Psyke.org

Caitlin

Born to a Childproof World

Copyright, Caitlin

Since my whole ordeal with self injury, the only thing I can see left to do with it, is help people. I’m done with it. I have been for — let me think — eight months now. I have been doing a lot of thinking, about who, what, when, where and why kind of stuff. The first time I remember actually self injuring, was in 5th grade. On November 30th 1999 my friend killed herself at school. Still to this day, I can hear the fatal gun shot going off. That’s when I started breaking my toes, mostly to get out of school. I didn’t want to be there after that. And I did that for a while, once they started healing, I would just do it again. (Something I regret very much.) Then I moved. From New York to Utah. A big move, but not in the ways most people would think. It was a culture shock. I lived in upstate New York, small towns. Salt Lake City, is a rather large city to live in. People-wise at least. And it was different. I was different, the kids were different. Everything was. I was chubby when I moved (in 6th grade) and no one there was. That’s when I began to starve myself. By 7th grade, the kids I was starving myself to fit in with weren’t hanging out with me anymore. But I was addicted to not eating. So I continued. And that’s when I picked up drinking. Not alcohol though, anything that could cause any harm to my body. Not to kill myself, just to… I don’t know actually. It started with nail polish remover, that was horrible, and random things like that. Then my first suicide attempt was drinking gasoline. Which, I just threw up, for a week or so. It was white, it was gross. And definitely not a good idea. I think because my body reacted too quickly to get it out, no real bad damage was done. I lost my voice for a while, and it was bloody. But now, four years later, I am doing fine from that. Then 8th grade came around, and that was the first time I cut. I was at the library; I had the ‘HIV’ smiley, which Jonathan Davis had tattooed, on my wrist. And one of my friends told me ‘hey, that would look cooler in blood’. so right then and there I grabbed my giant safety pin and started scratching away, when it was bleeding I stopped. And was utterly satisfied. And from then on I did what I could to cut. Soon after that, my uncle killed himself. And that put our whole family in shock. I began dreaming of death, and of how people would react if I died. More cutting. 9th grade, I hit rock bottom. I had a friend, who killed herself at school on January 27, 2003. And that was totally unbearable to deal with. And I snapped completely. A month later I was in a psych ward at Primary Children’s Hospital. That started my odyssey to mental health. Two weeks later I was transferred to Wasatch Canyons, a private hospital for psychiatric and drug related problems. I was there from March to July. I can’t say much about that stay, because I was really sick, mentally and physically and on a lot of medication. I was 5’10” and I weighed 115 lbs. when I was sent to the state, I was the same height and weighed 186 lbs. Two months I gained a lot of weight. And I was even more unhappy. During my stay at Wasatch Canyons though, I do remember some things. I had three serious suicide attempts and countless amounts of other things. That’s where my addiction to self harm really came in. I was cutting everyday every chance I got. When I woke up, during lunch, in the bathroom during class, before I went to bed etc. As much as I could fit in. I started pulling my hair out, and giving myself bloody noses, then I started to bruise myself with my rock named ‘Henry’, when I gained all my weight I was really upset, so I stabbed myself twice in the stomach with a screw driver hoping the fat would fall out. It didn’t. At the end of April I had my first serious attempt during treatment. I cut myself worse than I ever have. And was sent to the emergency room to receive stitches. Then another week long stay at Primary Children’s. When I returned to Wasatch I was pretty pissed off. So I did what I could. About a month later in June I made a noose out of hemp and wire for making bracelet’s and attempted to use the sprinkler system for fires to hang myself. It broke. And I was hoping if it broke, that the wire would slit my throat. It dug in, but alas, did not work. So in my last serious attempt I took forty-five 100mg tablets of Trazedone and ten 15mg tablets of Zyprexa. My roommate saved my life, she shoved her fingers down my throat and I threw up everything. The next few days I couldn’t walk, talk or even really think. Another trip to the emergency room. After that my therapist was sick of me. And transferred me to the Utah State Hospital. My stay there was brief considering most of people are there for a year or more. I was there from July to November. They told me they didn’t know how to treat borderline personality disorder so they wanted me to go out of state. But my parents wouldn’t allow it. So they sent me back to Wasatch Canyons because they did DBT exercises. Around this time, the last time I cut was September and I started again in November. Then I was released February 1st. And I was doing well. They threw me back into public school (the school my friend killed herself at) and it was really difficult. Between February and April I was baptised to the LDS religion, and doing better. But breaking down a lot. So I went back to Wasatch Canyons in day treatment for the remainder of my 10th grade school year. So now I am here, five months out of treatment. Nine months out of self harm of any sort. I have been on every anti-depressant except Prozac and every anti-psychotic except Risperdal. Bad withdrawals from not cutting. And I am seriously depressed. But… happier… I am holding on. I am getting through day to day to day. It’s not always so bad. A lot of stuff happened for me to get here. But I got here. I am free. And I want to stay that way. I don’t want to be a slave to medication anymore. And I’m not. I don’t want to be a slave to therapists anymore, and I’m not. But most of all I don’t want to be a slave to my memories anymore… I am still working on that…

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Copyright, Caitlin

My name is Caitlin and I have actually stopped cutting for about 3 months. I started cutting when I was in 6th grade. I am now in eighth grade. I was abandoned by my father about a year ago. He said he didn’t want to be my father anymore. I got into a lot of drugs and cutting was my way out. I have approximately 90-120 scars on my body. I quit for my mom who now might have cancer. My biggest fear is losing my mom. If she dies from cancer I will never be the same again. I hope every cutter out there knows that even in the hardest of times you should talk to someone you trust about it and I promise you will get help.

 

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