Self-Injury Awareness Day

[butterfly]

If you read this journal, then you know someone who has performed SI.

I've been a cutter for over six years now.

For me, the badness started in high school.

My aunt died. My sophomore year of high school. The day after Christmas. An car accident. Her fault.

I miss her.

Just before that, I'd had a pair of bad things happen at school. Some boys who'd... said hurtful things about me the year before and had had to leave school because of it, were let back in; they'd apologised. I hadn't forgiven them yet. The friends that I'd had in freshman year had drifted away, and somehow, I'd forgotten how to keep friends. I'm still not sure. It seems so much easier for other people. I'm so absolutely terrified of rejection. My fear outweighed my hope. It still does, some days.

The first time that I cut, I was in the middle of a screaming match with my father. I'd barricaded myself in my room and he was on the other side of the door, just yelling. I wasn't afraid, at least, nowhere near afraid as I was just so terribly, terribly angry. At him, at the world, at life. I can remember the event clearly -- I was leaning against the door, I was crying, and I spotted a knife that I'd left in my room some point earlier.

I can't remember deciding to use it. But after I did, after the rush of pain, I felt so clear, so very calm. I was able to stop leaning, to go outside and talk to my dad about whatever it was that we'd been fighting about.

I can't remember what it was.

I remember the way the knife felt. I can remember the way it looked, jagged edges and a black plastic handle that was starting to get rough on the end from use. I can remember the way the door felt against my back. I was sitting on the floor, my feet out in front of me, bracing me.

It wasn't about trying to die, not exactly.

The times since then are jumbled. I don't remember when I did which cut, though I can remember all the events themselves.

I started across my wrist. I would cover it with my watch or my sleeves.

Later, I started experimenting on how many cuts I could make and still keep them covered.

I never bandaged any of the cuts, but none of them were deep enough to bleed for more than a few seconds. I've never practiced 'safe cutting', with disinfectant and bandages and clean knives. It's dangerous and stupid, but it's self-destruction, so that shouldn't be shocking.

One of my therapists once told me that cutting was, essentially, an 'inefficient coping mechanism'. One of the most useful things that I ever learned in therapy.

Knowing that doesn't stop me from cutting. But if I have a better method at hand, I can stave off the urge by doing something else. Do something else long enough, and the urge fades away.

I took refuge in fandom. Buffy saved my life, quite literally. I don't know what I would have done without it, without her. To me, Buffy is more than a character, she's my hero. She saved me. Whenever I was watching Buffy, I felt no urge to cut.

It could make me laugh, make me cry, make me feel, all without the pain. More than that, Buffy urged me to create. Instead of using a knife to carve out lines on my flesh, I used a keyboard to create lines on a screen.

But I was still so broken and vulnerable back then. I took comments about my girl personally (I still do, when I'm not careful). An insult to Buffy was an insult to me, especially since I could see so much of myself in S6 Buffy. To call her stupid for not being able to break out of her cycle of self-harm felt tantamount to calling me the same. I went through the same cycles of healing and relapse that Buffy did. Reading so many comments about what a 'bitch' Buffy was for not appreciating what she had... how would these people who had such a disgust of Buffy feel if they saw my life?

People said that they didn't understand how Buffy could be so blind. And that is because when you are depressed, you are lost, you are blind. All you can see is the dark. Even your yesterdays, that were once so bright and clean, become shrouded in fog and bitter lost longing.

You feel as Frodo did on the slopes of Mount Doom --
"I don't recall the taste of food, or the sound of water, or the touch of grass. I'm . . . I'm naked in the dark. There's nothing . . . nothing, no veil between me and the wheel of fire."

All things that were wonderful are gone, and all that you have left is the aching burning emptiness where happiness and hope used to be. The Elves named Frodo 'Endurance Beyond Hope' and that's what it is, to survive through depression. You do lack hope. All you can see ahead of you are more days of darkness. There is no true light anywhere, only fire that burns. All is dim, the edges of the world somehow both blurred beyond sight and sharp enough to cut. Yet you endure, you survive without truly living.

Depression itself is like walking in a nightmare, being absolutely certain that you'll never wake up.

I still cut. On February 14th through the 17th, I went through a bad spot, reverted to old coping behavior at work. The urge doesn't go away. It probably won't ever. I have to choose to or not to, every time.

Comments

[ruedifference.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

*hugs tight*

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

*hugs back*

You're welcome.

[timba.livejournal.com]

Thank you for being frank about that.

My mom was/is? a cutter. and sometimes, I don't understand why she does it, but I know that SHE feels like she has to. And it helps to see it from the other side of the fence, because, sometimes, from this side, I can't see the reason and the hurt that she feels, because all I see is the hurt and the pain that it causes ME when she does it.

So, thank you for posting that. It reminded me to not judge, and to understand that she's hurting too.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

And yeah, it's hard for me to picture the other side, as well. She's not doing it to hurt you. If she's anything like me, then it would be hard for her to understand why it would hurt you. All you can see is your own pain. You can't see the people who love you.

I remember talking to my cousin and I'd told him about the cutting and that I'd even thought about suicide on occasion and he told me that my mom would never recover. And that's... hard to believe. Even after seeing the facts on what happens to families after a suicide, it's hard to believe that the people you know care so much. You can understand it intellectually, but emotionally, it makes no sense at all. Why on earth would they care so much about this person that you have so little respect for?

[shadowcat]

Butterfly, thank you for posting this.

I've never been a cutter, but my sister was. I watched her and tried to help her through the times that it hit.

My methods weren't cutting, but seing how hard I could hit something with no give. The rush of pain would clear my head and then I was able to deal with whatever it was I was trying to deal with.

Fandom saved me from doing somehting completely stupid. Buffy and Phoebe were my heroes and I was protective of them (still am). The X-Men ladies were also.

I was recently diagnosed with depression. I was told that my doctor that with everything that I had been through in the last two and a half years he would be amazed if I hadn't. I went through brain surgery, I went through trying to learn my life all over again, trying to learn how I deal and what I do.

I recently in another place posted a long description of how depression feels to the one going through it. You are lost in the dark. You're locked in a box somewhere deep inside yourself and you have no control over how you feel. Everything is dark, and cold and lonely.

*hugs* It's always nice to know there are others who understand.

You're not alone. My walk is nowhere near as hard as yours has been or is, but I'm here and you're never alone.

Thank you for being open enough and brave enough to post this.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

My methods weren't cutting, but seing how hard I could hit something with no give. The rush of pain would clear my head and then I was able to deal with whatever it was I was trying to deal with.

That's just how it feels with cutting. The pain clears my head and I can deal with people without wanting to scream. Slightly different ways of getting the same result.

*hugs*

Depression does feel so dark and lonely. It's nice to be able to say, I've felt that way, and it does pass. Because it helps me when I hear it from other people, so I hope that my saying it can be helpful, too.

[tripoli8.livejournal.com]

I start cutting myself in the eighth grade, which was 1998. I stopped for a while, towards the end of high school, and sophomore year of college things got weird and I started again. I haven't in a while, but I still think about it a lot, and I feel a lot better knowing I've got something sharp handy. It's one of those things that shouldn't feel so good, but it does.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

I've tossed my straight-edges at least half a dozen times and I always end up getting new ones.

It is one of those things that never quite goes away. Like being an alcoholic, I suppose.

*hugs*

Day by day, yeah?

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

I cut on occasion. It's scary how much I see myself in season 6 Buffy...

Thanks for being so honest and brave *hugs*

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

*hugs back*

Season Six Buffy really was such a well-done portrayal of someone depressed to the point of self-destruction. And the general dislike of that season as it happened only confirmed the reasons why I always used to hide that I was a cutter -- it's something other people think of as 'ugly' and 'stupid'.

[nicole-anell.livejournal.com]

I appreciate your post. Like some of the above posters (!) I've had family members and friends who dealt with self-injury and depression. This is so much more complex and common than many people seem to think.

It also makes me happy to see the power of fiction, even (gasp!) TV, to represent real emotions and help people cope.

*hug*

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thank you.

*hugs back*

It's rather amazing how prevalent it is. Then again, considering the state of the world, the US in particular, maybe it shouldn't be surprising.

[minnow1212.livejournal.com]

Thank you for posting this.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

[honorh.livejournal.com]

I never cut, but I did go through depression. I'm on medication and doing much better, but I still feel it out there. Sometimes, it's close enough to touch. It's like something I can just see out of the corner of my eye, and I try not to look. It's malevolent, something that's just waiting for me to make the wrong move before it pounces. I can honestly say I hate it. My faith and my family keep it at bay--I know it intimately, and I know I can't go there again because I've got something real to hang onto. So I cling to what I have and hope that someday, *it* will fade into the distant past and be only the faintest memory of darkness.

People don't understand when they haven't gone through it themselves. You're right to say depression is blindness, because it is. It's a form of amnesia. You can't remember anymore what it was like to be truly happy and not have *it* snatching away those moments before you can savor them. The whole world seems to be full of people who are either faking it, or are truly ignorant of what the world's really like. Depression is a lie. It tells you that you were never truly happy. It's like the Green Witch in The Silver Chair, telling you that this underworld is the only world, and life under the sky was only a dream. It's an almost physical force that keeps you from seeing light and hope again.

I just have to cling to God and those I love and not look at the shadow behind me.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

People don't understand when they haven't gone through it themselves.

That's so true. It's something that, perhaps, you can't understand without personal knowledge. I've had people tell me that Buffy in S6 should be more accessible, but depression isn't. If you make her more fun and more understandable, it's no longer an accurate protrayal. Depression is ugly and scary and lonely. It's nothing that can look good from the outside.

*hugs*

[noorie.livejournal.com]

this is so strange, i don't know you but reading this.... thank you for being so open. i don't think anyone really understands if they haven't been there. endurance beyond hope makes it sound so noble and heroic, but is it really? just plodding on in the dark because suicide is not an option? because this is what my life is. i know about this urge, and i hope this doesn't sound stupid or insensitive or callous, but really i've tried it and it's helped me in the few times that i have had the urge... have you tried sublimating it to cutting your hair? it also has a symbolic meaning: my mother says if you dream of cutting your hair it means your troubles will all fall away. ok, i'll shut up now.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

Well, for me, suicide is an option. I choose not to out of sheer stubborness. Because people forget you after you die and I loathe being ignored more than anything else in the world. In my worst times, I lived not because of hope but because I'd be damned if I wouldn't do something to make people remember me, first.

Not noble or heroic. Endurance isn't, always. It's just lasting, despite it all.

I do usually feel better after I get a haircut. But I get a haircut when I've embarked on something new. It's connected, definitely.

[noorie.livejournal.com]

in october 2002 i was having what was possibly the worst bout of depression in my life and i truly wanted to die, not this "i'm miserable and i don't wanna live" feeling, but this *longing* for death, to just end it all because i couldn't take it any more and i couldn't keep my "face" on anymore. i think what has saved me from actually doing it was that my mother was there with me all the time, physically. i think she felt what was going on, because she didn't leave my side for more than a few minute at a time. so i had to remember what i would be doing to her and to the people who love me. it's these ties, the fact that the decision to commit suicide isn't just about the person who's deciding... am i making any sense? i don't think people forget you after you die, not the people who matter. if i believed that maybe i wouldn't be here today.

[raveninthewind.livejournal.com]

On February 14th through the 17th, I went through a bad spot, reverted to old coping behavior at work.

Oh, my dear, I am sorry to hear that. I hope things are better now.

I'm not a cutter, but I've had to use various 'inefficient coping mechanisms' of my own in the past. All are a sign of a depression in my case. And the less effective coping methods usually result in an escalating anxiety, to the point I've come thisclose to acting out at work.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Oh, my dear, I am sorry to hear that. I hope things are better now.

They are. It was just a really bad week. It was cutting or screaming at co-workers and guests alike.

I'm not a cutter, but I've had to use various 'inefficient coping mechanisms' of my own in the past. All are a sign of a depression in my case. And the less effective coping methods usually result in an escalating anxiety, to the point I've come thisclose to acting out at work.

They don't work well, long-term. I remember another thing that guy told me -- "if cutting worked, we would encourage it." It doesn't, it really doesn't.

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that people are open about this nowadays and know what it is and what it means. When I was in college, I had a friend who cut herself, and we all freaked out because we thought she was suicidal, which just wasn't the case. She let me read her private journal about the sense of relief she got from it, and how troubled she was, and I could learn how to be there for her as a friend instead of jumping to conclusions about it.

I've been through depression and am on anti-depressants. My less healthy ways of coping are different, though. But most days, I'm doing well.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

But most days, I'm doing well.

That's good.

It's a hard thing to share. But it's easier to do it here. Maybe because of the format, maybe because it's writing instead of speaking. Maybe it's because I already knew several people on my flist who were also cutters. Hard to say.

[masqthephlsphr.livejournal.com]

People on LJ tend to be especially sensitive/empathetic to certain issues, I've found, at least people on my own f-list. Maybe it's because it's a journal and we're already in the mode to put up private or personal stuff, and we're not surprised when others do so as well.

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

Your posts make me wonder whether I was on the way to SI when I was young.
My life sucked when I was a kid, then when I saw Star Trek TOS for the first time, I thought it was so great to be a Vulcan, and be able to repress emotion, so I practised this, not just in the sense of not showing emotion when I was sad, but not letting myself laugh either - so, if I did let the mask slip, I would go somewhere private and slap my own face...
I stopped doing it, mostly because I was pretty successful at the repression thing, until it was safe to come out again.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Actually, the slapping thing does sound like a very mild form of SI.

And yeah, a lot of the reason that I cut is so that I won't show negative emotions. I don't know if I could count all the times that I cut so that I wouldn't cry.

[trepkos.livejournal.com]

I guess I was lucky the thing didn't go any further.

[thawrecka]

Thank you so much for this. I recently started self-injuring again and it's nice, at least, to not feel so alone about it.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

And I'm sorry that things are bad for you right now.

*hugs*

[jic]

*hugs*

After more than a year (two?) of knowing my friends self-injure, I forget that it's usually secret. It's just part of who you are to me. But like so many other things I take for granted, much of the world doesn't get it.

You're very brave for sharing your own experience, and generous for sharing what you've learned.

(Oddly, your bad spot coincides with when I was feeling pretty jittery myself.)

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

*hugs back*

Thanks, sweetie. Every time that I talk about it, it gets easier, so that's something.

And huh... that's interesting.

[tafkarfanfic.livejournal.com]

The urge doesn't go away. It probably won't ever. I have to choose to or not to, every time.

This is true. Although it gets easier, with time. I haven't done it for several years, now, and each time I choose not to makes the next time easier.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

I'm waiting for the 'getting easier' part. Part of the problem is that, lately, all my cutting has been at work, where I don't have any other distractions. I can't do the things that I can do at home to stave off the urge.

I can't wait until I'm out of this job and doing the other full-time.

Thank you. Both for the words and for reaffirming the knowledge that it's possible to keep choosing not to.

[theamyrlin.livejournal.com]

> I have to choose to or not to, every time.

I know what you mean. It's weird that life can be seen as just a series of choices. We decide everything we do. It was a depressing book Man's Search for Meaning that really drove in that point for me. Even when it seems we don't have a choice, we do. We choose what we think, and to an extent, what we feel.

{Hugs}

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

*hugs back*

We do always have choices. We may not have good choices sometimes, but there's usually one that's less bad.

[silly-cleo.livejournal.com]

*hugs* I am so impressed with you for being so frank and open about this. Thank you.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

You're welcome.

*hugs back*

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~Christina~