tash28 Posted November 11, 2010 Report Share Posted November 11, 2010 How to help a person who self-harms! Hurting yourself is NOT about attention! Hurting yourself is NOT about wanting to kill yourself! Hurting yourself is NOT about bloody EMO!! Hurting yourself is NOT about proving how cool you are!! Hurting yourself is NOT about having a weakness of personality! Hurting yourself is NOT about self-hate!! Hurting yourself IS a symptom of a larger problem! Hurting yourself IS a symptom of a larger problem which the person may not even be aware of!! Hurting yourself IS AN ADDICTION!! Pure and simple. Like any form of addiction - gambling, drugs, smoking, chocolate, porn - you simply have to do it again, only with every new time you do it, it has to be bigger in order for you to receive the same “hit”. This is where people who aren’t even suicidal are killing themselves by accident. I’m not saying that everyone who self harms isn’t suicidal, nor am I saying that anything which I have written above about what self harm is/is not is set in stone. People self-inflict for all sorts of reasons, but from my experiences not only with my own self harm but also talking with people, who do the same thing, they aren’t suicidal or weak (in fact, some of the people who self-inflict that I know personally are the strongest most beautiful souls I’ve ever met) I started self harming five years ago. My trick with self-harming was to attack parts of my body which I could cover by throwing on some form of clothing, beit a jumper on the middle of a summer’s day or a long sleeve T-shirt on a cooler one. Always with injuries which wouldn’t leave any long-long term scars. I would always use similar methods and every now and then, when the mood struck, would become creative and resort to more unusual methods. I was never doing it because of wanting to kill myself, or hating myself, or wanting to prove how tough and resilient I was. Nor was I doing it for attention - if attention was all I was after I would release a wombat into a crowded shopping precinct or streak Brunswick Street on a Sunday afternoon. (And no, I’m not referring to this pain-pleasure as in a sadomasochistic way - ‘cause if that was the case whenever I felt like self-inflicting I would just go visit a dominatrix and have some sexy woman whip me rather than doing it myself.) I’m referring to the coping mechanisms people have when their internal pain becomes too great. Remember I said earlier to note the use of the word after in relation to my suicide attempts. The reason I self-inflicted after those attempts was as a way to control the inner conflict, pain and turmoil my mind was going through as a result of them. It was a way to stop me from trying again! It wasn’t because I still wanted to die; it was because I wanted to live! The other times I self harmed was as a way to feel something. Life had become numb, frustrating, painful, empty and meaningless. The over-riding feeling of loneliness and emptiness is a powerful influence, because we live to feel, and if we are feeling nothing then what is the point of being alive? Again I wasn’t self-inflicting because I wanted to die, it was because I wanted to feel something: to feel like I was alive! Hence, why, before my third suicide attempt I did self harm - as a means to grab some physical feeling. something to convince myself not to go through with what my brain was telling me to do. However, on this instance, no matter what pain I caused myself, it didn’t work. Overcoming the urge to self-inflict has been one of the hardest things I have had to deal with through this tumultuous time suffering from depression. As I said above, IT IS AN ADDICTION. Pure and simple! And anyone who has tried giving up smoking or gambling or Lindt or badgers will know that overcoming addiction is fucking hard! Not only because of the pure level of addiction, but also because it means having to face up to whatever problem is feeding that addiction in the first place. Whatever buried pain is making us smoke, drink or gamble needs to be faced up to. In essence, we need to become whip-wielding dominatrixies in order to tame and eventually command our problems. To overcome self-harm, like with every form of mental illness, we need to start talking about it in order to understand it, in order to help people overcome and control their addiction. So how can you help? If you know someone who self-harms here are a few pointers: - Whatever they’re doing DON”T take it personally. It isn’t about YOU! - Be available and LISTEN to them if they need to talk. - ACKNOWLEDGE their pain, it won’t make it go away, but it will make it more bearable. - DON’T avoid the subject or pretend it’s not there. - ASK THEM “I know you hurt yourself and I would like to understand it a little more, could you maybe explain why you do it? I’d be grateful if you could.” - DON’T confiscate their “tools” (because I guarantee you this will lose their trust and they will just get more creative anyway) - BELIEVE in them and BE HOPEFUL - DON’T push them - TAKE the initiative and distract them; take them to the cinema, rent a DVD, bake some chocolate brownies, go to a trivia night, go for a walk, have a playful pillow or water pistol fight, hell, if they’re your bf or gf, do a seductive strip tease and get them thinking about that cute butt of yours. - DO spontaneous acts of kindness - Be available, and willing, to LISTEN if they need to talk. - EDUCATE yourself - slip on your Willow hat and hop on the net for some research. - SUPPORT them physically; call them up and tell them you’re worried about them and invite them over for a game of scrabble or a blueberry muffin. - SUPPORT them emotionally; go to the Doctor/Psychologist with them. And please, please…whatever you do… - DO NOT TRY TO MAKE/ORDER THEM TO STOP!!!!!!!!! If you make them feel guilty, or punish them in any way, this will just add fuel to their addiction. And please, please, please, please…whatever you do…remember to… - Take TIME OUT and recuperate, caring/loving someone who suffers from any form of mental illness is exhausting and you need to look after yourself. Although it’s confronting, brutal and painful to think that people you care about are inflicting this pain on themselves remember that to them it is merely an addiction. A symptom of a larger, possibly unknown illness or condition, and they just need some help and support in order to get them through it. As we’ve all experienced from time to time: the over-riding feeling of loneliness and emptiness is a powerful influence. It’s time to stop judging people who self harm, and start understanding what they are feeling; it’s the only way to understand their pain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
malign Posted November 11, 2010 Report Share Posted November 11, 2010 And anyone who has tried giving up smoking or gambling or Lindt or badgers ...I was right with you, until "badgers". :-)Thank you for some good and very direct advice, tash. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaskade Posted November 12, 2010 Report Share Posted November 12, 2010 Extremely insightful and explained very well, thank you for sharing this information. You covered everything including a reminder for the caregiver to remember to take care of themselves too because that can be easily forgotten. Very much appreciated tash. - Kaskade - Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Athena Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 Right on. Unfortunately, I am being judged rather severely right at this moment. The problem with being judged is that it can potentially accelerate the problem. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waiting Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 I am sorry you are being judged Athena.Try to remember that self harm is something very, very hard for most people to understand and that they may be trying.I know when I got involved with my partner I have no clue about self harming. I didn't even really know it existed.My partner was a self harmer when we initially got together in fact it was me reaching out to help her that got us together.Wainting Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tash28 Posted November 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 When I use to live with a friend of mine I use to self harm but would do it away from her. I use put things against my door so no1 could come in. Once my friend tried to come into my room and couldnt as I had things against to stop her from coming in. She knew something was wrong so she pushed the door in. She seen me cutting myself and tried to stop me by pinning me down which mad me worst. I waould cry scream and beg her to let me go. She called a few of he friends over to help her control me and they pinned me down on the bed until I had no fight lest in me. But once they had let me go I would run off with them hanging on to me but I would get really aggrestive towards them so I could get free. It use to make the matter worst as when I was free I would just slice my legs. I felt so bad for them having to see me like it and so angry for them for making me stop as this was the way I felt in control and they use to try and stop me from having any kind of control over my life. I know my friend really could cope with it and use to find it very hard to deal with. We have got into many of fights over it she pushed me down the stairs and i use to hit her so the only option was 4 myself to move out before we killed each other. I know she was trying to help but I was past having help and really was out of control. She phoned the police to get me sectioned but I was very good at lying and pretending everything was ok.People do find self harm hard to deal with and infact they dont know how to deal with it as they dont want to see you hurting yourself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waiting Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 I can attest to that. My partner would do her best to hide it from me for a long time. It was quite a while before she trusted me enough to let me in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Athena Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 When I started, it was a half attempt at drifting off to a never ending sleep yet being able to "leave it up to God" as to whether I woke up or not. It shook me up quite a bit and I cried for my kids growing up without a mother. Later cutting became more of a relief valve, like popping a balloon when the pressure built up too much. I move from panic to depression, sometimes quite quickly. The cutting happens when I'm in a panic and am simply compelled to take action. Sometimes the phone rings and that snaps me out of it. Other thoughts that have arisen:- Maybe i do it as a literal version of "just how much more blood do you want from me?" as I deal with an ex who fails to move to the next step in my never ending divorce. Waiting, waiting, waiting, drip, drip, drip...- Maybe I do it as a form of exercising my self control, such as "fine, you can force me to be his slave for life, but you can never force me to LIVE with that result".- I know I do it to calm myself so I can then have a good cry and go to sleep.- I often refer to my cuts as "battle scars", so I think I just simply make my outside look the way I feel inside (beat up) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gorillacj2 Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 How to help a person who self-harms! Hurting yourself is NOT about attention! Hurting yourself is NOT about wanting to kill yourself! Hurting yourself is NOT about bloody EMO!! Hurting yourself is NOT about proving how cool you are!! Hurting yourself is NOT about having a weakness of personality! Hurting yourself is NOT about self-hate!! Hurting yourself IS a symptom of a larger problem! Hurting yourself IS a symptom of a larger problem which the person may not even be aware of!! Hurting yourself IS AN ADDICTION!! Pure and simple. Like any form of addiction - gambling, drugs, smoking, chocolate, porn - you simply have to do it again, only with every new time you do it, it has to be bigger in order for you to receive the same “hit”. This is where people who aren’t even suicidal are killing themselves by accident. I’m not saying that everyone who self harms isn’t suicidal, nor am I saying that anything which I have written above about what self harm is/is not is set in stone. People self-inflict for all sorts of reasons, but from my experiences not only with my own self harm but also talking with people, who do the same thing, they aren’t suicidal or weak (in fact, some of the people who self-inflict that I know personally are the strongest most beautiful souls I’ve ever met) I started self harming five years ago. My trick with self-harming was to attack parts of my body which I could cover by throwing on some form of clothing, beit a jumper on the middle of a summer’s day or a long sleeve T-shirt on a cooler one. Always with injuries which wouldn’t leave any long-long term scars. I would always use similar methods and every now and then, when the mood struck, would become creative and resort to more unusual methods. I was never doing it because of wanting to kill myself, or hating myself, or wanting to prove how tough and resilient I was. Nor was I doing it for attention - if attention was all I was after I would release a wombat into a crowded shopping precinct or streak Brunswick Street on a Sunday afternoon. (And no, I’m not referring to this pain-pleasure as in a sadomasochistic way - ‘cause if that was the case whenever I felt like self-inflicting I would just go visit a dominatrix and have some sexy woman whip me rather than doing it myself.) I’m referring to the coping mechanisms people have when their internal pain becomes too great. Remember I said earlier to note the use of the word after in relation to my suicide attempts. The reason I self-inflicted after those attempts was as a way to control the inner conflict, pain and turmoil my mind was going through as a result of them. It was a way to stop me from trying again! It wasn’t because I still wanted to die; it was because I wanted to live! The other times I self harmed was as a way to feel something. Life had become numb, frustrating, painful, empty and meaningless. The over-riding feeling of loneliness and emptiness is a powerful influence, because we live to feel, and if we are feeling nothing then what is the point of being alive? Again I wasn’t self-inflicting because I wanted to die, it was because I wanted to feel something: to feel like I was alive! Hence, why, before my third suicide attempt I did self harm - as a means to grab some physical feeling. something to convince myself not to go through with what my brain was telling me to do. However, on this instance, no matter what pain I caused myself, it didn’t work. Overcoming the urge to self-inflict has been one of the hardest things I have had to deal with through this tumultuous time suffering from depression. As I said above, IT IS AN ADDICTION. Pure and simple! And anyone who has tried giving up smoking or gambling or Lindt or badgers will know that overcoming addiction is fucking hard! Not only because of the pure level of addiction, but also because it means having to face up to whatever problem is feeding that addiction in the first place. Whatever buried pain is making us smoke, drink or gamble needs to be faced up to. In essence, we need to become whip-wielding dominatrixies in order to tame and eventually command our problems. To overcome self-harm, like with every form of mental illness, we need to start talking about it in order to understand it, in order to help people overcome and control their addiction. So how can you help? If you know someone who self-harms here are a few pointers: - Whatever they’re doing DON”T take it personally. It isn’t about YOU! - Be available and LISTEN to them if they need to talk. - ACKNOWLEDGE their pain, it won’t make it go away, but it will make it more bearable. - DON’T avoid the subject or pretend it’s not there. - ASK THEM “I know you hurt yourself and I would like to understand it a little more, could you maybe explain why you do it? I’d be grateful if you could.” - DON’T confiscate their “tools” (because I guarantee you this will lose their trust and they will just get more creative anyway) - BELIEVE in them and BE HOPEFUL - DON’T push them - TAKE the initiative and distract them; take them to the cinema, rent a DVD, bake some chocolate brownies, go to a trivia night, go for a walk, have a playful pillow or water pistol fight, hell, if they’re your bf or gf, do a seductive strip tease and get them thinking about that cute butt of yours. - DO spontaneous acts of kindness - Be available, and willing, to LISTEN if they need to talk. - EDUCATE yourself - slip on your Willow hat and hop on the net for some research. - SUPPORT them physically; call them up and tell them you’re worried about them and invite them over for a game of scrabble or a blueberry muffin. - SUPPORT them emotionally; go to the Doctor/Psychologist with them. And please, please…whatever you do… - DO NOT TRY TO MAKE/ORDER THEM TO STOP!!!!!!!!! If you make them feel guilty, or punish them in any way, this will just add fuel to their addiction. And please, please, please, please…whatever you do…remember to… - Take TIME OUT and recuperate, caring/loving someone who suffers from any form of mental illness is exhausting and you need to look after yourself. Although it’s confronting, brutal and painful to think that people you care about are inflicting this pain on themselves remember that to them it is merely an addiction. A symptom of a larger, possibly unknown illness or condition, and they just need some help and support in order to get them through it. As we’ve all experienced from time to time: the over-riding feeling of loneliness and emptiness is a powerful influence. It’s time to stop judging people who self harm, and start understanding what they are feeling; it’s the only way to understand their pain.WOW,Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gorillacj2 Posted November 13, 2010 Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 I am so sorry for your pain. Thank you for your insight. My daughter is a cutter who has tried to explain to me why she does it. I heard her voice in your words. Thank you for helping me understand a little more.gorillacj Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tash28 Posted November 13, 2010 Author Report Share Posted November 13, 2010 hiI hope this post can help many people out not just the self harmers but the people that care for them to i.e family and friends.Take care Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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