A few questions about self harming for people who have experience of it...

[juicychops]

Just a few questions to current or previous sufferers to hear your experiences...

What were the main triggers?

How did you stop it? (if you have stopped)

Did you want to stop?

Can you stop without help?

How long did you do it for?

Main triggers - feelings of rejection 9stirring up older feelings of rejection), frustration/anger combined with feelings of powerlessness (ie you need to lash out, and the only person you can safely lash out at is yourself), feelings of self-disgust/humiliation.

It's hard to explain, but I used to have relationships (with friends and parent-figures and teachers and all sorts, not just romantic relationships) which were semi-destructive, too intense, and were all about me being needy and NOT getting my needs met properly. A bit like picking at a sore patch constantly, lurching from emotional crisis to crisis etc. The self-harming occurred during the more emotionally intolerable phases of those relationships. It was a pattern of behaviour which was almost entirely driven by me and which the "object" - the other person being targeted by all the crazy feelings - was quite often quite in the dark about how I felt.

How did you stop - I stopped it because I had some counselling (not enough, but some), made some firm non-dependent friendships and stopped abusing drink/soft drugs/other people. I started slowing down, emotionally/job-wise, taking more care of my own feelings in relationships and experiencing day-to-day knocks for what they were rather than as some sort of hideous replay of old hurts, IYKWIM. I think some of it was just maturation, really. I was about 22 when I stopped actively self-destructing, I think.

Did you want to stop - I didn't want to stop for quite a while, it felt necessary, like emotional blood-letting. I wanted to stop beiong found out and I wanted to stop experiencing the disgust and shame I felt after I had self-harmed. I did eventually start to make the connection and realise that it was an all-round bad idea (sounds thick but there it is)

Can you stop without help - I don't think you can stop without help, no. I tried over and over again but just found myself hitting a brick wall and ending up at rock bottom again. I did accept help in the end.

How long did you do it for - I did it from the age of 5-ish (deliberately biting my tongue to draw blood in class, for attention, making big scratches in my arms and showing them to people etc) through the teenage years (cutting/burning etc) until I was about 22. The last time I self-harmed I went a bit further than I had previously and permanently scarred myself. It frightened me enough to make me really seek proper help, plus I was in a good healthy non-fucked-up relationship by then.

I don't think I will namechange for this, because it's the past and I've given up feeling low and shameful about the past. I really, really hope this helps, whatever your reasons are for asking these questions. You would be more than welcome to CAT me if you wanted to.

Did this when I was a teenager, triggers were stress and feeling a lack of control over a situation, for a short time I used it as a visible cry for help (and still my lovely parents looked the other way...). I stopped when I moved away to uni, made a conscious decision not to do it anymore having moved away from extreme stress and tension at home. I wanted to stop because I wanted to be normal. I had no specific help but I did drink like a fish for a couple of years and contemplated what to do next... I did it from maybe 14 to 18/19. Interestingly I had pnd and have really had to work hard to stop myself going for a knife, have had a few dodgy moments scratching/hitting myself...
Y'know it's weird I've never really thought about the reasons I self-harmed, I've always focussed on my eating disorder...

Can i ask why?

"What were the main triggers?"
Life was a trigger for me. I was filled with an incredible hatred of myself because of what had been done to me. SI was my way of getting a release when my dancing failed. I needed to feel physical pain to make sense of the emotional pain i was feeling. Seeing the blood made it seem as if my problems were flowing out with it.

"How did you stop?"
I haven;'t fully. Although i haven;t harmed in a while.

"Can you stop without help?"
I don't know the answer to that question. I wouldn't and have never asked for help

"How long did you do it for?"
From age 14 to now in varoius ways

redclover, i selfharmed as a release from my ED and used my ED as a form of SI (If that makes sense)

Thanks greensleeves I do self harm but its only recently that ive realised that its actually quite bad i think.

Ive done it since i was about 7 i used to kick myself to relax me when i couldn't sleep and over the years it has got harder and worse.

I have asked the questions just to hear other's stories. thanks for replying. I feel weird as its not cutting myself or scratching - the things most people associate with self harm. Thats probably why ive only recently seriously considered it as being this due to the reasons i do it.

But i like doing it and don't want to stop as its the only outlet i have that does calm me when im stressed or angry, upset, or when ds is having a huge tantrum.

my family know i do it and my dp and they think im weird but they don't understand the release it gives me and i cant explain it to them.

Didn't think about name changing.... but i wish i did now as i probably sound like a right nut!!

thanks everyone else too for replying!

now i feel like i have given some info that is too personal for MN and should have changed my name

oh well, its said now

You don't sound like a nut

If it helps I used to do the kicking myself thing too when I was a child. I used to have a row of bruises on my shin.

Don't get sucked into feeling ashamed or thinking of yourself as a nutter or weird. There are THOUSANDS of people in your situation. And whatever the cause of your self-harming, it's not your fault, and you can be helped! xx

I feel a bit shocked at myself for posting this under my own name too MoM. But I've spent enough time hiding and skulking out of shame, so arseholes to anyone who thinks I'm barking

i have a different name i use for talking about things that i don't talkabout in RL so feels a bit odd to use my "real" name for this.

Ah well, its part of me.

Juicy, i don't think you are a nut! I 2 used to hit myself to sleep when i was younger (didn't know to count that) and i broke most of my fingers and toes on purpose so i have probably used SI for much longer than i admit to if i am being totally honest.

What were the main triggers?
Stress, exams etc. Depression (obviously, though no one has mentioned it). Later on when I was depressed doctors would ask me if I had cut myself this time and sometimes I got into a frame of mind that I thought they would help me more if I had.

How did you stop it? (if you have stopped)
Consciously (Sp?) deciding to, distracting myself with computer games etc, giving it twenty minutes to see if I still wanted to then, then again and again. Not sure that I wont again, but Ive had several periods of a year or more without.

Did you want to stop?
Yes, it upset me and others around me and led into a vicious circle

Can you stop without help?
Yes but somebody supportive and understanding can help a lot.

How long did you do it for?
From age 16 properly til age 25. Cant say I have stopped, just not done it for a year.

Message withdrawn

For me self-harming was anger and pain turned inwards

as a teenager I found there was no acceptable outlet to express these feelings which overwhelmed me

but self-harming was a wonderful emotional and physical release (and I sometimes think it was a lot more straightforward than some of the other self-destructive behaviours I have indulged in)

I stopped because as I grew up I found more complicated and sophisticated ways to harm myself

Now I no longer suffer from depression I seldom or never feel the urge

I did it sporadically for about 6 or 7 years I think, although I can remember the odd incident more recently. I didn't want to stop DOING IT particularly, I wanted to stop FEELING that way

LOL just remembered picking strips of skin off my feet as a child until it bled - god that is painful! And biting the inside of my cheeks - still do that without meaning to if I am stressed

I am past being embarrassed about this as well. Shit happens. I have visible scars from it and I don't really care any more. I am a happy person now.

I luv you Franny

Shuddup you barking old wotsit

mumofmonsters, its interesting to hear you broke your fingers and toes. Ive never done that but i force my wrist backwards and forwards further than its supposed to go. Because the stretching is 'nice'pain.

Also i kicked myself too hard a few weeks ago in the wrong place and think ive damaged my muscle as it still hurts when i put pressure on it. But i find myself automatically kicking that sore bit without even thinking even though before i origina;;y hurt it it wasn't a normal place i would do it. Its like subconsiously i know its going to really hurt there so i do it for ultimate pain.

It must seem really stupid to an 'outsider' who hasn't experienced it but im sure you know what i mean

I dont' want to do it because of lasting damage, but i don't want to stop iyswim

i have loose joints and wrist problems thru doing exactly that juicy!

I know i must be doing myself long term damage There is no way you could do it for years without causing some kind of long term damage. This is why part of me wants to stop. But i just cant imagine not having this outlet anymore.I really do 'love' the feeling. But getting help to stop would be opening a can of worms and i don't feel ready for that

Sweetheart, if you do start getting help it isn't a five-minute fix, nobody is going to suddenly wrest control from you and you probably won't stop for a while after you start counselling. You'll stop when the help you are getting is sufficient to make you feel you can stop, and want to stop. It can be a long, gentle process if that's what you need.

Do you think you could talk to your doctor? I know I couldn't, I spoke directly to a counsellor first, but I was at Uni and the counselling was free, so I was very lucky there. How do you feel about counselling, anyway?

There are ways of doing it safely. Am a bit wary of what i say juicy, i don't want to be seen as encouraging something that i know can be destructive

I'm afraid I've namechanged for this because I am ashamed of it, but I hope it means I can be more honest than if I were posting under my usual name.

Triggers included any kind of stress, particularly occasions where I felt helpless or out of control of the situation - frustrated and wanting to lash out. Also when I was cross with myself for mistakes or bad decisions I made.
I remember very smugly telling my form tutor (who must have gone through hell with our class of screwed-up 16yos) that I thought it was better than taking it out on other people, and I think to a certain extent I used that to justify it to myself.

I stopped I think only in the fullness of time - I started at 14 or 15 when I didn't really know who I was or what I wanted, but whatever I was I didn't like it or think it was good enough.
By the time I was 19 I'd grown so much happier with myself that I was no longer frustrated with my own rubbishness.

I think the fact that I was at an intensely academic, highly selective private girls' school where we were constantly driven to achieve and made to feel failures if we didn't, because both our parents and the school 'knew we had the potential' was a big part of this.
I think I thought that love and attention and 'worthiness' were conditional upon the twin peaks of academic success and social popularity, and failure to conquer one or the other meant I'd failed utterly at everything.
Luckily I failed an A-level (which made me lower than the worms in the eyes of the school) and found out that perfection was not necessary for happiness. I still got onto the degree course of my choice, and was so thrilled to discover a less intense atmosphere at university that I reckoned I could fake happiness and popularity as well as acheieving academically. This worked so well that by the beginning of the second year I discovered that I was both happy and popular rather than having to fake it.

We'd had a kind of mini-epidemic of selfharm amongst the fifth form during GCSE mock exams, which I discovered later isn't uncommon, and the high pressure meant that the atmosphere wasn't really psychologically very healthy. Being out of the school environment where it seemed normal and was widely accepted really helped - I realised that most people didn't think it was normal.

While I did it I did want to stop, but in the same way a smoker wishes they could give up but still lights a fag every morning. I'd think 'I wish I could stop' but I didn't really take any action to do so.
I did little attention-seeking things that really meant I wanted someone else to stop me rather than take on the responsibility of it myself.
I remember scribbling a stream-of-consciousness poem in the back of my maths book knowing that the teacher was bound to see it when I handed it in. She was young and, I thought, sympathetic, and I kind of hoped she'd sort it all out and it would all be over.
The book came back with the page cut out and it was never mentioned.

After my best friend attempted suicide and it all came out with the form tutor we were all 'counselled' by a pretty useless and ghastly counsellor, but tbh we were intelligent girls and knew what we were doing so her saying 'So, what do you think about when you're, you know, cutting?' wasn't especially helpful.

So basically I guess what I'm saying is I grew out of it, which I suspect isn't especially helpful.

The main triggers were feeling shame, self loathing and anger towards self and others.

I had various counselling (SP?), to help me stop, I had try try a fw different ones before i found one that helpd. Also helped me massively when I was in a healthy relationship for a change....I really wanted to stop feeling bad al the time, also wanted to stop beacuse of scars/marks, I kept it a secret form most people and was ashamed of SHing too. It did take me a long time to want to stop.
I am not sure if I could have stopped without any outside help.

I did it from when I was 17 to about 23, haven't done it for a long time although have wanted to sometimes, although like redclover have had some scatching incidents.
I hope things get better for you soon juicychops.

Can I ask if anyone here who does/did this, do you family, friends etc know about this. No one who knows me now apart from dp knows tha tI did this and I gt very anxious about trying to hide the scars.

i would maybe see a counceller but a few years back when i desperately wanted and needed to see a counceller and the doctor reffered me, the appointment took about 4 months and by then i didn't want to go through with it.

I have thought about speaking to my doctor but i play it out in my head and picture him just laughing at me! I know that wouldn't happen and he would be professional about it but i would feel stupid and embarrassed talking to him face to face about it.

I know councelling would help me with a lot of problems i have but some of them i just don't feel ready to face yet. Plus some of them im terrified of family and dp finding out. i wont go into what these things are though

i really wish i had name changed

and buckets of respect to the people who've posted without namechanging

much love to you all and especially juicychops

Soreen, I haven't a clue who you are, but your post is full of intelligence and integrity. What a shame you were failed so abjectly by the adults who should have been safeguarding your welfare. It's so sad that you reached out to a teacher and didn't get the support you needed.