Unless you’ve experienced what it’s like to want to harm yourself, self-mutilation is a very difficult area to understand. Surely we are programmed to avoid pain? Pain is a warning that something is wrong; fear of it keeps us from taking dangerous risks. The only time we might voluntarily chose pain is for greater good: childbirth, dentist, injections, operations. Why would anyone want to inflict it upon themselves?
Self-harm is a complicated and potentially very serious psychological disorder. It may take the form of cutting or scraping the skin with a knife, razor blade or scissors. Burning the skin or physically damaging behaviour such as punching a wall or causing bruising to yourself are also acts of self-mutilation.
Although cutting yourself seems such a destructive thing to do, it’s important to realise that the self-harmer is getting some relief from extreme mental anguish when they inflict physical pain on themselves. Acts of self-harm usually follow a build-up of pressure – pressure from unbearably strong feelings which don’t seem able to be resolved. The pain helps to reduce the emotional turmoil, providing an effective distraction. The self-harmer may feel in a trance as they cut themselves, with no thoughts for the consequences of what they’re doing.
If you’ve started self-harming or have maybe been doing it for some time, it’s very important to get some help. This could be via a GP or through talking to a professional such as a counsellor or teacher. Instead of turning your anger in on yourself, you need to find safe and effective ways to express and deal with difficult feelings.
The full extent of self-harm is not known, since many people who do this never seek help. Nevertheless we do know that there was a massive increase in cases reported during the 1960s and 70s. But deliberate self-harm is nothing new. “Self flagellation” was a regular religious practice: there are accounts of it shortly after Jesus’s death and all through the Middle Ages. Beating yourself was a kind of penance: physical pain to relieve unbearable feelings which were often about guilt, or fear of damnation. All these centuries later, self-mutilation is still about using physical pain to relieve unbearably difficult feelings: the replacing of emotional distress with something more direct. It also has elements of self-punishment and self-hatred.
So what sort of person harms themselves deliberately? We know that they are most likely to be young – under 25 - and female, though this does not rule out older women and males. There needs to be intense psychological pain in order for you to drown it out with physical pain. There may well have been hereditary factors such as mental illness within the family; abuse, neglect, abandonment.
Counselling can help by starting to unravel what lies behind the self-harm. It’s vital that the person seeking help feels the counsellor genuinely wants to help them to get the bottom of their difficulties, rather than simply trying to encourage them to stop. A good counsellor will help their client to start talking about things that may be buried very deep. Once feelings are being discussed honestly and openly, there will be less need to seek relief from them in such a destructive way.
Julia Bellerby - Counselling and Life Coaching in York and anywhere in the UK by telephone
Julia Bellerby
Grad. Dip. Counselling BACP Accredited; Dip. Coaching
Contact me on 07939
255425 or click here to contact me by email.