Self harming teenage DD

[Zzzexhaustedzzz]

I thought she was behaving oddly and investigated by looking in her diary... I know, not good.
The last entry said that she has started cutting herself. Can't remotely relate to this!
She has been quite aggressive and grumpy when I went to her room to speak to her. On the day she wrote that she started cutting her wrists (which do look ok, haven't seen any scarring) there was blood in the sink and on her bedroom carpet. She told me that she must've cut her foot somehow and wasn't sure where, I thought it was odd but believed her.
Now I'm obviously looking for signs all the time since I read this yesterday. She is always in long sleeves but like I said, wrists look fine.. The diary entry was v dramatic and not like her voice so I'm wondering if it's a sort of trying on another persona thing which has already blown over. It was around 10 days ago that she wrote this and nothing in the diary since. I know I shouldn't have looked but it occurred that the behaviour might be due to some internet communication I wouldn't approve of ie I don't want her chatting to complete strangers.
Any thoughts on how to handle this?

[breathslowly]

Not sure why you didn't get a reply to this as it's a pretty hot topic. How is it going? Any more problems?

[rachellebrown41]

hi , I discovered my 13 year old daughter was cutting about 7 weeks ago at 1/2 term . (please check all of your dd arms and legs ), my dd is cutting top of arms and lower arms and tops of legs. always wearing long sleeved top so I did not see. but she has lots of scars. I made an drs appointment that evening and took her straight away. she is now having counciling at school once a week . she is very down on herself and always critisizing herself and others. she sits in her room most of the time on her own.
I was devastated when I found out and cried for days. just find it very difficult to understand.
have tried to talk to her but I don't get very far , I do feel that I am quite an easy person to talk to and will talk to my kids about anything( sex drugs ect) I have 2 other children a 19 boy and a 15 girl.
I try telling her that I just want to help her feel happy again but I don't get much of a response.
she had not cut since I found out at 1/2 term ,but now easter and 2 week holiday from school and have just checked her arms and legs and she has done it again. tried talking this morning but she just says she dose not want to talk.
from what I have read up on self harming that it can not occure for a few weeks then it just gets too much and they do it again. it is not something that they do every day or even week , they may cut once a month or two months.
she will happily show me her arms and legs now with or with out cuts but she just won't talk about it.
don't get any feed back from the counciler at school as patiant confendenality .so don't know if it is helping or not.

I really don't know what else I can do, I tell her that I am here if she wants to talk, we have an agreement that she spends 1 1/2 hours of an evening downstairs with everybody. and I try to get her out her room as much as I can but it is very difficult. when she is down stairs she can seem quite happy and joins in with conversation, but as soon as she gets the chance she will go back to her room , it almost like she won't let herself have fun.
when I found out she said she did not want anybody else to know so I said that I would not say anything and as far as she know I didnt, but I told the two other children and my husband and my mother as I did not feel I could cope with it on my own. and I knew if any of then saw her cuts (and did not know)they would question it and could make the situation worse.
so if they see them now it won't be a shock.
my husband works away sometimes weeks at a time , so my mother has been a rock being able to talk to her about it.

I really urge you to look further up you dds arms and the top of her legs . they are very good at hiding it