tell me all about it

I've started this three times and keep erasing it trying to figure out how to put this. Every time I start, I kind of descend into really dry psychobabble I learned during intense study after my very first Psych class, when I found out there was a word--there was a concept--that covered what I'd been doing when I was nineteen. I was shocked and horrified and went along with vague class discussion, freaked out that everyone else knew about this--knew about this--and half of them were making fun of it. So I read. I read and read and read and I still don't know more than I started, just like I didn't know then that there wasn't something seriously wrong with me that I couldn't talk about to anyone, ever, not my best friend, not my boyfriend, not the people who were around me when it happened, not anyone after.

The first person I ever told about it was svmadelyn. The second was chopchica. Then I could talk about it. Sort of.



I used to cut myself when I was nineteen, when I found out by accident it helped. I mean, I won't lie about this, it's better than antidepressants, better than drugs, better than anything I've tried but writing--and possibly morphine, but whatever. When I say it helped, I mean--

This may not be obvious, but I'm just now getting into a lighter shade of severe depression after eight months talking to myself about brain chemistry and vitamin supplements and being careful about because it drowned out the reminder of the fact I own a boxcutter and can get a scalpel and I know, I know this like I know my name, that it would have helped. I haven't even considered it viably in years, but I caught myself thinking that it wouldn't be that bad. You can't even see the other scars. Because you know, I get we all are jaded and shit and people who really are cutters are like, not going to be on the internet talking about it, those are just attention-deprived teenagers and fuck them, that shit's funny, the attention whores. If you're a real cutter, you wouldn't talk about it, you wouldn't tell people about it in a last ditch effort not to go through with it, and you sure as fuck aren't triggered by anything happening, because the internet isn't real and if it's real you don't talk about it.

Fuck this shit; it's not like anyone is going to sit down after reading this and think, Gosh, maybe taunting someone threatening to cut themselves is like, bad or something, obviously it's attention whoring because if it was real, real real, they'd be ashamed of it. Yeah, no, shame my friends has nothing to do with it; I liked it. I loved it. It was the best thing, the only thing that worked when nothing did. It set an endorphin and adrenaline rush, it set off seratonin transmitters, it set off euphoria, I have no idea, everything I've read lies because when they talk about it, they miss the entire point.

In general, if you're a cutter, welcome, yes, there's something wrong going on there. In a shocking turn of events, depression isn't unique and for some reason, it's much more preferable to sit around in a fugue state unable to even want to get out of bed than let a little blood and feel like you can face civilization again. Take medication, meditate, think cheery thoughts, go out and get active, sleep more, eat right, and if that doesn't work, don't suicide, it gets better. And don't even fucking think of picking up that razor; the zombie look works for you. Better that than scarring. Better that than parade around with scars like the attention whore you really are because how can that feel good so it's not real. If it were real, real, real, real, real, you wouldn't talk about it.

It gets better. I know. And then it gets worse and the cycle starts again and its' not like I know right now isn't forever, that if I'm right about how this cycles, and I know myself, I have at least six months before I'm back to something resembling baseline, and that's until the next time. I'll backslide again in a few weeks--I know this shit cold, it's hilarious how self-awareness just does shit, but I'm not suicidal. I haven't been. Self-destruction can take so many forms, and if you're really fucked up, there are many better ways to hurt yourself so you have to live with it. I'm not scared, I've never been scared of killing myself; I'm scared of that, of the moment not-caring becomes finding a way, any way, to care about something. Being mildly OCD--diagnosed by a trufax doctor, so fuck off the sneer--has one use only for me when it gets like this and I've used it ruthlessly from spending hours and hours creating spreadsheets no one will ever see of stupid shit to hours reading linux to days and days of doing nothing but uninstalling and reinstalling and crashing my server so I could do it again and again until I could sleep, or what passes for sleep, because you can't call this shit insomnia when your life is where sleep, real sleep, is the fucking exception.

Just so we have that down, let's count the ways I find all cutting discussions fucked up.

It's more socially acceptable to drink for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to become a drug addict for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to commit suicide than cut yourself. Those three get you nice people who want to help. Cutting gets you internet diagnosis of attentionitis and mockery and reacting to it gets you more. Shock me.

I'm not advocating for finding a clean razor and practicing your art skills, anymore than I'm advocating for alcohol, drugs, or any of a thousand ways people with depression find something like relief. I'm saying, this is something people do to deal, and one that doesn't get you in the ER for an overdose, costs very little, and doesn't involve hurting other people because you ran out of ways to hurt yourself.

All of these things--all of them--are not the problem in the end. The problem is that you're fucked up from depression and there's no cure. There is no cure. It will never go away, and it will hit you from nowhere, or from a mile away you watch it coming and there's nothing you can do to get out of the way. You know, you know what life will be like, when it hits; you know you won't think right, you won't feel right, everything becomes impossible and ridiculous and boring and hateful and the most ordinary world imaginable becomes a nightmare you won't get to wake up from. You don't know when it will end and you take on faith it will end at all. It's kind of all you have, really, in the end; it's you and a brain that's betrayed you on the most fundamental level, that's stripped you down until the world you live in might as well be a different fucking universe than the one that everyone else seems to live and love and enjoy. And the worst part is, you do know it. You do. You know. And you still can't fix it. You just have to live with it.

Now, tell me about that girl--usually a girl, always a girl, you know girls, they do it for attention, that's what they want, attention--who totes faked it for attention again. She showed you her scars, she writes bad myspace poetry, she thinks she's a goth, it's not real. Because you know real people that have it and they're nothing like that. You do it and it's nothing like that. It's really all about you.

Come on, you know you want to. You know. You learned it on the internet.

Note: I reserve my right to make as many cutting jokes as I want. There's something comforting about them; sure, it's the internet joke, but it's a joke because other people did it and you know what? I need to know that.



I feel better. Ranting, I admit, isn't as good, but there's a lot less clean up.

Also, person who might not want to be named in my DW/LJ but had surgery for gall bladder, update me! I can't find the comment or the email, because I haven't read most of it. I should get caught up on that.

Comments

[fanofall]

Two things:

1. I am sorry that you (or anyone) has to deal with any of that. Brain chemistry is what it is and we as a society have never learned to deal with it and it sucks and I am sorry.

2. I am heartily sick of chicken noodle soup and jello, let me tell you. More in my journal (thank you for reminding me to update!)

[seperis]

*grins* I ate a lot of soup and plain vegetables too. *sends hugs*

Thank you.

[hollyberries]

I never know what to say in response to posts like this because, well, 'I'm sorry' is so weak, and I try really hard not to pity people because that's just taking their dignity away from them without asking, and yet what you're going through is really, really horrible, and there's nothing to make it better. Er, for certain values of 'nothing'.

And I don't want to say nothing because, yes, I see this, and I've read it, and I feel what you're saying.

The thing is, I feel guilty that I found books (and later, fic) before I got to the point of actively trying to self-harm, that it was distraction enough for me, but not for you. (Although, self-destructive behaviour? Got that covered pretty well.) And I'm such a non-confrontational coward that it doesn't even occur to me to speak up when people make terrible, inappropriate jokes. So, thank you for this post.

[seperis]

I never know what to say in response to posts like this because, well, 'I'm sorry' is so weak, and I try really hard not to pity people because that's just taking their dignity away from them without asking, and yet what you're going through is really, really horrible, and there's nothing to make it better. Er, for certain values of 'nothing'.

God, I know. I always feel horrible when I read painful posts by people and have no idea what to say or hwo to say it.

And I'm such a non-confrontational coward that it doesn't even occur to me to speak up when people make terrible, inappropriate jokes. So, thank you for this post.

The jokes I always liked in a way; they make it something people do, something people know about, something more real. Before I knew--hell, before the intenret exploded with the jokes--it was this thing that seemed so horrible and unnatural and wrong. Jokes aimed at a cutter telling her to cut herself, though; I admit, hypocritical or not, that one gets to me because I still can't tell what set me off or how; I was suicidally depressed all the time, but I didn't cut every day. There would just be this--something. And I'd do it and feel good.

*hugs you* Thank you for commenting.

[rynia]

I was trying to write a comment that was at two long, ranting, angry paragraphs, but mostly what it sums down to is: Word. Wordy McFucking *Word*.

Signed - A former cutter whose winter has been pushing for a relapse.

[ineptshieldmaid]

No useful additions to the discussion here, but: post read and duly noted.

Thanks for sharing.

[out_there]

It's more socially acceptable to commit suicide than cut yourself. Those three get you nice people who want to help. Cutting gets you internet diagnosis of attentionitis and mockery and reacting to it gets you more.

That doesn't feel right to me, but admittedly I don't spend a lot of time on the internet away from safe fandom zones -- my online life is lived in protective cotton-wool -- so I wouldn't come across any of those jokes. Still feels very wrong, though.

[out_there]

I hit "post comment" too soon. ...although the comment above reads a bit like I think you're wrong and it doesn't get treated that way. Which isn't what I meant at all.

I meant that it feels wrong that it gets treated that way. It shouldn't sit outside the square box of "ways to deal with depression", it feels wrong that it gets minimised into a joke (something teens do for the look of it) and not treated as a serious sign that something's not working here.

[fox1013]

Ahahahaha, I have... a lot to say to this, actually, none of which I can bring myself to actually say because of exactly what you said up here, about the conflation of talking about your problems and it just being a cry for attention.

But thank you for posting this. Thank you a LOT.

[seperis]

The thing is, a cry for attention is a good thing. People carry on with it like ti's bad--"she jsut wants attention!"--and that gets to me, because no fucking shit, wonder why?

God, I"d rather everyone jumped up and down screaming for attention than shut down. *hugs you a lot* Say anything you want. Anything.

[wordwitch]

This has never been my thing, like suicide has never been my thing, or overdrinking, or drugs, or serial murder, or ... I dunno, or voting Republican, I guess. So I got nuthin' to say as someone who knows.

That nothing having been said, the computer and potatoes are my thing, and they can be every bit as secret and destructive as any of the above, in sufficient quantities, and for the same purpose. So to that extent, I sympathize.

And from that standpoint I will say again: It is not proper to make fun of any group to which one does not, oneself, belong. Nor is it proper to assert advice for someone who is not dearly known, and who has not asked for said advice.

Bah. Godsdamned exclusioners.

[seperis]

*grins* Potatoes? Like, food or metaphorical couch potato? *curious*

[mrshamill]

As someone who's been battling depression for, oh, roughly as long as you've been alive and who sometimes wishes cutting worked for her, I got nothing to add, except if you were here, I'd hug you tightly, then give you a noogie, so here, have a cat macro. Because, you know.

[jrho]

Thank you for sharing this part of yourself.

[xenakis]

In this case, I can do nothing more than read, take note, try to understand and send you lots and lots of *HUGS*

[seperis]

*hugs you* I don't think--okay, no, it's more, I don't really require people to understand? I mean, I don't understand, at all, and it's frustrating, too. Reality is so different when I'm in or out, and even when I'm not in a cycle, I know that I'm still not quite--seeing the world as it is.

I think that sometimes gets lost in there; it's hard to comprehend to people who have it, who are living with it, and I seriously do not expect anyone who doesn't have clinical depression to be able to get how it changes not just what you feel, but how you think, how you interpret the world, how you react to it, how all of those things feed on each other. It's fucked up.

Er, I am saying, don't feel if it sounds incomprehensible, you're doing it wrong. *hugs you* Thank you.

[mis-mariposas.livejournal.com]

THIS THIS THIS.

I'm young enough (and dense enough) that I don't have the cycle down cold yet. But I'm working my way out of what has to be at least the third major down cycle and I keep thinking (hoping) I've reached baseline and then realizing I really, really haven't and it has been months and on some level reaching baseline doesn't even matter because it'll nosedive again eventually.


Also, I hate the dismissive attitude towards cutting because, you know what? Sometimes that's all that allows me to function in something resembling a normal manner. If the choice is between sitting and doing nothing for 24 hours or drawing blood and actually being able to do something for an hour or two I'm going to want to take door number two every single time. It's HARD not to because I own knives and needles and it's so easy to draw blood.

Basically you just put things that are in my head into words much better than I ever could and I thank you.

[seperis]

Heh. I can't even track my own period, but depression is weirdly easy. It always, always starts with sleep; I start sleeping more because I feel moody or something, doesn't help, I get worse, then realize what is happening and it's basically on a timer from there. And then I start not sleeping, because I panic about the depression, which seriously does not help and it's just downhill from there. Sometimes, I can--derail it? I dont' know how or why, but sometimes, I can get out before it starts feeding on itself.

It's funny in some ways, I guess, and worse and better, knowing it's possible to stop the cycle before it gets bad, but also knowing I have no idea what will do it or how. Like, if I've done it before, there, all done, but--no. I don't know. I just hope and think maybe and it's a total reality-perception lottery.

[margrave]

Agreed.

Cutting is so much more acceptable than drinking oneself into oblivion to handle problems.

For me - I think I'm one of the lucky ones whose brain chemistry is fairly balanced, and barring the outliers I don't have any major depressive episodes or general anxiety. Well, I haven't for awhile now.

I entertained thoughts of suicide during adolescent (early teens mostly), and I've gone the route of punching walls and other inanimate objects. I also tried cutting myself during the phase - it wasn't for me because I felt completely out of control and couldn't do it more than twice. This may be due to a tiny, tiny fear of sharp objects and skin, which doesn't make things better for me.

Punching walls, gauging nails into palms and so forth worked for me, made things better, and then I think my brain chemistry balanced itself out, and I just stopped. Fast forward about a decade and well, major depression hits, and instead of getting help (fucking hell, I have a psych degree, I can self-diagnose thank you very much, and yes, even if it is self-destructive, I still needed to figure it out myself), I started drinking. I don't know why I didn't go down the route of cutting or punching stuff, but honestly, drinking was pretty damn scary. I didn't realise how much I was drinking or how depressed I was till I started feeling good about myself and life (OK, so I quit my cushy job that was pretty much making me depressed and chose mental health.) To give you an idea I drank a bottle of Jack Daniels (the 2L bottles) in a week, on top of that I was going through beer and sake like it was water. So, yes, complete agreement on how it is socially acceptable to drink but not cut oneself.

[seperis]

If alcohol had worked, I honestly think I'd have liver problems by now. But it doens't work and my stomach also has issues with it, so--yeah. Right now I can drink maybe a few times a year at most, and boy do I pay for it for a week after. It's ridiculous.

*hugs hopefully* I hope things are better now?

[niqaeli]

I never cut because it didn't seem like it would help. And, I mean, I wasn't suicidal! Because being teenaged and miserable and just rational enough to recognise suicide would only create MORE problems for everyone that I wanted to stop fucking up their lives, means that you don't even get suicidal ideation as an option! Not that suicidal ideation is a good thing, but trying to wish yourself out of existence, to never having existed, is totally healthy especially when you know fucking well that it's ridiculous and you can't.

No, instead I was an athlete. A competitive gymnst. I'm pretty sure that it saved my sanity as a teenager if perhaps not my life, what with all the fucking endorphins being wonderful meds, and also? If you have any masochistic tendencies? Competitive gymnastics will help you hit them. You will hit euphoria! I didn't enjoy the pain, is the thing. But it shut my fucking brain up.

When I was ever extremely frustrated, I would hit my thighs in rage repeatedly until the pain really hit because then my brain would clear. I hit the thighs because they don't bruise readily, and I kept it thudding rather than punch-like so I could get pain without it showing.

Gosh, and I was a well-adjusted teenager. People tell me so.

I mock my former emo angstmuppet self but only I get that privilege, I who once was her. I don't mock other people for their, their whatever. I only mock my own particular fucking self and if other people mocked her, I would be ENRAGED, even now. Because when I was her? It fucking hurt. I grew over callus and am fortunate to have very very few triggers, but the girl I was DIDN'T have that callus. Also, laughter is my coping mechanism, which is how that girl became me of today.

But -- yeah. I don't know. I have this wacky thought that, if someone is actually not cutting themselves but saying they are for the attention, or is doing it but only for the attention? MAYBE THAT'S A FUCKING PROBLEM TOO. And not because they are or aren't slicing themselves up, because it's a symptom of greater problems that need treatment and support.

Teenaged girls are primarily who people think about doing this. Colour me shocked that it's trivialised and mocked. Shocked, I say. Teenage girls and their problems get even less respect than women, which is sort of horrible because it's not like women get that much for their problems.

And... just. Pfegh. Also notice how I will talk about being disabled and my current forms of brain fail but hardly ever talk about what it was like when I was a teenager. Because I survived it and I am grateful and because I don't want to hear about it from other people. Because the shame of being a teenaged girl is enough to keep my mouth shut, and I'm not much for shame.

[(Anonymous)]

I mock my former emo angstmuppet self but only I get that privilege, I who once was her.
Yes. This. I fucking hate it when others mock or others even smirk and agree with me mocking because they don't get to do that, no one does.

[apatheia_jane]

I agree with a lot of what you've said about cutting discussions, and you're right, there are worse ways to deal with depression.

I understand what it feels like to feel like you're living in a completely different world to the one other people enjoy, & I understand how much you can feel like you need to find a way to describe your universe to the people who don't live in it. But I can't help hating cutting discussions where cutters describe both the misery & the euphoria, because after about 3 years of misery & about 2 years of hearing other people, who seemed to feel exactly the same way I did, talk about finding something that worked, kinda horrible but it actually worked, I tried it myself. It was kinda my one last hope, the thing I didn't want to do but always knew was there to try if things got worse, and when they got worse and I gave in it didn't help and I felt nothing. I turned the lines into letters, because maybe it's not the blood but the expression? Then I made them deeper, because maybe I just wasn't doing it hard enough. Then I sandpapered the scabs off, and all of it had about as much effect on my mood as cutting my toenails, except that it came with a rising sense of despair because if this wasn't working, nothing would.

So, I pretty much opt out of all cutting discussions on the internet before I start screaming something along the lines of "Liar, you're all liars, you said it helps, you said it worked, and I was devastated when I found out it didn't." Which, yunno, is not how I want to behave on the internet, and is hardly fair on anyone.

I've been pretty good for years at this point, which is not something I ever believed would happen at the time, but I never quite got over that feeling of betrayal. Even though no one ever promised it would help me specifically, so many cutting discussions seems to come from trying to make people understand, and I understood and thought they were talking about how my body worked too.

[seperis]

I've been pretty good for years at this point, which is not something I ever believed would happen at the time, but I never quite got over that feeling of betrayal. Even though no one ever promised it would help me specifically, so many cutting discussions seems to come from trying to make people understand, and I understood and thought they were talking about how my body worked too.

Oh God, I know the feeling, and this is so stupid, but alcohol. I kept hearing about dealing with depression with alcohol or drugs or something and alcohol did shit; it acted as a intensifier, not a reversal. Pot? Same thing, but with lethargy. And all I could think, even though no, I have no desire to be an alcoholic or a druggie, that even that was pointless to help, even that.

So yeah, I get that. *hugs*

[minim_calibre]

Brain chemistry, I would like to say, is right alongside the human knee in Evidence Exhibits Against Intelligent Design.

Damn, it's hard to hug someone with just 1s and 0s.

There is a reason I no longer own one of the old school T-style razors, despite my fondness for them. I just don't let myself own shiny tempting razor blade objects. I mean, in theory, I have a box cutter, but I never know where it is. Which is good.

Now I just obsessively and aggressively floss to get through rough patches. A few years ago, it was epilating, but then we moved and it became harder to do that whenever I needed it. I've found a lot of social acceptable ways to bring on some relief in the last few years.

It's more socially acceptable to drink for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to become a drug addict for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to commit suicide than cut yourself. Those three get you nice people who want to help. Cutting gets you internet diagnosis of attentionitis and mockery and reacting to it gets you more. Shock me.

I hate this so much in discussions of it, too. Because in hindsight, a: cutting during my last major depressive episode (21, about a year before the cycle flipped all more over to anxiety on me, and the baseline depression levels went to low-grade) probably saved my life; and b: it was nowhere NEAR as bad for me as the regular drinking binges I used to cope after I stopped cutting. I'm not saying it was a good thing, because it wasn't, but damn, it was better than just spending three days in my bedroom unable to move or get out of my bathrobe, which is where I was when I wasn't doing it.

[nagasvoice]

I've got zero right to comment with any kind of judgement, but I do find this fascinating. I've had three alcoholic/depressed friends with fairly strong histories of getting hurt, and I wonder how much of it was unconsciously seeking the endorphins that would come from repeated pain during recovery from things like joint replacement surgery after a fall.
I was pretty sure that there was something else going on, because whatever outside folks heard them saying to me, it clearly wasn't just the suicidal bit, it wasn't just seeking attention by being totally outrageous and taking risks (the better to make your friends prove you're worth keeping alive) or anything that might sound like those, when they were having a dramatically epic fugue state. I know one of them gets irrationally enraged during such a state, and that probably evokes some of these endorphin effects to kick them out of depression a little bit as well.
Also, judging from some of the antidepression med side-effects and the damage ot their livers, I'm not sure but what some nice simple clean cutting episodes might be far better for their overall health. They were the folks for whom the available meds of choice didn't work (including major stuff like lithium), when what they needed was something more like you describe.
I also find it interesting that none of these efforts work to induce this effect for everybody. That sounds like it involves some truly unique individual biochemical kinks, and why don't we know more about how this works by now?
Oh, yeah, because it earns more money to sell ineffectual meds in the meantime, while maybe we gimp along trying to research better ones.

[(Anonymous)]

I make jokes about how emo (used not to describe the wearing black, listening to certain types of music or whatever the actual definition of the word is, more just mocking myself for being ~sad~ by using the word... derogatively) I used to be.

It's weird because I read posts like yours and others about depression with a half view of well, at least other people feel like this and the other half of jesus, why are you telling people about this, you can't (because I didn't). I whined a lot on LJ sure and had my friends mock me about 'cheer up emo kid' and all I can think is 'I think you missed the point there'. It sucks because I kinda agree with them because depression doesn't exist, you're just weak, you need to think yourself out of it and I hatehatehate it because I judge by myself by standards that don't apply to others (I can't, they'd be my patients, I know it's wrong, I know how to help if I can but somehow, that doesn't work for me) but I can't stop, it's ingrained to just ttfu.

from a mile away you watch it coming and there's nothing you can do to get out of the way
It's always been this for me and for so long now, it feels like it's been forever and it's unending but the good days always come on the days that I decide to do something about it and finally see a shrink, finally take the meds (and this time I'll stick with them), finally take a proactive stance and then it goes back to I'm fine, I don't need it, see it went away and then a few months later it's like whoa, here we go again, fml.

Hmm that felt cathartic.

I like the taste of blood but I scar so easily. I ejoy it someimtes when I've hurt myself (by accident) and I bleed but I've never done it for the rush. Too scared I think (of it or that I'll like it too much).

i'm gonna ramble at you now, ok?

[harpers_child]

i'm mostly here saying "yeah, me too." only when i started i was fourteen and it was the only control i had in my life and so what if i'd been coming home covered in bruises every day for years, at least this was me hurting me; this was something i wanted. there was a point in my life where i didn't know anyone, male or female, who wasn't hurting themselves. there was a point in my life where one of my friends would cut at lunch and the rest of us rolled our eyes at her like she was picking her nose in public or something equally socially rude. (this period of my life is what most people refer to as "high school." i remember my actual shock when i found out one of my college circle didn't hurt themselves and never had. like no one had ever told me it was an option.) i haven't cut myself in 9 years, but sometimes i dream about blood.

i'm sort of looking forward to several months from now when i'll get six weeks of happy before starting to downspiral again.

so yeah, me too.

[alwayswondered]

I'm a cutter, too, and have been since I was 18. I haven't felt the need to do it for a while but when I was actively cutting, it helped. Drinking made me feel worse (and still does); cutting was like a magical hard-reboot that made me instantly functional again, whether the problem was rage or misery or panic. So, maybe I'll never understand why it works for some people or not others, but I think I get where you're coming from in this post, I know which incident you're talking about, and I'm sorry you had to go through this shit over the last couple of days.

Note: I reserve my right to make as many cutting jokes as I want.

Same. Sometimes I do it as a way of coming out about cutting (hey dudes, THAT'S OKAY WHEN I SAY IT!). I know that's kind of manipulative but IDK, coming at it that way, all casual-like, makes me feel less afraid that my brand new confidant will freak out that I'm begging them for help or think I'm trying to be ~dramatic~. I'm not; I just don't think I should have to hide it for fear that I'll be thought an attention-seeker.

[synecdochic]

Wishing you strength and grace.

[silver_spotted]

It's more socially acceptable to drink for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to become a drug addict for depression than cut yourself. It's more socially acceptable to commit suicide than cut yourself.
This attitude drives me up the fucking wall. Thank you for talking about this.

[caorann]

Thanks for talking about this. I'm in the middle of a depression/anxiety period right now, so I totally understand. I just wish I could see it coming, but sometimes I can & sometimes I can't. I have my own coping mechanisms that people would find just as dysfunctional as cutting I'm sure. I've never really tried it- I have a bleeding disorder so I've always been afraid I'll cut too deeply & not be able to stop. But it's my opinion that whatever the fuck gets you through the day with your sanity intact is better than nothing. It infuriates me how diseases that affect women more than men and mental health issues are treated with so little respect. How many wonderful drugs for impotence, and yet they can't find reliable methods to treat depression?

[ilyena_sylph]

I have a friend I dearly love who cuts.

Thank you for words that clarify at least a little of why, because she's never been able to talk about it.

Other than that... I am just grateful -- for your willingness to speak.

[the_shoshanna]

...I can't say anything, except that I am listening, willingly and respectfully and gratefully and wishing you grace.

[lately]

I really like this post a lot. I had a friend who I met through lj who doesn't seem to be in a position to be in touch with many people at the mo, but when I met her at sixteen (her age, not mine) she was already gouged all over her body with the scars of her depression. She was the first person I met who (visibly) self-harmed and it was through her that I came to understand it as a very legit coping strategy for the kind of shit she was (and is) going through. Mind you, it took me seeing what happened when she discovered promiscuity, drugs (nicotine, alcohol, idk what else besides) and the extent of her eating disorders for me to recognize the razor as safer, but.

As you say above... why not let depression be visible, why not let the outlet be something less (self)harmful than fine white lines?

I wish I could take away the reasons for your desire. Instead, I'll wish you strength to get through the down. ♥

[second_banana]

YES.

Times elevety.

Hilariously enough I got into BDSM as a "socially acceptable" version of self harm. Hey look! I can hurt *and* someone accepts me! Yaaaaaay! Except for when they didn't. And except for when I just couldn't be arsed to find someone else when I was soaking in depression. Fortunately my desire to not be hurt by others non-consensually and my desire to protect myself from other people's stupid kept me pretty safe with this.

For me cutting (or the more dull stabby version I so loved) was like doing knife play with an unsafe bottom. Part of me would never safeword out if shit got too intense. And since unsafe bottoms scare the SHIT out of me, once I started framing it that way it felt less awesome.

I do, however, think it's funny in a rage blackout kind of way that unsafe BDSM with a partner with more socially acceptable than unsafe BDSM with myself. the first is sexy! The second is joke fodder. Grrrrrrrrrr!

[being_broken]

I just replied to the main thread and was carefully not going on into BDSM (because I was pointed here by a friend and don't actually know the OP) and then read this :-) Yeah for me the problem was that so many (though not by any means all) tops had such judgments about what I wanted / why I wanted it and that ended up leaving my feeling all dirty at the end (or worst of all in the middle).

[if you're ever looking to do stabbing in a more controllable way diabetes lancets (available at many drugstores and med supply stores) and like tiny knives that have a hilt to stop you from stabbing very far on so while neither the top or bottom (i.e. you) might notice depth or whatnot the tool itself will.