food in the house, and can't be arsed to make real food, and well Sorky, aren't you a lazy little failure who probably doesn't deserve to eat anyways) but these are always less immediate solutions to the problem of "I am out of cope".

Physical: Lots of both drown and drought here. Drought behaviours are when I pull away and can't be touched by anyone, when I tense my hands and arms and body, when I Katball --pull myself into the fetal position, wrapping everything I can around that one tiny spot where my consciousness resides.

It's arguably also drought when I become compressed in some way, and this is one of the most comfortable things. The best ever is being in a vacuum cube, and sealed in, but just being under someone is pretty good, and if I can manage it, being under enough heavy blankets, pillows, cushions, chairs, whatever to be comfortable.

(My friend Bethany has-or-had a weighted quilt, and I dream of the day when I can afford to commission one from her. It just sounds so super cozy and nice, being weighed down and burrowing under that sort of thing.)

Drowning behaviours are when I need to be cuddled, to be held, to be hugged (and it's not common). They're also when I need to dig my nails into my arms to feel a physical reaction to the mental anguish, and when I need to lick things (which is usually not as much about the taste as the texture).

It's also physical drowning when I throw my arms out to be buffeted by the wind, or best of all things, stand in the cold pouring rain and let myself become soaked by my goddess

It's *also* physical drowning when I push myself to exertion, through biking or dancing or swimming or even just running like an idiot sometimes, and make all my muscles ache and throb.

And of course, it's physical drowning when I orgasm, at least if I take the effort to do it thoroughly. But it's rare that I'll use masturbation as sanity-tool (and rarer still that I'll use sex), so this isn't really in my toolkit as much as it is something that has good side effects.

All this babbling sortof comes completely tangentially to a comment a friend made offjournal back when I made my posts in early January about self-injury. soong said "Why can't you have normal self destructive habits and just get drunk like the rest of us?" which is one of those things that I am both grateful is true, and a little...worried. Why aren't I able to drown my sorrows in the bottle when I absolutely need to? No, of course it's not a good thing to do often or regularly, but I keep alcohol in the house --hell, I probably have enough scotch alone to pickle an elephant-- and when it's been this bad a week...why shouldn't I pour myself a drink and maybe let the edges of my mind go a little fuzzy.

I think it mostly boils down to the fact that I am entirely lawful about alcohol, and always have been, and probably always will be (because there's a part of me that knows "just this once" is too easily "whenever I want"). No, I don't mean I didn't touch a drop until I turned 21, or I won't share good booze with minors, just that I created my own set of laws long ago, and they are unimpeachable. Chief among them is "I don't drink alone". But I also don't drink at parties hosted by college students, at burns, or at cons. I don't drink to get drunk. And if I ever utter or think the sentence "Lord, I need a drink", I am specifically not allowed to have one.

Maybe it's just because "ALCOHOL IS ALWAYS BAD" was drilled into my head when I was young. Maybe it's because I actually just dislike pretty much all the physical and mental symptoms of being tipsy. Maybe because there's a brilliant blackmail potential to being "the sober one". Or maybe I just know that I have a sometimes obsessive personality, and figure the fastest way to avoid the slippery slope is to avoid it as much as possible.

Look on the bright side, at least it's not as long as yesterday's post?

~Sor
MOOP!

Comments

[harena]

Two thoughts pop into my head:

1) In a convo with Rtizy the other day, i remarked that i loved eating waaay too much to be anorexic and hated barfing waaaay too much to be bulimic, so i do the Overweight Depressed Thing instead.

2) i use unsquiggling all the time as a sleep aid. It almost always works but the hard part is that i have to heavily fantasize or nothing ever "comes" of it (ahahaha, aren't i the witty one?) & i end up more awake/tense/frustrated. And when my libido is in the dumps (which it has been muchly lately & i almost consider a good thing 'cause there lies less frustration) it's nigh on impossible and so it's either the toss&turn thing or putter around on the computer till i get to the point where i can fall in an exhausted nap on the CoA

Which is neither about self-destruction or sensory drowning but is what popped into my head.

[archangelwells.livejournal.com]

As to the boozahol part, you and me both. ~offers hugs~

[ms-hecubus.livejournal.com]

Weighted blankets are quite soothing. It's similar to being swaddled. They even make weighted pillows shaped like hands to comfort babies while they sleep. Although they're pretty creepy looking.

[londo.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I sometimes think I should drink more, i.e. at all.

Oh well.

[zombie-dog.livejournal.com]

You know that I'm a serious booze hound, but I still have the rule that I am not allowed to start drinking when I'm already sad.

For me, this is because it's important that alcohol be fun, and not a hurtful thing.

[worn-synapses.livejournal.com]

i don't see how drinking is a "normal" self-destructive habit. if it's a self-destructive habit in the first place, why and how is it normal?

[witticaster.livejournal.com]

My sister worries about me a lot, being, well, a protective big sister and psych major type who worries about my semi-closeted gender issues, and asked me recently if I ever felt like hurting myself. That particular form of self-destruction has never appealed to me, but it made me think about the ones that have. For me they're all entirely about no longer thinking, so alcohol is pretty high on the list.

Because of that, I have similar rules. Knowing that a beer will vastly improve my mood is enough to mean I only ever drink beyond sober when already happy and with people. Otherwise a drink with a meal for flavor's sake is as far as I go, and if I'm not sharing that meal with someone I feel cautious even of that.

[nurrynur.livejournal.com]

"I don't want/shouldn't have any of the quick food in the house, and can't be arsed to make real food"

with you on this one.