Snufkin

First of all –
I’m safe - I can’t sleep and I started thinking about my triggers.
I’m not exactly sure how to express my thoughts, but sometimes I find myself wanting to pick up a drink, intentionally - knowing exactly that it would take me to the edge and make everything worse; which in my case is, if I’m drunk, I’m very likely to be suicidal and try to hurt myself.

I’m a hopeless perfectionist, and usually I find life just too difficult to cope with. I can’t stop thinking that I will never be able to achieve anything I find worth living for, and it would be just easier to give up and die. I'm not a likeable person, I suffer severe social anxiety, my BF helps me with basic things like making a phone call or going to a doctor… I know he loves me so much, but we haven’t been intimate in years, and sometimes when I self-injure, I keep it in mind; who cares, no one is ever going to see my scars.

I’m not sure exactly what advice I’m looking for – if any… some remedy for self-hatred perhaps? I know I’m gonna feel low very soon and I don’t want another relapse…

least

I hope you stay strong and sober. I don't want to see you hurt yourself.

Dee74

You seem very likeable to me - either you're a great actor or you're more likeable than you give yourself credit for

I spent years hating myself - partly because of the things people told me I was and partly because of my own impossible standards.

My way out of that was to a) stop drinking b) see a counsellor and c) grow up a little.

I don't mean c in a pejorative sense either

I avoided things for many years by drinking.

Not drinking meant I had to face feelings memories people or places I found unpleasant.

As unpleasant as that was it wasn't nearly as horrible as I'd worked it up to be - and I grew from the experience

Whatever demons you have chasing you Snuf you can outwit and best them...I promise

D

Dee74

I gave these links out to another member recently - I don't know if you feel you need them or not, but I'll put them out there anyway.

Chooselife -Choose Life - Suicide prevention in Scotland
https://www.samaritans.org/how-we-can-help-you
D

Snufkin

Thanks Dee - ah the growing up part is really hard...

Everything's so confusing. I never know what's created by my poor delusional brain (i.e. everyone hates me), what's AV and what's really there.

Snufkin

Or am I just weak, lazy and looking for excuses to get plastered?

I don’t know how to turn this overthinking off.

gettingsmarter

Snufkin have you ever talked to a doc about your social anxiety? Mine put me on an AD med for it and it helps hugely.
Sorry not pushing meds but just throwing it out there if you have tried everything else.

Delilah1

Snuf, I was just looking at your artwork on the 24 hour thread, and you are incredibly talented. That is definitely the path you should go down. Illustrator for books? Pieces for museums? Your own art show? Maybe that artists residence would be good.

TheToddman

One of the things that I've been doing at the end of my day is journal. This allows me to get all of my thoughts down regarding the day and reflect on them. You've done a great job of expressing those here also. For me it's a release and something that I can look back at and see patterns that may have gotten me to a particular place mentally that would compromise my sobriety/sanity. It also does a good job (at least from my experience) of quieting the mind...

Peace, Snufs

T.

Dee74

The overthinking won't always be this bad and you'll get better at discerning whats you and whats not you Snuf.

Give it a chance - I found a few months sober really surprised me with how things I thought were true weren't actually true at all

D

goodbyeevan

Stay strong snuf. I also have crippling social anxiety that I treated with alcohol for years and now I find myself having panic attacks in situations I used to breeze through after secretly having quite a few. This weekend was discouraging after my first sober panic attack in months. I got upset and resentful and pretty quickly was about to have myself a big ol pity party. Why am I like this? Why do I feel like an alien in my own skin? If I'm going to be like this forever I might as well drink. Why am I like this? Why?

I played the tape forward and if i pick up, it's more of those same feelings only magnified ten times. There's no more drinking for relief from these feelings and anxieties or drinking to feel better. Now that we know how it is for us, its impossible to go back to being ignorant or pretending this time it will work for us. We must be brave and face them head first. Through the tears and anxieties and panic attacks, we will make it out and be strong women who don't need alcohol to cope. It's just going to take more self care and healing. You can always PM me.

Berrybean

Hugs to you Snuf. Perfectionism really is setting ourselves up for disappointment in ourselves. Honestly. Unrealistic expectations of ourselves and others and life in general really do set us up to fail. None of us is destined to be perfect, or do anything perfectly.

I listened to this lovely little talk by Nadia Bolz-Weber the other day and thought it was very helpful. Simple and short but straight to the crux of things....

https://youtu.be/YgTTMt8ByRs

Xx

joandmelandhan

Snufkin sweetheart I find you to be a very honest, lovely and dare I say charming young lady. You have qualities I would be proud to have in a friend. I don't say this to attempt to make you feel better it happens to be true and I'm not alone feeling this way about you.
The fact that you have mental health issues in no way makes to a lesser person or unlikable in any way.
It does however make it absolutely essential that you find a way to put the poison down for good. Until you do that it's not surprising you are in a whirlwind of overthinking and confusion. Is it AV? Is it OCD? Is it depression? Ugh exhausting!
I know it's frightening Snufkin. You have a long and difficult journey ahead of you. But you don't need to do it alone and we are here to support you. It does help Snufkin I can honestly tell you that from experience.
The thing is - how can you address your issues whilst ingesting a depressant poison into your system? It's got to go Snufkin by whatever means and no matter what.
Maybe it won't hurt in the short term to assume it is indeed all AV. I did that and whilst I still had problems it did get me to a place of consistent sobriety which then allowed me to address those problems when I was stronger.
Of course I am no doctor and if you need additional medical help and support you must seek it out. You must be brave it that respect Snufkin.
There is a life out there for you. With your talent and nature I have no doubt it could be a wonderful one.
❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤

Mummyto2

Sometimes we see ourselves totally different from what others see, try and take baby steps, perhaps step outside your comfort zone and make a phone call one week and build up to doing other things by yourself, don't harm yourself, try and start loving yourself no matter how difficult it seems at times, you seem nice to me, wishing you happiness, we need more of that stuff

Gottalife

My thought too.

My next thought was about your issue with triggers. Why not take a deeper look at that? Personally I didn't have triggers, I had excuses as to why I drank which at least some of the time had a certain plausibility.

A certain time of the day, an unpleasant person in my life, stress, fear, feeling happy, sad, raining, fine, dissapointed, delighted, the list is endless. My main trigger was being conscious.

I drank because I am an alcoholic and that is what I do. I used many excuses (triggers) but none of them really stacked up in the light of what happened when I drank.

Let's try one out: It is a perfect day, not a cloud on the horizon. Everything is going really well and alcoholic mind thinks, lets have a wee drinkee, just to relax and enjoy the moment.

That thought came against a background of repeated disastorus experiences that occured almost everytime I drank. I nearly always lost control, quite often did something really stupid, never woke up happy about having been drunk.

Why were these thoughts absent in the moment just before I took the first drink. They were the reality of drinking for me, yet they were easily pushed aside in favour of the idea that this time would be different. I believed the delusion over the reality. Figure out how to fix that and you are on your way to recovery.

Nonsensical

You state that like it is an observation of fact.
It isn't.
It's a belief you hold.
How committed are you to believing it?
You can change things you believe.
A belief is just a thought you have over and over.
Want to do something difficult, yet VERY gratifying?
Change that thought.

Hugs to you, Snufkin! I'm rootin' for ya!

Rar

You are a likeable person Snuf! Also talented and compassionate. You are as beautiful inside as outside. ((HUGS))

Snufkin

Thank you all, some very true and honest words here, you got me thinking...

tomsteve

I can’t stop thinking that I will never be able to achieve anything I find worth living for, and it would be just easier to give up and die.

could it be not necessarily that but maybe the achievements dont happen quick enough? instant gratification- wanting it and wanting it now?
because you are able to achieve anything you want to achieve. it just takes time for things to materialize. rome wasnt built in a day( i think it was 4 days. ).

I’m a hopeless perfectionist
oh yeah!
so, there i was doin wanescottin in my family room. i got buggered up becaus ea few of the joints were noticable. i was planning on tearing it all down and starting over when a friend stopped by. showed him what i wasnt happy with and my plan. he said,"if i was doing this wanescotting, how would you expect me to do it?"
"well, id expect you to do the best you could."
"what makes you think youre so much better than me that you have to have it perfect and i just do the best i could?"
HUH!

my house used to be spotless. everything had a place and everything was in its place. same friend stopped by( this is a friend i met after i got sober).
"dam,tom, youre house is clean. pretty spotless."
"thanks."
"its not lived in though."
"what?"
"its not lived in. too clean. too tidy. no signs of life."
HUH!

MantaLady

Hi Snufkin! I abolutely get the overthinking and social anxiety you are feeling as it's the same for me. I am currently in rehab in Thailand and have met a wonderful chap called Paul Garrigan who is a mindfulness coach. He centres on the fact that "you are not your thoughts" and is teaching me techniques on how to let the thoughts pass and understand/accept that I don't control them, they are what they are but I can control how I act on those thoughts. If you put into google "paul garrigan mindfulness" you will find his site which has a lot of good stuff on it.

“To see our own mind clearly, without being caught up in its movement, to watch thought without trying to do anything with or about it, simply seeing it and letting it go, this is the way to freedom from suffering”
Luangpor Teean (The One Who Feels)