Sylvanna Devlin

From “Game Over” A narrators perspective.

CN: Thoughts of suicide and a different angle on (non performed) self harm. If you experience the urges for the latter you may wish to read this anyway.  What Sylvanna came to understand is vindicating. And it just might help.

 

For this it’s worth knowing. Sylvanna’s heroic therapist convinced her to put the crisis line  on her phone, and stick it in her list of favorites. She did call them at one point, and she wasn’t carted off. No ambulance or police came to her door. She was talked through a rough patch and turned around.

She can not recommend enough that you do the same, sane or not. Maybe one day it won’t be for you. It is a safety net we fear, but if you drop into it he can do more than help you survive. he can turn around your perspective in a very good way. These are professionals.

On to the point of this essay. We get back to mentioning them.

Sylvanna’s joints may have always become an issue one day. The Fibromyalgia that made it worse was possible but brought on by the acute stress. The difficult PTSD was hard to avoid. Unfortunately the repercussions do not stop there. Anger or PTSD caused hours – sometimes days/weeks/months of torture, we understand. What if, on rare chance, something triggers rage?

It first caused her to bolt.

Then, tears streamed down her face, her heart would beg for suicide. She could not stand the feeling her mind and body screaming for the emotional pain to stop with her life so she could never feel such psychological agony again.

Anything but this.

No. Let it never come to this again. Let us be done.

The first time she called the crisis line, she tried without the second. The yearn for death would pass. But next came a symptom that contained a revelation she was not expecting. The urge for self harm, but slowed down and controlled.

When she would hurt herself in the past she would claw her own arms – a knife having cut too deeply before. When the urge was not present she never understood how she could get past the pain.

Then, she learnt there is a physical aspect

As the desire for death passed, her left arm began to crawl for wounds like the body preparing itself for touch but without that form of pleasure. Soon after her other hand with razor sharp nails would eagerly join the urge and be and ready. Her psyche wanted the same (but different) strength of sensuality.

To be clear, self harm was not sexual. Sylvanna has the experience to assure you It’s not remotely the same.

Dark arousal of the urge to slice, rip or claw is unique. And horrific. The pain you want to inflict, the blood you want to see, so dangerous and powerful it is akin to passion but no where near close to pleasure. Satisfaction? Yes. But fleeting.

It is just hard to resist because your flesh is calling for it.

Pain, at that point, has its own form of lust.

Sylvanna managed to calm, letting it pass with determination she pulled from the depths of her soul. Sheer will er ex would not entirely destroy her. But she did not forget the very nerves of your body react differently when the psyche is screaming for blood.

Maybe don’t judge yourself or others for self inflicted harm. You need to be unmovable to resist the magnetic pull. And humans are creatures of motion.

The second time holding back the urge to bleed failed. She doesn’t even remember the trigger, just that part one was in some ways easier to avoid than part two.

The third was a snafu with medication that drove her over the edge. She called the crisis line for that one. She knew she could resist the urge to die, but not the body’s yearning for razor sharp nails.

The angel on the other end of the phone got her through, and a friend was available for the deconstruction of unexpected intensity.

It took unusual will and self-preservation to get to the point she could find a way to hold out till it passed. It’s possible. But you need to know what you’re up against first.

Your very own body.