How To Spot Self-Damaging Behaviors + How To Cease It

The foundation causes of self-destructive habits can fluctuate from individual to individual, in line with licensed drug and alcohol counselor Candace Kotkin-De Carvalho LSW, LCADC, CCS, CCTP. A few of the most typical causes embrace an absence of optimistic coping abilities, unresolved points from childhood or adolescence, and poor psychological well being.

Lorz describes self-destructive behaviors as being the product of both misguided makes an attempt at self-protection or moments of dissociation. They’re usually formed by beliefs you have got about your self, what you deserve, and the way you have got taken within the messages of the world and people round you, she says, making them primarily a response to non-public circumstances which have had a traumatic impression on you. They might have even labored (otherwise you believed that they’ve labored) previously to guard you from feeling confused, overwhelmed, damage, exhausted, scared, or in peril, she provides, however in the end these coping mechanisms are actually inflicting extra hurt than safety. 

Osibodu-Onyali provides that when individuals have skilled a number of damaging occasions and even traumas, it adjustments the way in which they view themselves, others, and the world. “They start to anticipate dangerous issues to occur, and when good issues come their means, they introduce self-destructive behaviors in order that issues return to the damaging sample they’re used to. It is not that they get pleasure from negativity; it is simply that it is acquainted,” she says.

Moreover, self-destructive behaviors could be signs of many psychological well being points, in line with Manly. For instance, an individual who’s affected by despair could interact in self-protective behaviors, like not going to work as a consequence of an absence of vitality or to keep away from stress, which are in the end self-destructive. Those that endure from substance use problems could resort to self-destructive behaviors, together with stealing to take care of the habit or driving whereas below the affect, with little or no means to genuinely respect the long-term impression; the cumulative results of those behaviors are sometimes tragic.  

“A wide range of psychological well being problems similar to BPD usually depart the sufferer caught in a cycle of self-destructive behaviors that depart the person feeling offended, remoted, and misunderstood,” she provides.