1. *VERY IMPORTANT* Self-harm is NOT a attempt. Suicidal people want to end the emotional pain permanently by dying. People who cut, for example, want to end the emotional pain, but they do want to live. They cut to end the emotional pain for awhile, which allows them to live. There is a problem with this: after awhile, cutting loses its edge, its effectiveness, and the emotional pain will come back sooner and sooner, and that can lead to suicial thinking/attempts. People who engage in SI do tend to become suidical at some point if they engage in the behavior long enough without seeking treatment.
2. Self-harm is rarely used for the purpose of getting attention. Think of all the other ways there are to get attention that do not make people think you are a freak: cutting class, underage smoking/drinking, without parents permission/swearing in front of the parents/skipping church/failing classes on purpose....I think permanently scarring yourself is a little extreme. In hospitals, some people will do "minor" acts of self-harm to get the attention of staff since they do not know how to vocalize their needs.
3. Generally, people do not use SI as a way of manipulation. If they are, then the chances are very high that they are a manipulative person in general, and this is just one more way they can do it. Most people who engage in SI try desperately to hide their behavior. If someone is hiding the marks and scars and no one knows, it can hardly be seen as manipulative. I hid my behavior from everyone for nine years. From the age of 11 to the age of 20. And I was on the Varsity swim team, and the track team, so hiding things got a little difficult.
4. Masochism. Physical pain is not the *real* goal that people who engage in self-harm are after. The real goal is to end the emotional pain. Quite often, people who cut don't feel any physical pain from their actions. I never did. Some people do feel the physical pain, but know that it blocks the emotional pain.
1. People who engage in SI often have an inability to effectively express emotions. For these people, SI skips over the words and gets directly to the pain.
2. Simalar to above, people who engage in self-harm often have a hard time coping with painful emotions and events. They never learned regular coping skills. This can happen because their parents never taught them; intentionally or not this is emotional neglect. Most often, this reason relates to some type of earlier trauma, be it childhood abuse, or a of a close family member, or a critical event that was seen in a negative light and had a great emotional impact on the person.
3. Revenge. This sounds mean, initially. What I mean is that someone who feels the need for revenge will take it out on themselves instead of taking it out on the other person. Rarely does the person go to the other person and say, "Look what I did because of you!" No, the person who cut needed to end the emotional pain generated by another person.
4. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. This one I question sometimes. Trichotillomania is when someone constantly pulls out their hair. Yes, that is OCD behavior, but if that is the only behavior, then that person may not have OCD, but may be pulling their hair out to relieve emotional pain, which is the goal of SI. If SI truly is an OCD behavior with someone, you will usually find that the person has a lower IQ, meaning there is a diagnosis of mental retardation (MR). Some people in psychotic states will repeatedly bang their heads, but quite often that is related to psychosis and not OCD. Again, let me remind you that I am not a doctor. I have written research papers on this subject, but I do not have an degree on my wall. What I am writing here comes from my research and from my personal experience--both as a patient, and as someone who worked in a psychiatric facility.
5. While some people SI in order to stop feeling anything emotionally, some people SI in order to end a dissociative state, or to regain a sense of living, ending numbness. Many people who SI frequently may report using SI to stop feeling, and to start feeling at different times, depending on what they need emotionally. Most of the time, I cut in order to numb out, but there were also many times when I cut in order to end a dissociative state.
6. SI helps some people relieve tension and anger. They may not need SI in order to cope with sadness or loss or loneliness, but will want it in order to get rid of anger.
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First page on self-harm
Ignorance
Begins explaining self-harm
Alternative Coping Skills
Lists some coping skills, divided up into emotions and then a general list of coping skills
ARE YOU READY TO STOP?
this is not an easy decision
Silverware
An old mental wandering