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I cannot stop replaying a message I already sent.
I cannot stop replaying a message I already sent.
Do not send a second message to soothe the replay unless a fact was wrong. Put the phone in another room for twenty minutes and write the likely reading, then the catastrophic one, and notice they are not equal.
What may actually be happening
Your mind is trying to control their reaction by rehearsing it. The rehearsal cannot reach them. Another clarifying text often creates the problem you were afraid you had caused.
What you can do
Check once: was there a factual error or a cruelty? If yes, correct it in a shorter message. If no, wait. Tell yourself the time you are allowed to revisit it. Then do a physical task with an end.
What not to do
Do not ask three friends to interpret a comma. Do not punish yourself with a night of screenshots.
Try this today
Read the message once, aloud, as if a calm colleague had sent it. If you would not be alarmed, close it. If you would, fix the fact and stop.