So good to hear that you're feeling past the worst of it right now. We all care about you so much and it makes me so sad to think of you hurting yourself. I do wish we could meet up!! I wish I could travel around the world for a year and meet all of my Susan's friends (and give them hugs!).
I don't know if this thought will help, but it's something I find helpful. Forgive me if I mentioned it before:
There are hard times. There will be more. There will be losses and victories, lows and highs. That's part of the nature of life, the difficulty of being trans and the fragility of the human spirit. But when we hit a low point, we have to remember that there will be a high, too.
I just read the first post in this blog (if I'm honest, I wanted to see how long you've been on HRT so I could give you a hard time about expecting too much, too soon) and it has such a hopeful tone. That shows me that you have the capacity to be happy, positive and hopeful and that you will return to those feelings at some point. I read a self-help book when I was in my 20s that changed my life. It's called "Your Erroneous Zones" and the main concept of the book is this:
No one makes you happy or sad. No one hurts you. No series of events makes for a good or bad day. These external things happen around us and we decide to be happy or sad. We control our reaction. We choose our emotions. I know that sounds ridiculous at first pass because it makes feeling happy sound so easy and not worrying to be impossibly simple. But if we step back a little, we realize it's true. We can regulate our emotions and reactions. We can decide how to feel We do it every day. But I know the big challenge of mental health struggles is that the badness and rejection and pain are inside of us. So we have to climb inside and try to scoop out that pain, look at it, name it, accept it and move forward. I suppose that's the hard part.
As a musician, I've learned this about progress and learning: realizing that you have something to learn or change is the hardest part. Once you realize (as a drummer) that you tend to rush when you play a "fill," you just have to start paying attention to that and slowly correcting it. It may take years but it's just a function of time and effort. The hard part was objectively looking at the situation and accepting that you had work to do to correct a problem.
Take it one day at a time, Charlotte. One minute at a time if you need to. There will be bad times but there will be happy times, too. Oh, and like Sarah said, you/we need to give this time and give our bodies grace. As I like to say, it takes a long time to turn this ship around.
Plus, you're a cutie. Don't let your brain tell you otherwise.
