Have I reached bottom yet?

[sillyrabbit]

Well the day after I wrote my last post "Who am I? I am nothing.." I broke down in absolute defeat.

I cried my heart out in my boyfriends arms. I told him I am at my lowest point and that all I feel is pain. That I am being devoured by the pain.

also that I am filled with anger. That I hate my life, I hate this world, that I dont have the strength to pretend I am okay anymore to those around me.

That I have nothing... that I am so far into this dark pit that I cant get any lower.

He comforted me, and, blamed himself for it all. (after all it was his lies and PA use that began it all for me. I haven't healed since his last use.. and in fact have been on a rather steady decline since.

Well I was wrong. Wrong about thinking I had hit my lowest point.

I am not sure if anyone can remember, but, when this first happened, (after his last P use) , I found these forums for the first time and I was incredibly unstable, distraught, and full of self blame. (I have learned so much since then..)

Anyways, back then consumed with my self pity, self hate, and. self blame.. I got drunk and in a drastic attempt to release my pain, I turned to a razor blade and literally bled out my sadness. I'm left with some scars now which I hate, but, in that one moment, I was floating on crimson clouds of ecstasy and peace. I felt in control, I felt satisfaction, I felt Accomplishment.

I will never forget it. I felt like I was in heaven, all my pain.. gone.

That was quite a few months back.

Anyways, last night I hit my bottom. I ended up shattering a glass and cutting myself up pretty bad. I was covered in blood, and, floating once again in peace and happiness.

I am not happy about what I did. It was an "accidently broke it on purpose..." moment to get the relief from all the pain I was feeling.

I am not happy about it, please no lectures. I'm writing this here not to be lectured, or beat up about it... I'm doing this already... but, to reach out and take responsibility for my actions.


Besides my boyfriend there is no one in this world I would want to talk about this to except for the warm and bleeding hearts that I can so identify with right here.

[LookingUp]

sillyrabbit said:

I'm writing this here not to be lectured, or beat up about it... I'm doing this already... but, to reach out and take responsibility for my actions.

I've bit myself until I bled. I hadn't done that for 34 years (when I left ex1), but my husband's PA was enough to put me back in that unproductive, self-harming behavior. I refuse to let anybody have that kind of power over me ever again. I am sorry you're going through that; but I understand. What is your plan to take responsibility so you don't repeat that behavior?

LookingUp

[truthorlie]

(((((( SillyRabbit ))))))

You poor soul. You are hurting.

Every SO on this board has reached that point of pain where it has become intolerable and unmanageable. For some, their bodies rebelled on their own, for others, they had to resort to drastic methods to refocus or deflect the pain in some way.

There is nothing wrong with you (except) that you need to start taking care of you and let him fall into whatever hell pit he's headed for (or not, if he chooses to start climbing out.) Regardless, you HAVE reached your bottom. You must now begin the climb out of hell for YOURSELF, because he may or may not assist you with it. And even if he does, he could loosen his grip at any time and let you fall to the depths. Do NOT count on him as he is an addict and not prepared to do what is necessary to be a full and complete support for you right now. Not right now. And know this, if and when he shames you by bringing these actions against you to prove his hierarchy above you, you remember the hundreds of SO's on here who have also cut themselves, contemplated irreversible acts, and performed others out of desperation, etc. Know this, they survived to make it through to the other side.

((((( Hugs with warm, soft, tender arms around you.... )))))

[iambetrayed]

(((((sillyrabbit)))))

Sweetie, my heart breaks for you. You do not deserve to be in this despair. No one can understand the pain - desperation - confusion - and utter despair that this situation causes a woman (unless you have been through it).

I must admit that I had fantasies of cutting myself when this first happened. This was so completely out of character for me - I am a 39 year old mom, pretty conservative and cautious in my thoughts and behaviors. I had heard of cutting, I didn't really understand that it gave an emotional high until I read your post. But I was thinking about how bad my husband would feel when he saw the blood. I think that I was thinking more about it to trick him into feeling some of the pain that I was feeling. I also momentarily considered going out and finding an anonymous man to sleep with me. Desperate, desperate thoughts. I have not done any of these things, but I fear that if I didn't have my children to consider I may have thought more seriously about it or even acted out.

We all understand how you could reach such depths of despair. And you have recognized that this is not really helpful to you in the long run. Yes, there are those moments of euphoria. But afterwards you feel awful and have the scars to live with.

I understand not having anyone to talk to about these things. I come here and only speak to my husband about this. I went with him to therapy last week, and that was the first time that I had voiced this to anyone else. I have to say, although the therapy session was not what I had hoped for, it did feel really good to talk out loud about this to another person. It felt wonderful to get some validation from someone besides my husband.

It doesn't sound like you are seeing a counselor, or at least one that you feel comfortable talking openly with. This is said in my best non-lecturing voice : Sweetie, please find someone to talk to. Call a therapist and just try it out. There is help for getting out of this despair.

Your posts are so heartfelt and articulate. It is obvious that you are an intelligent, insightful, and deeply feeling woman. You deserve to feel better. You know that and that is why you resorted to getting those feelings of euphoria from cutting. But you deserve to feel way better than what that can provide to you. You know that, too, and that is why you are reaching out. Look into your heart and see the beautiful, caring woman there. Take care of her, she needs you right now. You are valuable, and important, and you deserve to be happy.

Take care, sweetie.

[zerotolerance]

I've never done it, but I have thought about it. I can relate to that level of pain where it seems as if even the most severe physical pain that I can imagine, would surely feel far far better and sooo relieving on multiple levels. But instead of going there, which I knew wouldn't really fix it anyway, I decided to kind another way. My pain was mental, it was heart and soul, not body. Torturing my body wouldn't fix my soul, so I set about doing that instead of dwelling of what I couldn't change, and wishing I were dead rather than in that horrid pit. When I feel like you describe, I call it pit-dipping. And I try not to do that anymore. It takes sheer determination, and learning how to ride out those waves while not taking any action. When you know you are not in your right mind, don't do anything. Don't make any major decisions, don't think of hurting yourself. Either just lay down and rest, or think about getting up out of the pit. The bottom is wherever YOU let it be. If you stop now, and start going forward instead, then this is your bottom. If you go the wrong way deeper into the pain, then you will only continue to find new lows. Ultimately it is a choice, so make a different one. Refuse to let that pain finish conquering you. You are stronger than it is, you just have to learn how to exercise your power over it, rather than keeping giving into it. Hurting ourselves never helped anything, and I felt so bad I don't even think dying would help either.

[milla]

Sillyrabbit, this is a disturbing post and I'm kind of worried about you. I hope that if you feel destructive again you will come onto this board first, I'm sure someone will be around. Or call a hotline. PM one of us. I can give you my personal email or something.

Believe me this schmuck isn't worth it. One of these days when you manage to extricate you'll look back and have that "what the hell was I thinking" moment when you wonder why you stayed with him.

If I recall correctly this is your first relationship? Believe me they aren't all this sucky. I've only had one with a PA myself. I know PA's are out there, but I managed to date actively for years without encountering one. I'm really sorry yours turned out to be, but he's got other issues too. As it turned out my SO was just plain *broken* in other ways too, so he had no love to give anyway.

I don't know what's going on here, but if you've gotten into this bad of shape I think he's contributing to it with his convolutedness and emotional neglect. I think you need to go to a place where you can get your head together ASAP. Then talk to him later or something.

He comforted me, and, blamed himself for it all

I think he's full of (expletive) and from what I remember in past posts he always did sound that way.

You've got to stop blaming yourself for the fact he can't keep his weewee in his trousers. In fact, I think he's an emotional vulture. There are people like this. The lower you get the more they feed off of it. For people with low self-esteem or a tendency to self-blame they are extremely destructive, because they just feel so smug that they have created such drama. It makes them feel self-important and they tend to perpetuate the drama rather than seeking to help you out of it. Please look for professional help and realize that your SO has got a serious emotional problem himself most likely, therefore can't be expected to do much but make this situation worse.

[truthorlie]

I think he's an emotional vulture. There are people like this. The lower you get the more they feed off of it. For people with low self-esteem or a tendency to self-blame they are extremely destructive, because they just feel so smug that they have created such drama.

This is absolutely true. I cannot think of one single instance that my exH supported me wtih while I was down. If I was down, he got off on it!

Actually, there was one time that I remember that he even came CLOSE (but not enough) to comfort me - it was when I told him, "I'm afraid you going to hurt me again with the things that you do. And when you do these things it hurts me because it feels as though you left me and don't want me and makes me want to physically leave you." I think this was his biggest fear - me leaving him. So he held me for awhile. I started crying and shaking and before long, he made the excuse to go make dinner and left the room I was in. Funny thing was, he would come back to the doorway in the room (never completely into the room or close to me), to check if I was still there. And not packing my things to leave.

I guess what I am trying to say is that he NEVER ever tried to be intimate with me on an emotional level. He never even spied on me (like we all have our exH's, with computer stuff and trying to figure what we are doing without us around) but he WOULD check on me whenever he thought I would flee. It's like the only interest he had in me that was ever consistent is "keeping" me - keeping me prisoner. Sicko.

[cindyandben]

I am so sad for you and so hopeful that you will find strength in the sympathy, empathy and insightfulness of the people who post here and the ones who participate in support groups. One specific thing disturbs me and saddens me particularly. Are you aware that intentional pain can cause the release of endorphins, which are morphine analogues produced by our own brains? It is so sad that you have been pushed to resort to producing a drug effect in yourself in order to soothe the emotional pain caused by this fellow's misuse of another self-induced brain chemical effect. Please do take care of yourself.