tapping

[paul72]

TW (selfharm)

So, when I had T, she taught me about tapping. I never got really good at it - it mostly just worked while I was in the therapist's room.
I'm more of a scratcher. I scratch my chest and stomach, some days it's constant. It's been rough lately and my skin is pretty raw and tender. I've tried to redirect it to the gentler tapping but there's just no luck still.

I'm wondering if anyone has had success shifting from a harmful technique to stay present to a kinder one? Or maybe just some insight on tapping even... I'm just grateful for any input
thanks!

[rainydiary]

My experience with tapping is that it helps in specific contexts but overall I struggle with too although for different reasons.  In some instances it has helped me get in touch with feelings but otherwise I don't like it.  It seems like your body is giving you signs it isn't a fan and I think it is ok to not do tapping if it isn't supportive.

I wonder if you could identify what was supportive about tapping that context with the T that you liked and find a different activity that gives a similar positive experience. 

[Blueberry]

Hi Phil,
I'm not sure if this is going to answer your question but I'll try.

I respond pretty well to tapping, except that it really tires me out because of things processing on some subconscious level. I also have a type of SH tho not the same as yours. I've never tried to do or use tapping as a replacement for my SH method.

My T taught me tapping with the basic sentence "I accept myself although I... can't go to sleep / don't want to get up / haven't finished xyz"  - to name a few examples out of hundreds of possibilities in my case. I can feel pretty much whether the sentence is appropriate and/or possible. 

Elsewhere I've heard that tapping is just to be used for anxiety but that's not what my T said.
And somewhere else I heard that tapping can be used a) to relax or b) to process stuff. With the exhaustion I get, I'm pretty sure I'm processing on some level all the time.

I do remember that it took a lot of time and patience on my T's part to even teach me this method (so I could remember it and not forget where to tap etc) and took me a further long time to start to do it on my own outside my T's office. I felt ashamed of that but he just said that at some time or other I'd probably spontaneously start to do it on my own, which was the case. Since then I've even done it in my head - imagining myself tapping - in some context where I didn't want to do it openly, like sitting in a crowded bus or something.

Not all methods work for everybody all the time, so it might just not be your thing. Feel free to ask more questions if you have any - or search the forum because it's been written about before on here, undoubtedly also by me. 

P.S. It's also referred to as EFT, Emotional Freedom Tapping, so if you search you might find posts just referring to EFT.

[Armee]

TW self harm



I think the first important step is to just notice it as self harm, and you've done that here. So yay! 

After that, noticing maybe what was happening before it started so you start to get a sense of what is driving it.

I have had some but not complete luck replacing it with a kinder gesture, like once I catch myself and notice it is self harm i will put a gentle toner on a cotton ball and sweetly wipe my face with it, it feels a little like someone wiping away tears.

I also got other self harm under control by realizing where the impulse was coming from and seeing it wasn't an intention to hurt myself, it was a response to the trauma. Sometimes things have scared me because I don't want to hurt myself but I've caught myself with scissors poised right over the vein on my wrist and a very strong urge to snip just that vein, like it was a cord. I realized a week later I was trying to cut the binding from my wrists. Just like shaking or some other action to complete a trauma response. I was trying to free myself. Once I've realized the root of those urges they have not had much power over me.

[paul72]

thank you rainy, Blueberry and Armee for your thoughtful replies. I'm grateful to be able to pull something from each of your responses 

I really thought I used this as a grounding technique.
I've been trying to see a cause for what starts it, but it feels like it's a matter of trying to stay present. If it isn't an outside trigger, it's internal, but it seems to start with fear.
I'll put stuff in white here...

In T, when I started clawing my chest, she started tapping and asked me to join her.. it kinda worked in there but never really out of there

When I was little, I'd dig my thumb nail into my index finger... "am I awake?" was the question I remember asking myself.
I figure now, that I must have been dissociating very young.
To me , as silly as it sounds, scratching is easier and is something I can do for a longer period of time. I don't really get sore at the time and it takes no energy like tapping.
I'll note that I can't seem to smell when I dissociate so that doesn't work for me



Anyway, thanks again for the replies.. I'll do some research on EFT... I may have been thinking of it all wrong.

[Bach]

That was very powerful, Armee.

...realizing where the impulse was coming from and seeing it wasn't an intention to hurt myself, it was a response to the trauma... like shaking or some other action to complete a trauma response.

This is very interesting, and something I need to examine within myself.  Thank you for sharing. 

phil, I downloaded The Tapping Solution app a few years ago, and at times I find it quite helpful.  There are no methods that always work for me so I don't do it every day, but tapping with the app has become a significant tool in my self-help efforts.  I've tried to self-generate the tapping process, but I have a lot of trouble with that , so I use guided meditations from the app when I tap.  I don't follow their programs strictly or do the mood ratings, and the language used in the guided meditations isn't always very relatable for me, but I like having the voice to guide me through the points and give my thoughts a general direction to go in.