What To Do
When You Feel Like Hurting Yourself

Self-harm is something that usually happens alone, and in secret. Those of us who hurt ourselves—or who used to hurt ourselves—may do it to relieve great emotional pain and distress; to avoid, distract from, or suppress overwhelming emotion; to try to feel better; to stop a painful memory or thought; to punish ourselves; to reenact childhood abuse or the messages our abusers taught us; to try to connect to ourselves; to keep from committing suicide; to release or express anger that we're afraid to express to others; to silently cry out for help; to show ourselves how bad the pain is that we feel inside; or for a number of other reasons. But ultimately, hurting ourselves does just that—it hurts us. It may feel like a temporary relief, but it ends up traumatizing us, even if we think it doesn't at the time.

As a survivor of abuse, I used to cut for most of those reasons—and also because I was taught to use cutting to keep myself silent, and to keep from remembering. Within ritual abuse, my abusers also encouraged me to hurt myself because they thought it would help discredit me, should I begin to talk about the abuse I was remembering, and because they wanted to keep me in emotional turmoil so that I would be less able to heal. Self-harm helped me survive during the abuse, and for some years later; it kept me alive. But it also hurt me. Parts of me felt traumatized when I hurt myself, as if they were re-experiencing the abuse I endured. And while I haven't cut for many years, I know that method of coping is still something parts of me think they can fall back on, if things get too bad and I really "need" it. I have scars on my body that I can't erase, and when I wear short-sleeved shirts, I often experience negative reactions, condescension, intrusive and judgmental comments, blatant curiosity, and rudeness from people who see my arm. This can be painful to deal with, and can also bring up old shame. Sometimes I wish I could just erase the scars—but they are a part of my history.

Self-harm is hard to go through. There is the emotional overload before the self-harm, and then the shame, self-hatred, and anger at ourselves afterward, and sometimes added depression or despair. And always there is the secrecy, and all the triggers or loaded emotion that that can bring up for survivors of abuse. Then there's the actual physical pain resulting from self-harm, and the emotional pain that comes from having cared so little about ourselves that we could hurt ourselves so badly. Self-harm hurts, on every level.

So what can you do if you want to stop hurting yourself?

First, realize that this is a process. If you've been hurting yourself for a while, most likely you won't be able to stop overnight. It takes time to stop self-harming. It's important to see each victory you make along the way, no matter how small it may seem, and to recognize the skills that you're building, that will eventually help you to stop self-harming.

Second—and this was key in helping me to stop hurting myself—you have to care enough about yourself to stop self-harming. You have to be able to love yourself—even just a little bit—you have to see yourself as valuable, to truly know that you don't deserve to be hurt, not by anyone.

It can also really help to have a therapist who can help you explore the reasons you self-harm, and support you as you try to find new ways to cope. A good therapist can be invaluable, and can help you get where you want to go faster than you might on your own. But you can also do this by yourself; it may just be a little harder.

It can be healing to talk to someone about your self-harm—when you're ready and able to. This is especially important for survivors of abuse, who most often had to keep the abuse a secret, and felt shame about it. Self-harm shouldn't have to carry the same emotional weight. Talking about your self-harm with someone you trust can help break the silence, shame, and guilt around self-harm, and prevent those feelings from reinforcing the self-harm. It's a good idea to start slowly, and to choose someone you trust to tell. You may also want to prepare what you have to say ahead of time.

Discovering what triggers your self-harm is one of the most effective and important parts of learning to stop. Try to see the pattern in your needing to hurt yourself. There may be a number of patterns. For instance, do you feel like hurting yourself every time you've gotten into an argument with your parents or your lover? Do you feel like self-harming when you think you've messed something up? Do you self-harm when you're feeling really hurt or upset? Do you self-harm to try to punish yourself, silence yourself, or distract from your feelings? Do you self-harm when a memory of abuse comes up that you just don't feel like you can deal with? Write a separate list for each trigger.

Next, ask yourself how you felt when the trigger happened, and how you felt just before you hurt yourself. Were you feeling furious? Threatened? Overwhelmingly sad? Were you feeling unlovable, unworthy, like you didn't deserve anything good? Were you feeling overwhelmed, depressed, or self-hating? Panicky? Desperate? Write out what you were feeling on your list. If you hear words or phrases that go along with the feeling, write them out, too.

If you can, take it even deeper. Try to remember the first time you felt this way. When was it? What was happening then? Does it relate back to something that happened a long time ago? Or do any of the phrases sound like something you were told? Making that connection may help you to understand why you hurt yourself.

You may also want to figure out what you really need, what you were trying to get by hurting yourself. For example, were you needing comfort, needing to express emotion, or needing relief from emotional pain? Write that down, and then write some other ways that you may be able to get those needs met.

Now, on your trigger list, write out as many things as you can think of that will help you to:

• Get out the emotion
• Distract yourself
• Soothe or calm yourself
• Reach out to someone
• Do something fun, or do something that you enjoy
• Give yourself positive messages

Those of us who self-harm often hold a lot of self-hate, self-criticism, and anger turned inwards. We also often have low self-esteem. For those reasons, it's especially important to give yourself—and to receive—as many real positive messages and as much reassurance as you can. You may want to write a list of positive messages that you need to hear, and keep that list near you for when you need it. Or you may just want to list things in the "give yourself positive messages" section of your trigger list.

Sometimes the list will work, and sometimes it won't work as well. If you get through the whole list and still feel like hurting yourself, you can go back to the beginning and start again.

Here are two examples:

Remember that learning not to self-harm is a process; it takes time. Maybe the first time you try not to hurt yourself, it will only work for ten minutes. That's okay; that's progress! You postponed hurting yourself for ten minutes. Give yourself praise for that. It really is something; you're building your skills. Next time, maybe it will work for thirty minutes, and then forty, and then an hour. Soon it will be days, then weeks, and eventually you won't need to hurt yourself at all. Every bit of progress is important—and it helps to recognize the progress you make.

What you're trying to do here is not to suddenly stop hurting yourself—that's pretty impossible—but rather to gradually reduce the self-harm; to bring in alternative methods of recognizing your feelings and triggers and dealing with them; to build up your options; and to increase your ability to recognize when you're feeling triggered, and to move into treating yourself with caring and compassion, and gentle, healing ways of responding to yourself when you're feeling distressed. This will eventually lead to your no longer needing to self-harm.

It's also a good idea to give yourself lots of positive reinforcement every time you want to self-harm but don't, or every time you put off self-harm just a little bit longer. You may want to give yourself a little treat, allow yourself to have some fun, do something that feels good—and really notice the progress you're making. It all counts!

Know that you are not alone. Many other people have gone through what you're going through—and many people are, right now. Sometimes it helps just to know that.

And please know that you deserve not to be hurt. You deserve to be happy, to have fun, and to feel all your feelings. And you deserve to love yourself.

© Cheryl Rainfield, 2004.