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

[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.