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I never really understood what someone meant when they'd say: This content may be triggering. I understood it but yet the reality of such a thing eluded me. I like to think of myself as a witty and precise thinker so this admittance for me is an incredibly hard one. For the longest time, I didn't think I had a problem. Quite the opposite in fact. I had thought I had found a way to run away from my problems. I had believed that I had somehow 'out smarted fate' since I had found a pretty simple way to get rid of stress.

See, in the beginning, I used a quill. Yup, long feather and all, the tip was this lovely shade of gold that would flash in any light, regardless of how faint. I told myself 'I'm not a cutter, a cutter uses knives and razors and I'm using a quill!'. For a long time that excuse worked, not because it was some hardcore belief but more so because I didn't want it to be true. I can see that now.

I remember how one little red line 'wasn't so bad', how two was just as insignificant. Then those two became three then five the seven. By today, they count well over 100, well, the visible ones any way. It began to fly in a downwards spiral that I have yet to recover from. 

Now that I think back to it all I feel so stupid. Why the hell did I think that I was in control?! Where did I get that idea? The truth was not, and will never be, farther from that. I was the fly that the spider consumed after one to many dinners and lunches. One too many brushes with fire that turned my flesh into white scar tissue instead of ash.

I never thought I had an addiction until one day I tried to stop. I started to get scared, I had recently passed out from loss of too much blood. I had been convinced that I was going to die, die alone, broken, and unloved. I tried and I failed in less than a day. I feel so ashamed to admit it but here it goes: I FAILED AT QUITTING, I AM TRUELY ADDICTED. 

I suppose to some this might seem like a small and pitiful show of courage. The fact that I wrote in all caps to a bunch of strangers seems insignificant but for me it's a small leap in a steep uphill battle. I have faced denial head on, looking it straight in the eyes by way of a mirror. I have passed out and was convinced I was dead. I was and still am unable to leave the blade for any long period of time. And just now I can admit that I'm addicted. 

Triggers don't just exist on guns. They exist in our minds, they call home to the deepest and darkest parts of our heads where they play floodlight to flash upon unpleasant things. Every day I experience such lighting. Every day I experience the urge I have found impossible to deny. It's a crawling in my skin, a shiver down my spine, an ache in my gums. 

I never thought I was addicted, but I can see now just how wrong I was.