Steps in the right direction

For 6 years I have been battling self-harm, relapsing every couple of months. It was never something I thought I would turn to but is what I ended up using. In the past year, I have been working on myself more but the self-harming habit was one I could not get rid of. At a Christian camp called Soul Survivor this year I was praying about it and felt that God was telling me to get rid of my tools and that I could cope without them. I did not believe him so ignored him, but he would not leave it and kept reminding me. So at a second camp call Devoted on the second to last morning of Amplify the group for teenagers, I did it. I asked to speak to two female leaders and asked them to get rid of it. The feeling when I gave away my tools is one I have never felt before. It felt like a massive weight lifted off of my shoulders. It was incredible. But it did not just get better, that day was spent with a lot of bad thoughts, thoughts I had not had for weeks, but that night at Amplify I was freed from those thoughts and have not had them since.

I am not saying that having a belief in God will fix it all. It has only been a couple of days since this all happened, but I have gone from having these thoughts all the time to not having them at all.

Giving away my tools has not given me the strength to tell my friends and family, still to this day the only people that know are the two leaders that helped me on that morning. I will get there someday but for now, this is a big step.