Please be gentle - self harm as a feminist issue

[fluffydressinggown]

I am currently in a psychiatric unit because of my self harm.

My psychologist has asked me to read two books (Susie Orbach - Bodies and Women who Run With the Wolves) and think about them in relation to my own body and feelings.

Reading them and thinking has made me wonder about how I, as a woman, view my own body as a without value and an object for me to do things to rather than to inhabit and be a part of.

I certainly think that in the media there is a strong sense as woman's bodies as objects without meaning behind them.

I consider myself to be a feminist and so I am interested that some of my issues (of course this is not the only reason) may be related to this. I certainly place no value on my body in terms of keeping it safe or secure and I do see it as a vessle to destroy which is quite separate to my own internal being. I often say 'I need to do enough' and 'I need to make it right' which make me wonder why it has to be enough and right on my body. I don't do it for emotional release or to dull internal pain, it is about damage and punishment, and a way to communicate.

Of course self harm is deeper than this and has many many reasons, but I am interested in looking at it like this and wondered if anyone had any other feelings.

Interestingly I am very well 'kept' and for the 6 weeks I have been here (and prior while I was in the community and unwell) I have had my make up done, nice hair, nice clean clothes, showered twice a day. I find the contrast between this and the hand I can barely use because it is so bruised and swollen from shutting it in heavy fire doors to be difficult. Oh and I have been told repeatedly that 'I am a nice girl' and 'I obviously care for myself' because of my make up - despite the very physical damage I do to my body. Which is interesting, like being a nice, good, neat girl makes it ok?

Like I say please please be gentle :)

Fluffy I read your thread last night, but didn't know what to say. Reading your lastest posts I thought of one thing, but I am not sure if it will be of any use to you.

I have mild self-harm issues. It is always worse when I am stressed or angry. I take measures to stop myself being able to hurt myself sometimes, sometimes I don't and deliberately not. It is absolutely nothing compared to you situation and for this reason I was hesitant in commenting. The thing is, I have come to realise that the harm I do is linked to anger, frustration and not being able to control a given situation. I am struggling just now because I am job hunting and this provokes all these sentiments in me.

I have also realised over the years that this behaviour started while I was a child and passing through very difficult circumstances (sexual abuse) and I started in a way to maintain my outward normality and silence to the world. I had gained a reputation at school for being extremely angry and this was causing me problems.

I am not saying that any of my situation relates to you at all. I only want to ask you if perhaps anger/ frustration is also an issue for you.

As for the feminist slant, I think Basil resumes many of the possible reasons very well.

As usual I pressed post instead of preview.

I wanted to add that I was sorry you were going through this. I hope you can fiend the answers you are looking for, and more importantly that these answers help you deal with your issues.

Cat, that is a lovely post

I too hope OP can find some ansers that assist her

i have no experience of self harm at all, so forgive me if I am am way off the mark, but looking at the posts it occurred to me that there seems so much of either an element of feeling forced to conform in various ways or of feeling you have no control of what happens to you.

Perhaps self harming is subconsciously a way of being in control because it is something you decide (again maybe subconsciously) to do to and for yourself - even in you don't consciously want to do it.

I'm expressing that clumsily, and as a I say, forgive me if I am way off.

Kind thoughts fluffy and I hope you will find a way through this. It must be horrible for you.

I'm sorry you're going through this Fluffy. You sound like you are in an awful lot of pain.

What do you think happened to make you so obsessed with surface appearance, whilst being able to endure absolute agony in your body at the same time? Do you have any ideas?

I do think feminism can be a way of working through at least part of this kind of stuff. It does offer answers. Like the way our society objectifies women (in other words turns us into objects - objects don't have feelings) whilst ignoring women's real pain and sadness.

I'd also recommend Alice Miller, who isn't a feminist, but whose work is all about how pain and unhappiness and mistreatment in childhood manifests itself in adult behaviour.

Her website is here: www.alice-miller.com/index_en.php

I have struggled not to be boxed up into a perecption of self harm, a perception of it being a release, a punishment, to numb pain, to externalise pain.

I think for me it is about what this perception says, so different to how you see it. I have read Bodies (and attended a talk by Orbach) and I didn't see it as relevant to my own self harm, but that only goes to show how utterly vital it is that professionals realise that it is not a one-size-fits-all problem.

I'm not strong enough to say much else right now, but I hope you are ok and that this analysis is helping you :)

Thank you for your thoughtful comments, I won't bore you with how I am because it is never good at the moment. Ho hum.

I think mine is about control, and I wonder if as a woman I live in a society where I am not in control of my own body? There is a lot of stuff out there about self harm and women, but I have not yet read much about women who self harm like me.

I suppose I wonder where my intense desire for destruction comes from. I think about walking in front of cars to cause the sort of catastrophic damage I feel I need.

There is definately some anger there, because it is so violent, and yet, I am controlled in the way I do it, when I do cut, it is a careful, slow process until I get to the desired depth and damage. Even banging my head, I tell myself to do 10 or whatever number.

He wanted me to read the Wild Woman one because he thinks there is something in the bones thing for me, wanting to cut to the bone, wanting to break my bones. Like your bones are what make you, you, what make your soul. And maybe I want to break my soul?

Nyac - I fear I sound terribly shallow, I suppose I like to be on control of my appearance, although (and this does make me a terrible person) I feel uneasy with my friends who are much more relaxed about it. I love them and keep it inside, but I struggle to understand how people can look scruffy and leave the house. I am by no means high maintenance but my appearance is controlled and ordered.

I am in leggings and a tunic today and my hair and makeup took 5 minutes so nothing smart, just, not scruffy. Never ever scruffy.

Nyac, I am going to have a look at Alice Miller, thanks

Sorry more thinking.

I am comfortable in many of the female aspects of my life, I am married (with my husband's surname), I am a primary school teacher, I do like shopping and makeup and girly films, my husband does do most of the DIY and I do read magazines like Heat and Closer and enjoy them.

So I wonder if I can look at my own self harm from a feminist perspective when so many aspects of me are anti-feminist (for want of a better word!) and I am happy with that. I don't want to change the way I feel about my appearance or the fact that I drink pink wine and discuss Kate Middleton's dressing habits in order to change how I feel about my body as a vessle to destroy and maim.

Fluffy, I respect that you don't want to talk about it, but don't feel you can't - you wouldn't bore us, your feelings really do matter. The fact you said that just shows how little you think of yourself (I am probably stating the obvious there sorry) :(

It's strange you talk about needing to even control how much SH you do, as last night I cut for the first time in ages, and I found myself thinking I had to make it symmetrical, I was agonising over how many to do. I recently found out I have Aspergers so I think for me that is related to the need for control.

Sorry, that might have come across as an implied criticism but it wasn't. It's not shallow for women to be obsessed with our appearances. We're told constantly that's all that matters about us. You say yourself that even the people who are supposed to be helping you comment on your appearance as if it was the most important thing. Those are strong messages, so it's not surprising that women take them on board. None of this stuff happens in a vacuum.

I've been dealing with some stuff from my own childhood and I don't know if you'll feel it applies to you, but these sort of self destructive feelings can come from a childhood where people were destructive to the child, or where people didn't care or even where they actively hurt them. Once again, nothing happens in a vacuum. Those kind of feelings don't come from nowhere. They are usually forced on to someone.

I tried to read Women who Run with the Wolves once, but I only got as far as her take on Bluebeard (extreme male violence towards women) where she was arguing that this story had some kind of psychological significance, quite ignoring that there are men out there who are real Bluebeards, who really do slaughter women, and simply couldn't go any further with it. I couldn't cope with the idea of male violence towards women being turned into a psychological metaphor for something else.

If you want to read feminist analysis of patriarchal sadism towards women, I'd recommend Andrea Dworkin or Mary Daly's Gyn/Ecology, especially the latter. They are feminists who are very helpful when you're looking for answers, I'd say.

Fuzzpig - my days are endless and filled with me crying, banging my head, trapping my hand in heavy fire doors, smoking, crying to staff that I want to go home, being reminded that if I really do want to go home I will have to be put on a section, crying to my husband that I want to die, imagining ways to kill myself here, messing round with ligatures, and inbetween this trying to ignore it for a bit while I go on the internet and read Take a Break or chat to staff or watch some TV, before finally falling asleep downstairs at 3am with a throbbing head and hand watching some terrible film involving Hugh Grant. It is deeply dull to write about and probably pretty vile to read about.

Nyac - Yes - The bluebeard story, I read it thinking - blah blah blah women - he is a DICKHEAD

Surely the story is about him, not the wife. There is another story about a man trying to guess the name of some twins and she says this shows how as women we need to be validated etc but actually, it seems to be to be a story about a man getting his own way?

I have a very lovely Mum and Dad (no really, I am not a stately home child) but my childhood was emotionally invalidating which has impacted me. My Father has given me quite a strong identity as an empowered woman, and he is very much a feminist (more than my Mum I think?) My own husband is a caring, gentle man who values and respects me as a person. This is all very frustrating because why is it not enough?

As the staff know me more, they see me more, and they see beyond my controlled appearance. It tended to be A&E / early days that told me I was ok because I looked nice.

So I suppose the contrast for me is this careful control of my appearance, to the point of obsession at times (I can't go camping because I would not be able to make myself look right for example). And yet my self harm is destructive and ugly and I am very disconnected with that.

I don't see a contrast in those two behaviours: they are both completely consistent with feelings of low self-worth. One is "My body is not worth seeing without a bunch of processing first", and the other is "I am so hateful that I should hurt myself." I hate my body / I hate my soul.

I am so sorry that you feel this way. I think all women feel body hatred, to whatever degree (and far too many also hate their entire selves). I blame our patriarchal society.

Fluffy, the last thing you are is boring or shallow.

Thinking of you x

Hi Fluffy, I asked if you were angry because I wonder if you allow others to see your anger? Do you feel you have a "valid" reason to be be angry, or do you think that your reasons are not "valid" and that you shouldn't allow yourself to be angry/let others see you are angry?

I get the impression that you are very hard on yourself, that you don't give yourself a break. You don't want to talk about how you are because you think it will "bore" us; ie, you think that your sufferings aren't important enough to receive sympathy. I think perhaps you feel the same about being angry. You think you haven't had it tough, that your husband is a good man and you have no reason to be how you are.

If I am way off the mark, please tell me and ignore this post. It is not my intention to tell you how you feel or anything. As I said in my other post I am merely wondering if perhaps my experience is of any use to you. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find that I was wrong.

So: I think that this is a feminist issue. I think -as women- we are constantly told that our feelings aren't "valid" or that we don't have a "valid" reason of feeling how we do. It is common to dismiss an angry woman as hysterical or silly or say that she is exagerating her feelings with no reason. You will always find someone who will say, "that's nothing compared with what X went/ go through". It is said about rape victims to imply that "date-rape" for example is not the same as "real rape (ie by a stranger with use of extra violence). If you read comment sections, any articles in women's issues is always plagued by the comment to effect that women in this country have nothing to complain about compared to [insert country under a highly repressive regime here]. That we shouldn't be wasting out time on such "unimportant" stuff and concentrate on the "real" problems.

It is easy to internalise this message and believe that you have no right to be upset or angry or have mental health issues. I think a feminist response would be to say that you -Fluffy- are very important person and your feelings etc are important. You have every right to be angry, even if the cause of this anger is not mass murder. If it is important enough to make you angry, it is important enough for others to take seriously.

As I said, if I am totally wrong here, ignore me. I hope you start to get an idea of how to deal with your issues soon.

"Why is it not enough?"

I second what Catitainahatita says, we are constantly having our experiences and feelings invalidated, why the hell should it be enough? You talk about your childhood feelings being emotionally invalidated Fluffy, is that linked to your feeling that what you've got ought to be enough and that it's wrong of you to not find it enough? If you want to talk about that, please do, don't feel that you're being boring or dull or vile, we are here to support you as well as to try and find some feminist insights into why you might be going through this and why so many other women do. But equally, if you don't want to go there, don't feel you're under any obligation to explore something you don't feel is relevant or helpful to you.

I had an interesting meeting with my psychologist the afternoon. We talked about some of the things raised here and he asked me what I needed to exist.

And I had no answers.

I don't need food (I like eating but I don't need it), I don't need or want sex with my husband, I don't need anything. And I had never thought about that, how little I need because I don't really want to exist.

Sorry we talked about more than just me having sex with DH (obvioulsy there is more to life than that), it was just something raised, that I don't feel like I need so many of the things that give people pleasure in life.

Ramble ramble - which makes me think that as a woman have I been conditioned not to exist, to deny my body any value, to deny myself any value.

You are very articulate, fluffy, don't apologise for rambling!

Like others on this thread I have flirted with self-harm (never seriously) and for me it was about self-punishment... there is also something weirdly satisfying about the physical nature of self-harm, expiating one's (imagined?) sins as religious obsessives used to by flogging themselves and praying all night on a cold stone floor.

So the question is, why do we see ourselves as not good enough? What is it, really, that we are punishing in ourselves? Society sets women very high standards, and judges them viciously for not achieving them... it's not surprising, I think, that we internalise this.

I have achieved and am regularly praised for meeting the expected standards, house, education, marriage - I tick all of those boxes. I am 'pretty' (not my words) but obviously as a woman that is deemed to be important and I am praised for it (such a pretty girl). Not only have I achived them I have done them in a very female way, English degree, worked in health and social care, primary school teacher, married young, have a very beautiful neat and tidy house. Everything women are praised for and sterotyped into I have achieved (although I felt no pressure to do such female things). And yet. I am utterly incomplete.

And I feel guilty that that is not enough. I am told again and again how nice my husband is (and he is), as if, as if his value as a husband should make me ok, or complete. He is lovely but he is not me and nor can he make me intrinscly happy (iykwim), my value and experience as a woman is surely more than having married a good man. I struggle with this anyway, being told how nice he is. I deserve a nice husband, nothing more nothing less, having achueved that should not raise me to a higher standard of mental health.

There is something very fundamental about self harm, about the power I have over my own body. Although, as the bathroom door shuts on my hand, my only thoughts are of terror for the quite spectacular ensuing pain. It is quite possibly the worst pain I have ever felt (no children but have broken my arm, overdosed, cut through nerves on my leg so I consider myself well versed in pain). I jump up and down with it and cannot speak for about 10 minutes afterwards because it is just unbareable. And yet, I do it again and again, despite my fears, despite my horror at the fact that my index finger no longer works.

Waffle waffle!! I apologise for my typing, dud hand etc!

It's like you strive so hard for perfection or at least to make yourself acceptable by being well groomed - but yet you dislike yourself too much to let yourself be so perfect/acceptable and so you sabotage the hard work you are putting in.

I've not really considered this side to self harm before - as I said earlier for me it was release of pain, anger, the more well known reason I suppose.

I'm sorry you are going through so much, I remember being in the depths of my addiction (to be honest the worst of it was not when I was in hospital). I am glad the staff are helping you - the manager of my adolescent unit said (quote) "self harmers are manipulative, attention seeking and a waste of space". Twat.

Another one here saying don't worry about the waffle :) say what you want, nobody here's going to judge you.

(in the first paragraph I meant the sabotage as in by scarring/damaging your body, therefore 'spoiling' the body you are working hard to achieve... Sorry if I'm repeating others there)

Who praises you for reaching the expected standards Fluffy? Whose standards are they?

Who is telling you how lucky you are with your nice husband?

Feminism would say that none of the things you describe will necessarily make you happy, if you aren't in touch with yourself and and aren't getting your real needs met. Are you living the life you want? The way you describe it, it doesn't sound like you are.