That’s a really good question, thanks for asking that! It can be really difficult and confusing trying to understand why you may self-harm, and we’re really glad that you’re reaching out about this.
It’s hard for us to answer “why” you may self-harm or “why” you like self-harming because we aren’t you, and we don’t know your personal situation or struggles you’re dealing with. It’s definitely not our place to tell you why you self-harm because of how personal self-harm is.
Although we can’t tell you whether you self-harm to punish yourself or to see yourself bleed, often when we’re dealing with personal struggles and stresses, we try to find different ways we can cope, and using self-harm to deal with your struggles is definitely understandable. It can be really difficult trying to talk about our emotions and deal with them, and this pile up of stress can sometimes cause us to turn to self-harm to provide immediate stress relief or escape from that pain, or even to “replace” some of the pain. Sometimes, self-harm can be a call for help or may just help us feel better. While we aren’t in a place to pass judgement over someone’s self-harming behavior, we do encourage people to consider whether self-harm is a healthy or unhealthy coping mechanism. The risk of serious injury or even death is much higher when self-harm is used to deal with your stress as opposed to, for example, going for a run, listening to music, or reaching out to others.
There are many ways we cope with our emotions and stresses and we are only exposed to how others cope, what we see in the media, and other things that we think will help us deal with our emotions. Other ways that help us cope can even be more effective and may help us even more in the long term. What else do you do to help you deal with stress? It’s important to have options for coping strategies so that we don’t rely on just one type of behavior to deal with all of life’s stresses.
Talking to someone about this pain or other ways to deal with stress can be really beneficial and help relieve some of that burden off your shoulders. Connecteen is always here for that, and we would love to talk with you! Additionally, talking to a professional and your friends and family can also be good supports to help you navigate self harming and the stresses you’re dealing with.
Connecteen is always here to talk to, and we don’t judge! If you feel like self harming, or want to talk about self harm more, we would love to talk! We are always here so you don’t need to deal with it alone.
