I open shut my eyes, and I know I have to get out of here. This isn't safe, this way of thinking. This isn't good. This isn't what you are supposed to do.

Lie very still. Wait out the passing storm like it will wash over, just like that. This is nothing new. I am no stranger to this self-hurtful, self-satisfying ritual. I've worked out many ways of dealing with it in my mind.

There is no point to writing about it, thinking about it. Not this. The faster you forget, the faster it is over. But that is not right, either.

I wonder, does everyone have these thoughts. I can imagine the situations very clearly in my head. Scenes of violence toward oneself. Glass breaking, bones breaking, pressing the pedal so hard to the floor that it sends you bursting through the guardrail and hurtling into the dark landscape underneath the stars. No, not brave or cowardly enough to attempt these things. Just thoughts, steep thoughts that come in when you'd almost forgotten you wanted them there in the first place. You'd almost forgotten you needed them.

But I know. This is dark. There is something wrong here. It isn't the right turn of things, it isn't right to turn things on yourself. But I wonder.

How do other people deal with pain?

To tell the truth, I don't really want to talk about it.