Recently, my therapist checked in on how I was doing with self-harm since I was dealing with a lot of stress. I said I wanted to, but I have a doctor's appointment coming up and I don't want to have healing cuts. They said something along the lines of "good, I’m glad there are some external protective measures." And while I get where they're coming from, why are you glad that I'm missing a coping skill? Why is it a good thing that I can't fully relieve my stress? I'm just trying to cope with all these half-measures for the next week and a half. I'm fucking miserable.
I tried reframing my thoughts from "I can't cut" to "I can cut, I just don't want to." But I do want to, really badly. I just want gender-affirming surgery more, and I'm worried that if I go to the consultation with actively-healing cuts, they'll say I'm not mentally stable enough. But it's not fair that I have to go without my best coping mechanism because it makes other people think I'm crazy. People don't seem to understand how a full-grown adult can self-harm out of a rational cost-benefit analysis. I'm not delusional, erratic, or impulsive. I'm just a normal person trying to get by the best I can in an extremely stressful life situation.
I feel like I can bring this up in the next session or two and my therapist will take the feedback well. I think they maybe just misunderstand where I'm at right now. I'm not trying to stop. I don't think it's a bad thing at all. It's maybe not something I want to be doing long term, but I'm working on trying to make my life situation better and then I'll think about stopping.