Nearly a quarter of girls aged 14 self harm

[HavingALittleBabyToolshed]

[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-45329030]]

“A survey of 11,000 children found 22% of the girls and 9% of the boys said they had hurt themselves on purpose in the year prior to the questionnaire.”

This just breaks my heart. I dabbled with a little bit of self harm when I was about 16-17 but I cut it out pretty quickly. It makes me so sad to think of so many young people (22% of girls!) going through this.

22% of 14 year old girls is staggering.

The relevant report (which should cover definition of self-harming etc.) is available for download from Children's Society: The Good Childhood Report 2018

Austerity receives some much-needed emphasis in the summary report etc.

A brief scamper through (when I really should be reading something else) reveals the question was:

In the past year have you hurt yourself on purpose in any way?
[Note on how the question was asked which indicates no indication as to nature or degree of harm involved.] This question also used a ‘yes-no’ format.

Ah.
My dd self harmed, cutting and od's

Met all the female stereotypes. Good home, loving family, bright, good schools. No problems except low self esteem.

Had nothing to do with any of this. She had undiagnosed ADD. Once diagnosed and medication available problem solved.

What support was there: nada, zilch, nothing. CAMHS focussed on possible social/parenting issues. No ability at all to diagnose or look firther than the ends of their noses.

That said I do think there is too much emphasis on academics now. When I was at school 40 years ago the day dreamers happily became secretaries or cordon bleu cooks.

Ffs the children’s society doesn’t know the difference between sex and gender. We really are doomed.

Thanks for the link though.

Had a conversation about this recently, there seems to be so much stress placed on kids now days- someone I know- her child got told their expected gcse grades at the end of their FIRST year in secondary school. It’s just ludicrous. Kids having panic attacks about gcse grades it’s all just too much. When I said to someone I’m just not going to enter into all the exam stress- as in I would say to Ours-pick subjects you like and enjoy and have some ability in, try your best and see how it goes, the reply was along the lines of- well you can’t the schools pile on so much pressure now daily that the kids just can’t take it- they are there most do the time. I have also heard people say that they feel it’s unhelpful for self harm as a concept in secondary school to be spoken about as part of curriculum. That they saw a rise in kids harming in that school year after that point. I wonder if there is any relationship.

IAmLurkacus wrote: the children’s society doesn’t know the difference between sex and gender. We really are doomed.

I noticed that but was trying to not be permanently cross today and take some comfort from the fact that austerity does get a mention. However, as all of the analysis is based on Millennium Cohort Study, Wave 6, 2015 (when children were aged 14) I am apprehensive about the outcome of further analyses.

Has self harming always been a problem?
I don’t recall it from when I was young in the 70s and 80s but perhaps it just wasn’t talked about.

I self harmed in the 70s and 80s (and 90s and the beginning of the 00s but not now!) I didn't know that anyone else did it until I was 21 and then I met others who also didn't know anyone else did it, so it was a problem for some of us, but no idea how widespread. Support for it when I tried to get help in the 90s was crap. I was told I couldn't have any counselling until I stopped self harming. Women are now still told they are too damaged to be treated. I think there is a lack of understanding that this is often about emotional pain, which cannot easily be controlled just by thinking about it - these bits of the brain are not well connected - and that emotional pain sensors in the brain are in the same place as physical pain sensors. The emotional pain gets too much but physical pain can distract from it. Having said that there are obviously different degrees of self-harm and different reasons for it, and knowing that it exists may be a prompt for some people as a way of coping whereas they may not have thought about it on their own.

Has self harming always been a problem?
I don’t recall it from when I was young in the 70s and 80s but perhaps it just wasn’t talked about.

Self-harming is hugely contagious. I don't doubt a lot of kids are struggling massively and are in need of a lot of support but we also have social media fuelling it. I have no idea how you tackle it but it's a problem with suicide ideation and other things (including gender dysphoria) too. There is too much information out there about it - ideas on how to harm yourself, kids talking about having mental health problems on IG or You Tube - it becomes slightly aspirational.

vivarium not sure if anyone responded, one of my friends has found success with Calm Harm an app which helps get through the self-harm urges with different techniques. There's an articule discussing that app and another similar one here thepsychologist.bps.org.uk/volume-30/july-2017/apps-teenagers-who-are-self-harming and it might help alongside mental health support from professionals if that is needed/wanted/being waited for.

Sorry Arranfan will try and be more positive!

Agree self harm is extremely contagious.

Everard

Digital apps currently recommended by, or in testing by, the NHS for Mental Health (including self-harm issues).

apps.beta.nhs.uk/category/mental_health/

arran thank you! That's a much more in-depth resource :)

Thanks folks, appreciate those links.

My girl appears to be mildly distressed - tbh, probably "normal" teenage angst. Being a teenager is hard, low mood and trying to figure stuff out is essentially normal, I guess. Just a shame she chose to deal with things this way.

agree entirely with the "infectious" comment, she has a couple of friends who have threatened suicide, cue much drama and attention on snapchat by kids who really should just have reported it to an adult. I don't meant to be flippant - they were doing their best to help, bt as children none of them had the skills needed to work out what would be helpful and I really think they fuelled things with their naivety. Neither of the friends actually needed treatment, they were distressed but within "normal" limits of their age group's stresses, fi you see what I mean.

She does have one friend who is very troubled and school and her family have been very supportive and she is having active treatment. There has been a few comments about how "lucky" this girl is because she gets to miss some classes whilst she goes for counselling - which goes to show that they are just not mature enough to understand what is going on.

I'm not overly concerned about her long term wellbeing. It's just a shame that she will be left with permanent scars. She's so beautiful (maternal bias aside) it's very sad that she'll have to wear evidence of these current (and hopefully passing) difficulties for life.

I count eating disorders as forms of self harm. They are definitely deliberately harming yourself so I could quite honestly answer that question yes even though I've never cutyself or similar. I'm a teacher and I do see a transition from a large number of eating disorders to a large number of girls self harming. But I have no idea if eating disorder rates have gone down overall.

The contagion aspect is interesting. We encourage young people to talk about their difficulties now andany are very open about self harming. Does this actually make the problem worse? I know I was 'inspired' to become anorexic after reading an article about it (much more complex factors at play as well obviously).

I don’t think talking about it in a sort of ‘group therapy’ way in real life, with an adult steer causes the spread, I think the spread is more caused by online discussions where you can get ‘likes’ for what you’ve just cut into your arm or cutting may even be suggested to you as a way to ease stress by adults with dubious motives.

I think it’s very important that kids are encouraged at school to talk about this, but encouraged to talk about WHY they’re doing this and look at underlying reasons and find better coping strategies.

It needs to be talked about, but not in a ‘stunning and brave’ way that makes other impressionable/vulnerable students see it as a way to gain attention for themselves.

I hope what I wrote made sense, hopefully someone will be along soon to type what I actually meant much more eloquently (that’s what usually happens)

Apps can have a place, but the best way for people to learn to regulate emotional distress is to be around people who are already good at regulating their emotions - this is a large part of the way that therapy works but it doesn't have to be a professional relationship, it can be anyone. Other things that have shown to be good are things that involve group cooperation, particularly anything rhythmical, which could be music, drama or sports, yoga, art. One of the podcasters I listen to says that you are the average of the five people you are closest to, so making sure that they are positive relationships is really important, though obviously it's difficult to do much about teens' friendships, but there might be other adults that kids can spend more time with, family or family friends. The self harm is a symptom, not the cause, same as substance misuse, but people often focus on that rather than the underlying issue.

I'm not surprised to hear about this, being a 14 year old girl can be brutal, mostly in my case thanks to other 14 year old girls. Bullying plays a key role in this.

This is heartbreaking. The pressures on children - particularly girls, for the way that they look, is horrific.
Gender stereotypes are harmful. It's not surprising that some of these girls end up believing they would make a better boy than they do girl.

The world is an even more hostile environment for young girls now than in the past. It breaks my heart to see what contempt they are confronted with every day.

As a teacher I am not surprised, but very angry that there is so little support for girls. The disappearance of single sex organisations such as Guides is an issue, as I believe it is very important for girls to have friendships outside of school and be able to speak to older teenage girls or young women, in a safe space. Schools are not providing that, and are reinforcing the idea that sexual harassment is 'just what boys do'. Porn culture has a lot to answer for, and it should be condemned in the strongest terms.

So important.

The rise of porn and gender stereotypes must play a big part in this. As will the net and the wholesale immersion in malign forces and hostility against women that girls are exposed to from their childhood onwards.

The tactics of vested interests in deliberately causing anxiety in order to sell products, plus wholesale misogyny normalised, compounds the pile on. This scapegoating must be an awful force to reckon with at such a young age.

Then take any real-life vulnerability like moving schools or location etc and bang, girls bear the weight of all that hate and naturally feel distress in their bodies, as we are the feeling sex. Then the only outlet they can see for that distress is turning it on themselves. They then become the problem - a neat DARVO away from the origin - the misogyny and use of women as fodder for commercial interests and men, with no thought for their welfare.

Girls/women are continually misled into thinking that if they don't conform to stereo-myths, then there's something wrong with them - a lie perpetrated by this toxic cocktail of men keeping women and girls off-balance and focused on changing themselves - so they can never achieve their true potential and power - and hence are easier to control.

And yes, the loss of safe, women-only spaces that normalise the full breadth of femaleness is a huge issue - and where the Guides etc are so failing girls and their duty of care. No wonder a lot of girls are crying out in their own sanctioned way.

We have to start again and create these safe spaces and connect girls and women plus ensure they are only accessible to women and girls.

There's an article in The Times - Getting to the heart of why girls self-harm - anyone got a token? PS the answer is misogyny.

I tried to get a share token but it won't give me one for some reason. The article concludes resilience is needed. I do wonder looking at my teen daughter constantly on her phone whether the issue is not just the constant pressure to be on show and to be thin and beautiful but just that they have so little downtime to be bored, to reflect on things, to read books, to find a hobby that develops their personalities and builds up neural pathways in their brains that will help them cope with life. I think I had a much richer inner and outer life at that age than my DD does because she is getting exposed to a pretty narrow range of life. Ironic really that the internet has both opened up and closed down the world.

I think it would also be helpful to look at the girls in the same circumstances who are not self-harming and what is protecting them.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/29/self-harmed-body-teenagers-bullying-sexual-harassment?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

At 14, I self-harmed to erase my body. But my body was not the enemy
Maggy van Eijk

I shot upwards and outwards, sticking out everywhere. My body didn’t belong to me. A man stuck his hand up my skirt in a shopping centre. Another man flashed his penis to me with a Cheshire cat grin while I waited for a friend in our local park.

Boys in my class exhibited a newfound curiosity about what was going on with their female classmates. They fired questions like they were eager scientists wanting to know what colour my underwear was, whether I masturbated when I got home or if I smelt bad down there on my period. Someone had carved “vagina fluid” on my locker and I worried for weeks that it was a direct message to me. Was I permanently leaking? Why couldn’t I stop my body from ruining my life?