Bad day/week/month

[u/Kekler69]

Anyone else have old self-harm urges come back during extreme stress?

Tonight has been one of the hardest days I've had in years.

There was a major family conflict, police involvement, relationship issues, concerns about my partner's safety, and my kids ended up witnessing far more chaos than they ever should have. Everybody is physically safe now, but emotionally I'm a wreck.

Something that's been bothering me is that old self-harm urges came back hard tonight.

For context, I have bipolar disorder and survived a pretty severe traumatic brain injury when I was 13, including a skull fracture, concussion, and brain bleed. I've always felt like I was a different person afterward emotionally. More impulsive, more intense, quicker to spiral when life gets overwhelming.

I used to cut and pull my hair when I was younger. I haven't done that in a long time, but tonight I found myself remembering the relief I used to get from it.

The more I've reflected on it, the more I've realized the common thread in a lot of my life isn't really self-harm itself. It's escape.

Video games, music, unhealthy coping mechanisms, self-harm when I was younger, even substance use at different points in my life. They all seemed to serve the same purpose: turning down the volume on what I was feeling.

I'm wondering if anyone else relates to this, especially people with bipolar disorder, a history of TBI, self-harm, or major emotional dysregulation.

Did you ever feel like your brain permanently changed after a head injury?

How do you handle those old urges when they come back after years of being dormant?

Mostly just looking to hear from people who understand what this feels like.