Discussion coping methods?

[loslassen]

what are your coping methods?

I refuse to fall into any addiction since I hold on to the hope I might get better someday, but what do you people use to cope?
I drink alcohol but haven't fallen into alcoholism, I also blast stimulating drum and bass into my ears to silence the thoughts.

 

[momento.mori]

I abuse my sleeping pills I refuse to take antidepressants so on my bad days, I sleep the whole day away. I dislike alcohol and refuse to do illegal drugs, so sleep it is.

 

[locked*n*loaded]

I don't really "cope", per say. I don't want to get better, if better means continuing in this world. I don't drink alcohol anymore and haven't in 30 years. Although, maybe if I hadn't quit, I'd be dead by now because alcohol is a depressant, and maybe it would have put me over the edge earlier. Now, if coping means taking care of things I need to take care of before I finally CTB, hopefully fairly soon, then that is what occupies my time.

 

[4_science]

There are tons of coping mechanisms. There is no "one fits all". You gotta find what works best for you ib what situation or occasion. There is also healthy and unhealthy coping (drugs, self harm, lethargy, aggression towards yourself or/ an others etc.). Sarcasm or humour is a coping strategy I use a lot. The other one is the all familiar "it could be worse" approach to try and lift me back up.

Maybe there are things that have worked for you in the past. we all have been on bumpy rides.

 

[ClaudeCTTE]

I usually do several things for my addictions.
The only addiction I developed was to inhalants, although I feel like I actually used them because I wanted to have a cardiac arrest.
I used several methods to stay away from inhalants:

1. Surrounding myself with people: I usually use inhalants when I'm alone, so I try to be with my family all the time to avoid using them.​

2. Make it difficult: I try to make buying inhalants difficult. When I used inhalants, it was easy to access them because I lived at my aunt's house and there was a pharmacy nearby where I could buy them. Currently, being with my family makes it more difficult to access inhalants because there are no pharmacies nearby and I'm too lazy to walk too far.​

3. Make it unpleasant: Since inhalants are usually depressants/dissociatives, sometimes I used to have unpleasant hallucinations and no longer felt like using inhalants. With alcohol, this can be done with a hangover, as the hangover (in my case) takes away my desire to drink alcohol again.​

4. Replace it with other things: when I manage to get to a pharmacy or supermarket, what I do is avoid looking at inhalants (in this case, deodorants and air fresheners) and instead buy something I like to replace the desire to consume inhalants. In this case, I usually buy chocolates or snacks.​

5. Avoid anything that motivates you to consume substances: In this case, what I did was eliminate all types of inhalants in my house (solvents, deodorants, air fresheners, paints, etc.) to avoid the temptation to consume them.
Another thing I do is avoid images on the internet that show any type of product that can be used as an inhalant. It happens to me with deodorant ads, and I usually use an ad blocker.​

6. This doesn't usually happen to me with inhalants, but it applies to alcohol. If you're offered alcohol somewhere, just say "I don't drink alcohol." Don't say things like "I don't drink now, I used to drink before"; because unconsciously you're saying that you consumed alcohol in the past, and the point is to deceive your mind and make it believe that you never drank alcohol and don't like to drink.​

 

[divinemistress36]

Binge eating

 

[Eudaimonic]

I cope by distracting myself. I go into phases where I hyperfocus on a given topic which inadvertently allows me to distance myself from my problems to an extent unless that phase is directly or tangentially related to them (as is sometimes the case).

 

[lotheb_5drop]

I drink and cut my thigh. Be aware that I used to do half a bottle a week and nowadays its more like a whole bottle in 2 days.