40 Days and 40 Nights

[Trigger warning] self-harm 

Tomorrow, my countdown to Australia hits 40 days.
40 days.

Erm, how did that happen? I do not feel like I will be stepping on a plane in 40 days and heading off to the other side of the world.

I mean, that's only a month and a half. No, it's less! It's less than a month and a half! Unless that month is February. But that month is not February! 

I don't even feel remotely ready. So many things to do, so little time. When I keep getting days of nausea, and my head is bad or good or great or worse depending on the day, I wonder if I'm going to be ready. If I'm going to be okay. 

My biggest fear is that I won't cope. Won't cope being away from family, from friends, trying to get work, adjusting to customs, and the heat. And I haven't in the past been well known for my coping skills. 

In fact, I have a history of engaging in destructive behaviour as a way of coping. Selfish behaviour that I would say I will never fully exorcise from who I am today, or who I will become. 

Because the way I used to "cope" was with self-harm.

The reason I'm mulling over this in particular today is because I caught a glance at my arm. And the scars there are minimal, despite everything I inflicted on them. But the light caught them, and for a second my mind froze, and I thought to myself "ah yes, that's how I'll cope if things get bad."

No. No no no. 

I recognise that I will never get over that part of me. Not just because of the scars that remind me daily of my selfishness. But because a tiny part of me remembers the feeling of ecstasy with every cut. The bitter happiness. The feeling that I was taking control, of something, anything, at times when I felt nothing was ok. 

The cuts were my anger, directed at myself because I wanted to direct it at others and had been chastised for doing so. I still have anger management issues. I smashed a wall with my fist in Tombstone, Arizona, in an act I am so ashamed of I practically blank that night out from my memory. I was angry that I couldn't cope, that my brain wasn't processing shit properly. 

I am ashamed of my behaviour that night, and I am ashamed of all the times I harmed myself. Let me go back to the word I used above - it is selfish. And this selfishness is good and bad. It is bad because a self-harmer does not consider what effect their actions have on other people. Not until afterwards. When you are in such desperate need to hurt yourself, to numb the pain, to just cope, you are only thinking about yourself. And that is the good part. I am not advocating self-harm in anyway. I am simply saying that by taking your feelings into account, and trying to find an outlet for them, that is a good kind of selfish. But these actions you take have consequences, sometimes fatal, and always life-altering. 

It's okay to need to cope. And I can cope for the next 40 days. And the 40 days after that. And the next. I don't need that way of coping anymore. 

In my darkest times, it's comforting, like a reassuring hug. But I'm staying in the light. I'm "clean", and I'm staying that way.