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ideas on self-harm
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I know people are going to get pissed off, probably dislike me all over again. But they are my views. If you don't like them that's your view. X
Although... it turns out I partially agree with your views on this.
What I don't agree with is your actions... and to be specific... what happened with your friend. See my earlier post.
No one is saying your views are wrong. No one is denying that you have not grown up with it. People are sharing their views. There is no need for you to start taking to personally and start throwing your toys. Accept people didn't agree with what you did by showing your arm to your friend at maybe not the best time.
There is no need to get offensive and start an arguement.
I completely agree.
Self harm is not, and never ever should be, a competition about who does it "worst". I have made posts both on this site and on livejournal where I have said that I feel guilty for telling my friends about my harming because to me, what I did was nothing compared to them. TO ME. In the long run, it doesn't matter how deep your cuts are and how many scars you have, what matters is the feeling which is driving those actions.
Incidentally, self harm is not "fine". As I have said before in this thread, there is no way you can ever say it is a good thing because it is deliberately causing harm to yourself and is a very clear sign of some form of mental illness - neither of which are "fine", or good. Recognising that harming is a problem is the first step to helping yourself out of the cycle and dealing with the issues which cause the harming in ways which are much healthier both for your body and for your mind.
Again - self harm is not ok, it's not good and it's not fine, it is a definite problem. But it is not WRONG.
It's not Ok in the way it
1) causes more problems than it solves
2) the way you are feeling for it to happen
From how I see it saying it is wrong is different from saying it is ok. Not that long ago I would have said it was ok but now looking back on 8months free of self harm. I can say I've been better off. Yeah at times I want to bu overall it's gave me less problems to deal with and I can focus on the problems I should have been focusing on.
So now I don't see it as ok, but I can see why people do. I must stress though I'm not saying it's wrong.
If you look upthread, you will notice that I said that I don't think drinking and smoking are good or ok, but that doesn't make THAT wrong either. Personally, I don't see how anyone can take pleasure in drinking 'til they're sick and chain smoking 20+ a day - particularly when they know that they are almost definitely causing lasting damage to themselves. Tattoos is a bit different because the damage is minimal and it has a purpose to it, it's not just needless self-destruction. But you'll find that there are people who DON'T think tattoos are fine or ok or whatever other word you want to use.
Self harming IS NOT OK. I have never said that I think it is wrong because that would make me a hypocrite, and frankly often it is a lot better than the alternative; but fundamentally, as I have said, it is a sign of mental illness and that needs to be addressed. I understand why it is done, I've done it myself, but as I also said, recognising that it's not a good thing to be doing to yourself is the first step.
Would you say that starving yourself or purging everything you eat from your body is ok or fine? Because they are essentially the same thing - harming your body as an outward sign of a mental illness which needs to be addressed.
There are *so* many other things you could do which avoid harming your body when you get the urge to. There is a website (I'm not sure which one - I'm sure someone will provide a link at some point) which has a list of howevermany things you could do instead of self harm.
I hope you do recognise soon that what you're doing to your body is not ok. There is help out there when you are prepared to receive it.
Oh and to that twat who said that my views aren't valid... I never fucking said "it's a competion" because it's fucking not. I'd give anything to stop self harming, and I can't. I'm fucking covered in cuts and burns. I'm very ugly because of it. The only reason I mentioned I self harm is because only people who do self harm can truely understand how fucking hard it is. How much it changes your life. How it takes over you. How it ruins you.
I'm not fucking throwing my toys out the pram before someone says it. I'm just not in a good mood.
She said that being a harmer doesn't make it more valid than anyone else's. Yes, you can understand the reasoning more easily, but that doesn't mean that other people can't or that THEIR opinions aren't as important as yours because they are fortunate enough to have never experienced the need to harm.
Incidentally, swearing so much really isn't necessary. This is a discussion, one where people are going to differ in opinion, that doesn't mean they are criticising YOUR opinion and there is no need to use direct insults and offensive language.
I simply, like Franki said, was making a point that everyone has valid opinions. And just because of your background and experience in self-harm doesn't mean you're the one who has the right opinion. Opinons are just that... opinions. No right answer.
And noone is denying that you'd give anything to stop... I know how hard it is, and I'm not questioning that. The only thing i did question was your actions towards your friend, but thats a different story.
Sorry I swore, I'm just in SUCH a bad mood.
X
When you say you only mentioned it. Is that about your friend? Because there is a difference between saying and showing.
I think you need to read posts more carefully or at least not post till you have calmed down or write it and take the swearing out...
Remember when you got a bit worked up over the comments GWST and Olive made about somethingIcan'tremember? My advice to you then was to either put off reading when you're in a bad mood, or not post until you've taken an hour or so out to calm down and then reread it and post then if you still feel the same way.
That advice still stands
No, I ment I've only mentioned it on here once, and people are bringing it up as if I've gone on about it..
Pretty much every one at schools knows I self harm though, because you can see the scars on my hands and legs. It's pretty obvious. But I only showed her my arms because she was saying she was a faliure, and I pointed out to her I was the faliure. I told her earlier that if she ever needed to take her anger out I'd teach her some Judo. I think martiel (spelling??) arts are very good to help with self harm.
X
I've managed to keep mine hiden most of the time but if people do know. No one has said.
Pretty much the whole of Worthing knows...
Word gets around here.
X
I just think this was unecessary... i don't see how showing you her injuries and turning the attention on to you would make her feel any better.
Particularly if she said that she was a failure for not doing it "properly". Whether you meant it in that way or not, she probably saw it in a competition kind of way. If everybody already knows, she most likely was looking to you for some support.
I'm not criticising you here, I know you were probably trying to help, but maybe think about changing your method next time
I understand what it is your saying but as i said `its ok to me',i used to think it wasn't ok when i 1st started but as the yrs have gone by i find that for `me' personaly it is ok and i can actualy say that i enjoy it and no i don't have any mental health issues i used to but i'm past all that now,i spent roughly 6yrs trying all types of things and in the end i found that self harming was the only thing that gave me that release,i'm also a tattooist and do scarfication which in all fairness is not that much different to self harming,i would say that about 70% of all my self harm scars are not just cuts to me they are visual permenant memories engraved into my body and i'm actualy proud of them.
Anyway, what am getting from what I've read... you know how sometimes parents say "i've been through what you've been going through now" and you as the child would say something along the lines of "no! you don't understand!"? That's the vibe am getting here.
But really, it's not about age. From what I can see, there are individuals who do not regret self-harming. This is because they have not incurred negative penalties from the behavior... or at the very least, they haven't been changed by negative penalties that the behavior brings with it. And then, there are those that have "seen the light." Am not saying that they're better that those that see nothing wrong with self-harm, of course not. Am just saying that because of their personal experiences and understandings they see self-harming as bad. So obviously, we can all just agree to disagree.
Now, I started this thread, for those of you who forget easily, because I wanted to see why people think self-harming is bad. And a lot of you have given your two cents worth. So far what I can see is that it's a toss up between it being bad because it's a social construct or because people think it's inherently bad. I welcome more ideas.
Oh, and yes, martial arts works. Try arnis. I dunno why some people call it khali, but basically it's fighting with sticks. It's fun and very cathartic.
You need a release but you have NO mental health issues? Ok. I can't figure out how you think it's "ok" for you to be causing physical damage to yourself for no discernable reason except for a release (which can be done by SO MANY other things - go running till you can't move, stick an iceball in your elbow until your whole arm goes numb, ANYTHING). Do you really think that's healthy?!
Also, tattooing and scarification are completely different things. I find scarification absolutely disgusting tbh and I can't see how anyone would want it done. Yuk yuk. However, I would still say that that is less about the pain and more about the end result. I know it is a BIT about the pain because otherwise why not just get a scar-coloured tattoo, but at the end of the day both scarring and tattooing are both producing results - they aren't about causing pain for the sake of causing pain, which is how I would (for the most part) classify self-injury.
Having said that, while I'm not "proud" of my scars - I would never show them off - I do recognise that they are a part of me, they represent a period in my life which helped to shape who I am right now, and I don't make an effort to keep them completely hidden anymore.
You will find that there are a hell of alot of people out there that use scarfication and tattooing just for the pain they get from them,quite a few of my customers do it the only reason they come to me is because they don't want to do it to themselves,i found self harming purely by accident,i was having the mother of all arguments with my dad and in a fit of rage i put his passenger door window through with my fist i went from majorly agressive to extremely calm very quick as the blood seeped from my hand,wrist and arm since then i've never looked back because i get the same exact feeling everytime i self harm,so you could say that in alot of ways i'm ok with it because i enjoy it.
Oh when i said i was proud of them i didn't mean in the sense of i go around showing them off i just don't feel ashamed of them or hide them,as long as i take care when i self harm and i clean the wound afterwards and i use a clean razor everytime then yes its healthy well for me at least,i know by saying that self harm is ok for me might sound rather unusual and i understand where you and everyone else is coming from but its just the way i see things,i would never say its ok for other people because we all have different opinions on it and i would never recomend it either.
I never ment people use tattoos for self harming,i have found that i get a similar release from tattoos as i do from self harming and i have used tattoos for self harming so instead of a scar i end up with a picture that represents the mood i was in when wanting to self harm.