Yes. When I was a kid, about 11? It escalated in high school, I never cut, but punched myself and walls, and scratched myself fast and hard to get rid of emotions so I won't cry or lash out in anger, mostly after an altercation with my mom.
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Later it escalated into drinking copious amounts of alcohol and painkillers to deal with shit, and two suicide attempts.
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After the second one I quit drinking for a year and a half, and now I'm only allowed to drink one drink per week, or two on the weekends, and only if I'm not drinking to cope with anything.
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It almost escalated by drinking a glass of wine after work every day, which turned into two or three per day, but then I told my partner about my fear of this becoming a problem since I'm drinking to cope again, and I quit again.
I was also bullied, never really had close friends, and my parents are very strict with academics (above 90%, high school 80%, no excuses). I had two sleepovers in my life, and rarely got to visit friends (birthdays only).
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My friends were not mom-approved, and she tried manipulating me to hate them, and if that didn't work she told them outright they're not allowed to be my friends anymore.
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They weren't bad people, just not the preppy (bitchy, snotty, rich) group my mom wanted me to hang out with.
I'll come back to this and complete it, it's just so fucking long and I don't really know where to start.
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Maybe the fact that my brother physically abused me by punching and scratching and hitting with sticks and shooting me with bb gun bullets up close, and throwing me against a wall, coupled with the fact that he was my mother's favourite; while my mother prevented my grandpa from seeing me and sending gifts for a few years because my brother wasn't favourited and I was (looked like gran, only daughter on his sons' side), and her reason being equality...
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A whole bunch of other shit like she gave my cat away (and gave me R5.00 to compensate when I was back) to my uncle and aunt while I was on a scout camp because she was "in the way of her cat", her favourite.
Then my parents fighting and my mom and bro fighting because mom kept picking at the other's strings until they snapped. And then it was snapped back to you because HOW DARE YOU BE RUDE TO ME when you finally retaliate.
Everything is invalidated, then love bombed, then gaslighted, and then back to square one: emotional and verbal abuse, many times physical, creating learned helplesness, and just taking it and starting to believe that you are, in fact, a piece of worthless shit and everyone else would be so much happier if you, - the blackest of the sheep, yet portrayed as the model child outside- , weren't there, fucking up everything just because you are, and it's only luck keeping you good, because that's the only thing you know how to control.
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Stick to the rules, you won't get hurt.
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Creates an excellently soft, manipulable, goody two shoes outside who thinks they are the worst person ever inside.
It was the end of the school year, and I had destroyed all the friendships I'd had and just felt really depressed all the time. I really never felt anything but hopelessness anymore. Thankfully I was able to talk to someone and receive the help I needed. If anyone is going through something similar, it really helps to talk to a freind, or a professional. Know that you are noticed, appreciated and loved!
I used to obsessively pick and scratch my skin till I bled on purpose for years. I had no clue it was classed as self harm till recently.
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Nowadays, I prefer blunt force, like smacking my leg with metal objects
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I do have a constant urge to slice my knuckle open and let it bleed out because i enjoyed the feeling it gave me when i accidentally tore it open a few times. It's getting hard to resist, especially as I get further away from the last incident.
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I don't do it for attention, nor as a cry for help. I think it's just my OCD and/or some weird enjoyment of pain.
Never.
I do however have some permanent scars from reckless behaviors. I had people ask but I feel weird saying stuff like "stuck on barbed wires" or some weird accident. Not that noticeable now but I felt like they didn't believe me sometimes.
@Zont I also do the excessive picking.
When I was a kid it was just like any kid picking a scab. But over the years it became much worse. I would pick at the spot till they healed than once healed I would scratch at the scaly skin till it bled again. I found in stressful or depressed times I will do it more. It got so bad that after my Dad died my whole stomach and arms were coated in spots. It even reached to my knees. I knew it was self harm when I realized the reason I didn't scratch my face or any where I couldn't hide the marks because I was afraid of what people would think.
When people did see them I would say I rescue stray feral cats.
When my husband found out he tried to help. He thought if he caught me telling me to stop would help. It just made it worse. I would get more stressed about it and the more stressed the more I did it.
Sometimes yeah it's like if I feel a small pain it will sooth my emotional pain.
But I find that it always just makes me feel worse after.
I once was suffering from a ulcer and refused to go to the doctor because I knew they would see my open sores and think I am self harming and maybe put me in a mental ward.
I finally got a better handle on it though.
I found watching videos of other people removing scabs instead of me doing it helps.
Ooh yeah. Scaly skin and spots are a few things that have left me scarred.
When I'm really stressed, I scratch my eyelids till they burn like hell and till I'm in tears. They end up looking like a lizard's unless I moisturise them.
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The upper part of my arm is scarred from where I'd pick at it obsessively years ago. I don't go out without either a long sleeved t-shirt or a hoodie.
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And I found that being told to stop just made it worse tbh.
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Watching other people pick scabs makes me want to do it myself, so I keep away from those kind of videos haha.
I actually had a huge scare. Right after I gave birth to my daughter. Who was born emergency C-section which meant belly button down. I did my damnedest to not touch it. Mainly due to a fear of it coming undone and my guts falling out lol which could not happen.
But one day about 2 days after the staples came out (14 by the way) I didn't even mean to scratch. The wound was EXTREMELY itchy. And well you probably know all to well when a scab itches it makes you want to pick at it more. But I resisted that is till unknowingly I scratched my pants that covered the scab. It ripped the scab clean off. It took me a few minutes to realize that the front of my pants was soaked in blood. I looked and it opened 1.5 inches wide. I called my husband's work but he already left for home. I went outside just in time to see him pull up. In complete histarics I tell him my wound open up. We rushed to the hospital and they bandage me up. I didn't pick again for 8 yrs till I found out my dad was dieing.
Damn, that sounds terrifying. I hope you're doing better nowadays.
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I've got a defect on my hand where a vein grew in the wrong place, and I just so happen to also have a skin weakness over it. It gets super itchy and sometimes I unconsciously scratch it.
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The first time the vein burst was when I was playing smash bros. I wasn't paying attention to my hand, just on the game.
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It wasn't till i'd been bleeding for a minute or so that I realised there was blood *everywhere*. It took over an hour for it to stop spurting, and I had to be rushed into hospital because I'd lost so much blood.
They told me I might have to get it cauterized, but it was starting to scab over, so they didn't think they needed to in the end.
It gets really red when I get stressed, and i'm suprised it hasn't burst in a while.
I for sure have a little of the picking. It’s compulsive. If there’s something on my skin, scab, ingrown hair, regular hair that I can get ahold of, anything, I pick at it. Don’t even realize. God forbid I have a pimple. I can’t let it alone.
At 14, I began taking my housekey and running it across my arms until it peeled the skin off. I didnt like cutting, didnt like the fear of cutting too deep and needing stitches, or bleeding too much. This way, I was in control with every single stroke, and while painful, I didnt need to worry about permanent damage.
I'm 21 now, and haven't harmed since I was 18 or 19. Such severe psychological damage that we resort to harming our own bodies shouldn't be normal in this society, but it is. I hope the stories we share encourage you to find ways to take care of yourself. Dont fall prey to our mistakes. In a world based so much on taking advantage of other people, loving yourself is an act of revolution. Take care of yourself, and there are always people around to talk if you need to <3
My shoulders and back are pockmarked with scars. I pick and scratch and claw excessively at my skin or any scabs I have until I'm bleeding. I attack my face too but I'm trying not to since I don't want it to be scarred more than it already is.
I never saw a problem with it all but one evening when my mom and I were talking about self harming she mentioned that she thought what I did was self harm. I've never been able to see it otherwise since.
It's horrible just how badly I've scarred my back and shoulders and every time I tell myself I'll stop I just find myself absentmindedly doing it anyway and once I notice I get the worst urge to pick at every inch of skin I can reach and 9 times out of 10 I act on the urge. Surprisingly enough I never bother to cover the scars but I feel horrible when people ask about them... I've been doing it since about 11/12 maybe?
I posted this because I reas about it somewhere. I myself haven't opened up a lot about my self harm issues as well. So, basically since I am majoring in Psychiatry, I am not even allowed to tell this.
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When I was in my 11th grade, I had been taught to excel in academics and since I was the eldest brilliant daughter, the pressure always kept mounting. I was expected to be the best at academics, extra curricular (my expectations of me were higher). However, I did achieve all of it but somewhere I lost a normal childhood with friends. By the time I completed my 12th grade, I had excellent grades, had won various nationals in extra curricular and had zero friends. I had a large social circle of hellos and hi's but never a friend with whom I could share what actually went into my head. AT that point of time, my boyfriend only added on to my pressure because he was charming and girls were after him so I had to look the best and be there for him whenever he needed because I didnt want to
him. He loved me truly and I had no reason to think of all that but still I had this thing in my mind that I had to be the best at everything. So, when in my mid term exams in 11th grade, I got 78%, I totally got shocked. I thought I was up to no good and I am a loser now. That night, I dont remember quite well but I sat in the bathroom and took my father's razor in my hand and was crying and hushing myself. I repeatedly would tel myself "no, no, no" but cut myself on my left wrist. Once I felt the physical pain, it somehow distracted me with all.of my emotions running on in my mind and I felt at ease. I liked how the drops of blood oozed faster at some places and shined. After that, I cut 2 3 times more. It was summers and to hide it, I had to pretend I was cold and wear full sleeves sweater because I had ony half sleeve or sleeveless garments.
Nobody wondered why and let me wear sweaters in extreme heat. This then later lead me to cutting my thighs and I'd do it overcome with al the
emotions, woud cry in the bathroom and then when I came out, I was the strong fabulous teen. My thighs would burn and I would like it. I guess some part of it may also be related to my childhood sexual abuse by my senior at a hostel I was living in. Then, eventually I stopped cutting before my first year of college. Then I didnt do it for 2 years and again cut myself on the thighs (because they can be easily covered) once in 3rd year of college and since then, I haven't.
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I used to nail bite as a child and would peel skin around my nails. I also would take out the inner layer of my cheeks by constantly picking on it with my teeth and never let the scabs of wounds stay there. I woud constantly scratch them.
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I wanted to manage my image as a strong, good, academically gifted girl so much that I completely disowned myself emotionally. Last year, I told some parts of it to my parents and my dad cried. He thought it was because of his constant nagging annd scolding me that I did all of
it but actually it was long written to happen with me. All of these things only compunded to it. I am still the model child, overachiever in the society, in my class, amongst teachers but I am also at a better place now. I do have my meltdowns but they are not to the point that I self harm again.
In my teens I used to cut myself with knives just to feel something, I drank a lot. Basically I was being beaten up a couple of times a week at school and neglected at home. Not very unique as a life story, unfortunately.
Slightly longer answer: I did it for months, ending around September of last year. It was so actively on my mind that it was all I could think about doing, and I loved doing it because it was a physical representation of my mental issues and it felt so real. I mostly stopped because I moved from my thigh to my upper arm, and the amount of hiding and things I had to change to fit it in, plus all the times I was almost caught forced me to stop because I didn’t ever want to be hospitalized. It’s still an issue that is often on my mind but I am trying my best
I'd punched a brick wall knowing I was going to fuck up my knuckles, then keep going. I was angry.
I used to just kinda.. let my neck go limp and let my forehead smack into my desk when I was peeved in school.
For a physics project I let myself get clothes-lined, flung from a shopping cart, and, on accident, involved in a car crash while street racing (the shopping cart thing did more physical damage for me in particular, but a friend nearly died.. he miraculously only hurt his back and literally walked away from a car that was impaled on a street light like a total badass, his first words "what am I going to tell my mom!?") We got an A, but we were not allowed to show the footage of the crash for our presentation. Later that year we got to go to Six Flags on a field trip. That's my second favorite class throughout my time in HS, only beat out by AP Biology.
I did some cutting as a teen. I never really thought about why, but in retrospect, I think it was sort of like a pressure release. Physical pain to drown the mental pain. Later in life, I settled for piercing, cutting hair, and running.
Running really helped a lot. I would run until I was totally depleted, then turn around and run home.
Sometimes I still need a good piercing though. It’s the same thing, but a little more acceptable.
all through my late teens and 20s. cutting, burning, bingeing and purging. i dont have a tragic backstory, just felt empty and nothingness, like nothing was real. the more i hurt the more i could breathe.
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Later it escalated into drinking copious amounts of alcohol and painkillers to deal with shit, and two suicide attempts.
.
After the second one I quit drinking for a year and a half, and now I'm only allowed to drink one drink per week, or two on the weekends, and only if I'm not drinking to cope with anything.
.
It almost escalated by drinking a glass of wine after work every day, which turned into two or three per day, but then I told my partner about my fear of this becoming a problem since I'm drinking to cope again, and I quit again.
.
My friends were not mom-approved, and she tried manipulating me to hate them, and if that didn't work she told them outright they're not allowed to be my friends anymore.
.
They weren't bad people, just not the preppy (bitchy, snotty, rich) group my mom wanted me to hang out with.
.
Maybe the fact that my brother physically abused me by punching and scratching and hitting with sticks and shooting me with bb gun bullets up close, and throwing me against a wall, coupled with the fact that he was my mother's favourite; while my mother prevented my grandpa from seeing me and sending gifts for a few years because my brother wasn't favourited and I was (looked like gran, only daughter on his sons' side), and her reason being equality...
.
A whole bunch of other shit like she gave my cat away (and gave me R5.00 to compensate when I was back) to my uncle and aunt while I was on a scout camp because she was "in the way of her cat", her favourite.
Then my parents fighting and my mom and bro fighting because mom kept picking at the other's strings until they snapped. And then it was snapped back to you because HOW DARE YOU BE RUDE TO ME when you finally retaliate.
.
Stick to the rules, you won't get hurt.
.
Creates an excellently soft, manipulable, goody two shoes outside who thinks they are the worst person ever inside.
.
Nowadays, I prefer blunt force, like smacking my leg with metal objects
.
I do have a constant urge to slice my knuckle open and let it bleed out because i enjoyed the feeling it gave me when i accidentally tore it open a few times. It's getting hard to resist, especially as I get further away from the last incident.
.
I don't do it for attention, nor as a cry for help. I think it's just my OCD and/or some weird enjoyment of pain.
I do however have some permanent scars from reckless behaviors. I had people ask but I feel weird saying stuff like "stuck on barbed wires" or some weird accident. Not that noticeable now but I felt like they didn't believe me sometimes.
When I was a kid it was just like any kid picking a scab. But over the years it became much worse. I would pick at the spot till they healed than once healed I would scratch at the scaly skin till it bled again. I found in stressful or depressed times I will do it more. It got so bad that after my Dad died my whole stomach and arms were coated in spots. It even reached to my knees. I knew it was self harm when I realized the reason I didn't scratch my face or any where I couldn't hide the marks because I was afraid of what people would think.
When people did see them I would say I rescue stray feral cats.
When my husband found out he tried to help. He thought if he caught me telling me to stop would help. It just made it worse. I would get more stressed about it and the more stressed the more I did it.
Sometimes yeah it's like if I feel a small pain it will sooth my emotional pain.
I once was suffering from a ulcer and refused to go to the doctor because I knew they would see my open sores and think I am self harming and maybe put me in a mental ward.
I finally got a better handle on it though.
I found watching videos of other people removing scabs instead of me doing it helps.
When I'm really stressed, I scratch my eyelids till they burn like hell and till I'm in tears. They end up looking like a lizard's unless I moisturise them.
.
The upper part of my arm is scarred from where I'd pick at it obsessively years ago. I don't go out without either a long sleeved t-shirt or a hoodie.
.
And I found that being told to stop just made it worse tbh.
.
Watching other people pick scabs makes me want to do it myself, so I keep away from those kind of videos haha.
But one day about 2 days after the staples came out (14 by the way) I didn't even mean to scratch. The wound was EXTREMELY itchy. And well you probably know all to well when a scab itches it makes you want to pick at it more. But I resisted that is till unknowingly I scratched my pants that covered the scab. It ripped the scab clean off. It took me a few minutes to realize that the front of my pants was soaked in blood. I looked and it opened 1.5 inches wide. I called my husband's work but he already left for home. I went outside just in time to see him pull up. In complete histarics I tell him my wound open up. We rushed to the hospital and they bandage me up. I didn't pick again for 8 yrs till I found out my dad was dieing.
.
I've got a defect on my hand where a vein grew in the wrong place, and I just so happen to also have a skin weakness over it. It gets super itchy and sometimes I unconsciously scratch it.
.
The first time the vein burst was when I was playing smash bros. I wasn't paying attention to my hand, just on the game.
.
It wasn't till i'd been bleeding for a minute or so that I realised there was blood *everywhere*. It took over an hour for it to stop spurting, and I had to be rushed into hospital because I'd lost so much blood.
They told me I might have to get it cauterized, but it was starting to scab over, so they didn't think they needed to in the end.
It gets really red when I get stressed, and i'm suprised it hasn't burst in a while.
I'm 21 now, and haven't harmed since I was 18 or 19. Such severe psychological damage that we resort to harming our own bodies shouldn't be normal in this society, but it is. I hope the stories we share encourage you to find ways to take care of yourself. Dont fall prey to our mistakes. In a world based so much on taking advantage of other people, loving yourself is an act of revolution. Take care of yourself, and there are always people around to talk if you need to <3
I never saw a problem with it all but one evening when my mom and I were talking about self harming she mentioned that she thought what I did was self harm. I've never been able to see it otherwise since.
It's horrible just how badly I've scarred my back and shoulders and every time I tell myself I'll stop I just find myself absentmindedly doing it anyway and once I notice I get the worst urge to pick at every inch of skin I can reach and 9 times out of 10 I act on the urge. Surprisingly enough I never bother to cover the scars but I feel horrible when people ask about them... I've been doing it since about 11/12 maybe?
.
When I was in my 11th grade, I had been taught to excel in academics and since I was the eldest brilliant daughter, the pressure always kept mounting. I was expected to be the best at academics, extra curricular (my expectations of me were higher). However, I did achieve all of it but somewhere I lost a normal childhood with friends. By the time I completed my 12th grade, I had excellent grades, had won various nationals in extra curricular and had zero friends. I had a large social circle of hellos and hi's but never a friend with whom I could share what actually went into my head. AT that point of time, my boyfriend only added on to my pressure because he was charming and girls were after him so I had to look the best and be there for him whenever he needed because I didnt want to
Nobody wondered why and let me wear sweaters in extreme heat. This then later lead me to cutting my thighs and I'd do it overcome with al the
.
I used to nail bite as a child and would peel skin around my nails. I also would take out the inner layer of my cheeks by constantly picking on it with my teeth and never let the scabs of wounds stay there. I woud constantly scratch them.
.
I wanted to manage my image as a strong, good, academically gifted girl so much that I completely disowned myself emotionally. Last year, I told some parts of it to my parents and my dad cried. He thought it was because of his constant nagging annd scolding me that I did all of
I used to just kinda.. let my neck go limp and let my forehead smack into my desk when I was peeved in school.
For a physics project I let myself get clothes-lined, flung from a shopping cart, and, on accident, involved in a car crash while street racing (the shopping cart thing did more physical damage for me in particular, but a friend nearly died.. he miraculously only hurt his back and literally walked away from a car that was impaled on a street light like a total badass, his first words "what am I going to tell my mom!?") We got an A, but we were not allowed to show the footage of the crash for our presentation. Later that year we got to go to Six Flags on a field trip. That's my second favorite class throughout my time in HS, only beat out by AP Biology.
Running really helped a lot. I would run until I was totally depleted, then turn around and run home.
Sometimes I still need a good piercing though. It’s the same thing, but a little more acceptable.