A reason why I cut myself

A reason for why I cut myself.
People have asked why I feel the need to cut myself. So I thought
perhaps now would be a good time to explain. I do not cut because I
want to die; in fact I am not suicidal. I cut, for several reasons. To
relieve the pain and shame I feel inside. To remind myself that I am
still alive when I am feeling numb. To punish myself for wrongs I feel I
have done. Perhaps, I cut, because the physical pain is better than the
emotional overload.

Sometimes the pain I am feeling, the emotions are so great that my mind
goes on overload and all I can think about is ending it. Dealing with
it is more difficult, so I take razor to flash and watch as the
emotional pain drains away. The razor slices small thin cuts that sting
and bleed by drips. Sometimes the numb feeling comes back while
cutting. When this happens I end up cutting more, and sometimes the cuts are deeper. Never enough to warrant stitches, but it's a shot in the dark sometimes
whether or not I will be found out and have need to go to the emergency
room.

Sometimes when I argue with friends and family I am feeling so shocked
inside that I know I must punish myself. Only then will I be able to go
on. I know it’s a cop-out sometimes instead of actually dealing with my
issues, but I have been using the cutting as a coping mechanism for more
than 10 years. I have had therapists try to threaten me with
hospitalizations or with my family leaving me. Threats do not work.
And I highly recommend that anyone who has therapists try that, walk
away as fast as you can. Because a counselor that wants to help should
not try to tear you down.

It has been over 6 months since I have cut the last time. But the want
to cut is still there. Whenever I get upset and want to harm myself, I
do try to find someone to talk with. Sometimes it’s a friend I can call
or someone I can talk with online. There have been times that talking
about cutting and why has been enough to stop me from doing it. There
was a time though that I would cut mostly at night when my husband was
asleep, he would wake in the morning and I would be asleep and covered
in blood. He has always wanted me to wake him up so we can talk, but I
have never wanted to inconvenience him. I know he has to work in the
morning.

I try not to cut now…. I make an effort but I do not make empty promises
about my ability to not cut. That just ends up hurting everyone
involved. The shame ends up being a two-edged sword. I cut because I
feel shame but afterwards the shame is greater because I have not been
able to keep myself from cutting. I end up feeling like I have let
everyone and including myself down.

Finally, cutting for me has positive and negative drawbacks. Some have
likened it to an addiction like alcoholism. I am not sure if that is
true for me. I am not addicted to feeling the slice of or
the clean up afterwards. I cope the best way I know how. And yes I
know I may not make the right decisions at times, but all I can do is
try. Maybe I should be punishing the men who have hurt me in my past
instead of hurting myself.
           
As for today 3/3/07 and my ability to stop cutting as of now, yes things are different inside me then when I first started "life spots" and later "cutting" myself.  The main difference is that even though I went through many different types of abuse in my young life. I don't think I knew then what REAL physical PAIN felt like.  I knew what  it was like to be attacked by a dog, to be smacked around by a an adult, to break a bone, to be dropped away in a lake like a stone, all of these i knew before I turned Fourteen. And actually there had been many more horrors in my young life I suppose im lucky that i don't carry more scars (physical/emotional) than I do now.
                     
But now that I am in my late thirties i am well aware of what real physical pain can be, how "chronic" it can be and when it is chronic what it does to you and your loved ones.  That is if you're loved ones are willing to stick around through everything else they've survived already with you, only now to be told that you have RA and there is no cure for it but that they can help with the symptoms as long as you don't mind the side-effects.  Then there are 15 to 20 migraines your lover gets a month that you need to race home once in awhile when she's trapped at the grocery store's seafood Dept> and the Manager has called you again asking if the  "Blair-witch-Exorcist-wannabe" is gonna continue to scare his customers away with that moaning and screaming that is coming from me.  So of course one more loved-one is thinking.... "is she really the woman I want to spend eternity with??" Knowing she is, he scoops her up and takes her home.  We put up with so much, because we love our girlfriends, boyfriends, wives, and husbands.
                                                         
And this is where I am as well... married.... the past, there in the past.  Dealing with the future the best we can, together.  What that usually means though is that we have to meet each others Future- head-on.  I am no longer the independent person I use to be, no longer can i drive, no longer can i safely drive, mainly because of the medications i take but also because of the nerve damage in my spine running through my legs.  It makes me have to ask for help.  Something I hate to have to do, no longer can I fall and work on getting myself back up.  Now if I fall, trip and fall, sit on the toilet and cannot get back up afterwards; I will have to scream for Husband; send the Retriever for the husband.  Which she will seek and find then will pull him till he comes to find me.  She trained herself to do that. Good Doggy. I would be happy always to help husband anytime he needed me but i HATE it that i need HELP. That he has to dress me, bathe    me, shower me, wash me...  i feel like a child not a goddamn adult.
                                               
I have doctors telling me that I will never work again because logistically I am Human Resources nightmare, and in a right to work state like FL I wont work again.  And yet I was turned down the first time I applied for Disability.  They gave me 3 stupid reasons: 1. I was too young at 35  2. I have a college degree and therefore cannot be disabled with a college degree. 3. I sit on my butt all day at the last job (as cust serv rep) and therefor as long as i can sit all day long then as long as my "butt" aint broke then im not disabled.  I got a lawyer at that point and got even more documentation including seeing one of their own doctors (which the state of FL lost the dictation and his notes after they came back from some place in India for Translation.)  My Neurologist whom i see for the nerve damage and migraines agrees that i will not be able  to anywhere, my Rheumatoidologist agrees as well as my Pain Specialist agrees that it will be impossible for me to find work.  I cannot drive, operate heavy equipment, i cannot sit for long periods of time without m y butt getting numb after 15 minutes; my tailbone starts to PAIN me after about 12 minutes; my scitica starts to hurt usually back to front to toes in about 20 minutes, numbness spreads from waist down as to crosses my tailbone and over my sciatica I feel FIRE deep burning inside that I want to reach inside and scratch at but I cany seem to get to.  And I know there is NO cure for the sciatica torture I live with, they can go in and cut the scitica nerves in half then burn the ends.  But other people who have had this done had "nightmares" after this: recovery issues, surviving issues, living issues, nevertheless; this is not the answer for me.  Finding a way to deal with this is my next step. A step I need to deal with, without slicing open my own flesh...
                                             
And now let's jump back to 1998.  This is a small poem I wrote in February 1998 while I was putting my own personal www site together and when i created a page under my Survivor issues and joined the "Bodies Under Siege" Web Link for Others who self-harm to link up their websites, I wanted to be connected.  I did not want to be alone anymore.  Because I knew, finally, that there were indeed others LIKE ME, and I WAS NO LONGER ALONE!!!  I think the poem belongs here.  If i could add a song I would add the one I am listening to "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" from the  Remember the Titans Soundtrack sung by Marvin Gaye.

Blood red is the wetness
warm on my arm
cold on the soaked towel
Red as life
and cold as death....
2/25/1998 

These are my own words that I share with you now. I share them with you now because I know, personally, it will be very difficult for me and my family and friends.  But for others who may be living through something like this right now... someone close to you, a friend, a lover, a mate, a husband or wife, or yourself and you think you are alone.  YOU, ARE NOT ALONE!!!!  There are other's like us out there and they would be glad to talk with you or whomever.  In fact page me here, or at yahoo, through ICQ, or just shoot me an email and I would be glad to talk about how you feel or we can talk about the weather.  Your choice. 
                                   
Also I would like to make a suggestion for other "cutters" and lovers of horses.  There is a great Series of books called The Mode Series by Piers Anthony (Virtual Mode, Fractual Mode, Chaos Mode, and DoOon Mode).  Here is a man who understands and is sensitive to the nature of the teenage "cutter" and the why, what's, how's, and who's.  And when i was but a teenager living in GA and struggling with my own immortality I wrote him a few times.  Not ever thinking he would write me back, him being an important Author (me, being, a stupid, nothing of a girl who's life meant absolutely nothing) and in fact had told him of a date when it was about to really mean nothing.  And I was home and he called me, I hung up on him at first; thinking he was a prank caller.  But he called back determined, thank the Goddess that he did because he saved my life that day, sincerely.  Only, a few people truly know the real reason he called or the fact that he truly saved my life and that I once got to thank him in person.  I always think its good to meet your idols once in your lifetime.  I have met mine.  Don't forget to meet yours. Finally, I just want to say that there are days that I still want to cut but there are more days where its NOT the only thought i have anymore.  This is what has changed in my life.  The love from my husband and family and friends has helped with this.  It can help you two. 
~Blessed Be

****UPDATE: It is now Sept 2012: And since I last wrote this much has changed in my life. I am now divorced (happily so) an now living in NJ with a man I have been in love with since I was attending college. In fact he helped me see that I deserve better in life than to be a punching bag for my ex-husband. He gave me a voice for myself and I am as happy as I can be. The relationship I have with him is not monogamous because, I have been Polyamorous for the past 25+ years. Im in a poly relationship with him and his straight, monogamous girlfriend and WE ARE extremely happy.
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I have had a few slip UPS that had me cutting but for the most part in cut free.  However, this does not mean my life is pain-free, I deal with chronic pain everyday, every hour and every second of the day. But now it is a physical pain I stead of an emotional one. Perhaps this is why I cut less, don't really know.
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I am here for anyone who wishes to chat about anything but it might be better to email me at my ••(gmail)•• account. You can easily find me by following the clues left behind.
Thanks,
••elvenbeads••