Short messages on Mental health, stress and anxiety issues from Respect Yourself, the guidance site for young people to help make good decisions in life.
Some may benefit from professional help for self-harm: this can be accessed through your GP, and Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service provision can be accessed through a referral by your GP, school nurse, or teacher.
An important step forward is making the decision to learn to live without self-harm, and being prepared to face underlying issues that may have caused the behaviour in the first place.
When you are feeling hurt, the proverb “This, too, shall pass” reminds us that all situations are temporary – good or bad – that change is inevitable, and that we can enjoy the good situations in life without the fear of losing them.
Some will be able to work through their self-harm issues by talking with friends and/or family. They may find it hard to understand; ask for help dealing with your emotions.
It is possible for all to learn to live without needing to self-harm. With the right support, understanding and motivation to get better, it is possible for everyone to recover.
Self-harming is usually an outward demonstration of an inner turmoil, trauma or crisis – a method of coping with difficult emotions.
Self-harm is usually conducted at times of anger, distress, fear, emotional worry, depression or low self-esteem in order to manage negative feelings that cannot be dealt with in a rational or logical way by the self-harmer.
Self-harm can be used as a form of self-punishment for something that the self-harmer has done, thinks they have done, are told by someone else that they have done, or that they have allowed to be done to themselves.
Self-harm is causing deliberate harm to your own body through physical abuse, for example cutting, burning, pulling hair, picking skin and deliberate bruising.
Whatever someone did to you in the past has no power over the present. Only you give it power.