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There's no easy answer to this.

I'll go a bit into my own story because yours sounds familiar in some ways.

I struggled for over eight years but didn't stop self-injuring until about two years ago. I did the whole thing, therapy, multiple hospitalizations, twenty-something different medications, but didn't 'recover' until after a year with living with the symptoms of schizophrenia. I think that was rock bottom, I lived in terror, thought people were trying to hurt me, following me on the freeway, talking about me, and I also had some issues with voices. What eight years of depression with extensive treatment did not accomplish one year with schizophrenia did. I put aside all the issues that had kept me behind, I did not leave room for the self-destructive streak. Instead of relying on only the outside world to help me, I worked with what I'd learned in treatment actively. How I did so? No idea. The only thing I can think of is that I was sick and tired of being sicked and tired, to be cliche.

There's always hope. It can come out of a big fancy program, it can come out of something else. It depends on what your mental illness is, some require lifelong treatment. There's really no one way of recovering. The only requirement is that you want to wholeheartedly - the deep down in your gut want to without any doubts or hemming and hawing - and that you don't give up. There are no miracle cures. There are no guarantees. There is hope.

I thought I'd be dead by now. I'm not. I'm not perfect but life is good.