Psyke.org

Katie

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Copyright Katie

Hi my name is Katie and I am thirteen years old. I have cut myself fifty-eight times and I have stopped for about three months now I am really happy and I’m free of the pain that I have caused everybody. There have been plenty of reasons that I would cut myself over. I have gotten caught three times by my mother and father if they would have let me go on cutting myself I would be. If I could find out some way that I could without anyone knowing I would but I can’t even though I really want to. I mean I really liked to do it I wish my parents didn’t care about it. I want to still do it even though I have been caught.

Deep Within the Void

Copyright Katie

I was twelve years old when it all happened. I came home one day, after spending the weekend with my dad. My mom and stepdad were upstairs, waiting for me. Mom called me into their bedroom. ‘I have something to tell you, Katie.’ I had a feeling it was about Brett. The previous Friday, I overheard he was in a coma from drug overdose. ‘It’s about Brett.’ In my mind, I prayed that he had woken up. ‘He’s… dead.’ My best friend in the entire world had just died from suicide. I couldn’t think. I could hardly breathe. He couldn’t be gone.

Around two or three months later, I had reached the depression stage of coping with a death. I had just finished watching that episode of Degrassi when Elli cuts herself. I had been thinking about self-injury for the longest time, but never got the courage to actually do it. Until now. I reached for a pair of ‘safe’ children’s scissors and raced it across my arm. Little blood came, but I felt the pain. It felt so warm, so sweet. I couldn’t take enough of it. Over the weekend, I had created over twenty new scars. It was an addiction. But I knew what I was doing was wrong. I was pretty careless when it came to hiding the new wounds. Mom soon found out. The next day, Monday, I was scheduled to see my counsellor. Apparently, mom had called her without my knowlege. I told her everything. Didn’t show, but told. She made me throw away my scissors.

I had pretty much stopped since then. That was until I broke up with my girlfriend. It was a rough moment. I had found a razorblade in the house a few weeks earlier, but this was the first I’d ever really used it. I jammed the tip of the blad into my arm and dragged it across the surface. I had to use my mother’s washcloth to keep the blood from getting onto the carpet. I felt so relieved. The deepest cut I’d ever made. I’m just sorry I wasted that sensation on her. She wasn’t worth any of my time.

As time went on, I began to make minor cuts on my shoulders, stomach and thighs. The past couple of weeks have been the worst of those. But nothing too serious.

But, as I see some of my friends and some of the pictures on this site, I compare my scars to some of the others. I feel pathetic for even trying. I feel like some wannabe cutter. I feel like I’m just doing it for attention. But, the truth id, I’m not. But I can’t help feel that way. I want to cut deeper, but my skin is too sensative. I hate it. I hate this. I feel like I will forever be stuck in this pit. At the age of forty, I’ll still have that razorbladee hidden in the battery place in my Gameboy. This is who I am. This is how I’ll stay…

My Story

Copyright Katie

Cutting was an enormous part of my life when I was in junior high. I did it to make the mental pain stop by creating physical. I thought it would fix everything that was going on in my life at that moment. I never cut too deep, just made the cuts deep enough so they would sting and bleed. I loved it, and I always did so well to hide it from my parents and my friends until one night my best friend saw me picking at the scabs from my last binge. He didn’t freak out; he didn’t scream at me, he just had this sad look in his eye that made me want to stop. But of course, I didn’t for him. But then one day my dad saw a few of the cuts, and the fact that I had to lie to him and hide the fact that I was so depressed I was mutilating my arms, made me stop that day. I still miss it, still want to drag that razor over my arm when I have a really low day, but I can’t. I still find myself picking at my arms, or my legs, wanting them to bleed and have that pain that made everything else not matter but it’s not enough. I’ve become addicted to tattoos and piercing. Which I have found is a much better way of getting a pain fix. Get tattoos, they can express your rage, depression, and even happiness, all of your emotions. Cutting just isn’t the way, because some way or another, you’re hurting a lot more than just yourself.

Self Injury

Copyright, Katie

The cuts are healing. I guess it is time to make more. There’s a lot of talk about punishment and not deserving to be OK on the inside. I guess that is a fairly common trait among us who self injure. Where does it come from? Is it our abusers who have taught us it is our fault and therefore deserve to be punished? Is it our inappropriate guilt feelings? Our drive for perfection? Our need to feel something? Our pain for what was done to us? I think the answer lies in all of the above. Is this what I should be pondering on my birthday? No, but here we are anyway. 9:30 a.m. is a bad time to be thinking these thoughts. It means we must fight them all day and into the night until we can cut. Alone. Secretly, in our shame and guilt to live another day. Is this any way to run a life? No. But it is all that we have at the moment. Endless days and nights of cutting, regretting and feeling shame.

We just have to do what we have to do until we don’t have to do it anymore. I think I want that engraved somewhere as my legacy to self injurers. It’s not permission, just the way it is. As Shakespeare once wrote, “To thine own self be true.” I guess that’s what we’re doing. Being true to our feelings or lack thereof is very important. No one but someone else who is going through it can truly understand. And I pray to God they never do. Because to truly understand you must have walked the fires of Hell and seen the face of the devil. I wish that for no one.

I guess if I could have one wish fulfilled on this, my birthday, it would be that not one more person ever would have to live with abuse, would never be abused, would not even know what abuse is. I want the suffering to stop, now! But I know it will not happen. Man’s injustices to man has been a thread woven into the tapestry of our history since Cain and Abel.

Long time! It won’t be stopped overnight, nor will it go away until it is what we all want. Every man, woman and child must actively work for the end of abuse in all its forms. We can do it. We have changed the course of our society and history before. It takes a lifelong commitment to a cause. A cause that states it is for the good of all and the harm of none. Do I think it will happen? Yes. Some day. I hope I’m around to see it. Until then I will keep fighting my own private war to put an end to abuse. It’ll catch on, someday. And when it does, no one will be able to extinguish the brushfire it will create.

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Copyright, Katie

I’ve been cutting for three years now. When I was eleven, my step brother raped me several times. My mother was an alcoholic and took off and later died of kidney failure. I now live with my grandparents who give me hell every day. I only cut with razors. One time I cut, and it wouldn’t stop bleeding. I was rushed to a hospital and almost died. I found that cutting on my arm is the only reasonable place to do it. I also abuse many substances. I’ve done heroin, pot, ecstasy, and coke. I find that cutting is my only release, I cut to see that I’m still alive. I also cut to vent anger. I’m also a schizophrenic. I’ve been prescribed many medications, those of which I also abuse. I usually do fifteen cuts at a time. And I usually slash my arm instead of dragging the razor. Cutting is my only way out of reality.

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Copyright, Katie

I was washing dishes. That was always my responsibility — wash and dry and put away all the dishes. And I did it faithfully. Every night. Sometimes, it didn’t even bother me all that much. But one night… I had so much on my mind. I had just gone from a very emotional “high”, to an extremely emotional “low”. I was hurting inside — a lot. I had never really experienced hurt like this. Or to this extent.

I was washing the very large, very sharp and shiny butcher’s knife that we still have hanging in my kitchen. I have painful memories every time I see it now. I was washing it carefully… intentionally… like I was preparing it for something. It was the last thing I had to wash for the evening. I looked down at my wrist, and I just felt this… this need. Like I had to put that knife there, and I had to slide it across my skin. I can still remember exactly how it felt. Like it burned and itched at the same time. I wore long sleeves for a day or two. I figured it would heal up, and then I would never have to think about it again. Just my luck — a friend saw it. We were at an audition for a play. I reached out to grab something from her hand, and out came my wrist. She saw my cuts. There were five of them. Long, and straight. She was surprised, and scared. She grabbed my arm and asked me what happened. I told her “nothing” and that I was fine. She didn’t believe me.

She told a couple of my other friends. I really didn’t care. It didn’t matter to me — I knew they wouldn’t tell any teachers. So it was fine. That night, my mom found them though. She freaked out on me — I tried to tell her I fell off my bike. The next few days were hell though. She cried, and I cried. She accused me of attempting suicide. I tried to tell her it wasn’t true. And then she told me next time she would send me to counselling. She found them one more time. But she never kept her threat. I suffered through the rest of middle school — my self mutilation progressed to other things, like an eating disorder. And I started to take pills. A lot of them. Any thing that could make me hurt, and I would do it. I stopped for a few months — it was during the summer. I was isolated enough from people that I didn’t have to think about them.

I started high school this year. There have been a lot of things happening in my life — some relationships that ended up very badly, and some situations that made me feel as if I had compromised my self worth. So I’ve still got a problem with self mutilation. I used to consider suicide, but I don’t anymore. I can’t take that idea seriously. I mean, there are a lot of things in life that I can look forward to. Self mutilation may help me get through life right now, but I’m sure there will be a point when I will no longer need it. Thanks for listening to my story.

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Copyright, Katie

Soon I have to face life without cutting… It sucks! I’m the youngest one in my family. My big sister is like so perfect; at least in my parents’ eyes. School has never been my thing I’d say. I’m more artistic but my mum can’t accept that; she wants me to be just like my sister, but I’m not her.

My parents got divorced 4 years ago when I was turning 11. After that I never saw my dad again and mum got a new boyfriend. So I had to live with my sister, mum and that stranger. In a year mum’s boyfriend started molesting me and when I finally got enough courage and told him that I’m gonna call cops or something he beat me up really badly. So after that episode I kept my mouth shut and bottled my pain inside.

I was really good at it though it was really rough. I was hurting but no one noticed. The year went by and as I turned 13 I found myself in the same situation as I was a year before. But now I was a bit older and I started to act out. I became a nightmare as mum used to call me. I was hurting so bad but I didn’t know how to express myself and my feelings. I was just so angry all the time. So one night I went to the kitchen, took a big knife and started cutting myself. I couldn’t believe how good it felt. It made the pain inside of me go away and I didn’t have to think about it. I started to cut myself every night.

Then after 6 months my mum noticed my arms and I thought that now she will send me to a mental hospital or something but that didn’t happen. Not even close. All mum said was: “Don’t be ridiculous, you’re just seeking attention, why can’t you be more like your sister so I wouldn’t have to be so ashamed for you all the time.” That night I went to a party and some guys there offered me drugs and I took everything they gave me. There and then I found a new escape for all my problems.

I discovered that the only time I didn’t have to think about my troubles was when I was high. I loved it; that I didn’t have to feel the pain. So I started to get high every day. At the end of the year I was using coke and crack and marijuana; I quit cheerleading and cut classes. Every night I sat in the corner of my room and slit my wrists. When I was turning 15 I ran away because I wasn’t gonna be molested anymore. But in a month I got caught for shoplifting and mum forced me back home. But I couldn’t live there anymore. Too many bad memories.

So I ran away again and this time I learnt other ways to make money. While I was gone dad had come to check how me and my sister are doing but mum just told him that I had ran away again that I was such a headache. Dad got really upset and went looking for me. After a few days he found me. I was on drugs (almost OD’d), really skinny and pale. I was really messed up so dad took me to the hospital and guess what… Oh yes! Of course those stupid doctors had to notice my hands that were full of scars, some of them still bleeding.

I knew that I had no choice but to tell my dad what was going on at home. There and then he decided to put me in to a wilderness therapy school for troubled teens. So I went but I guess I wasn’t ready to be helped. I couldn’t help them to help me because I thought I didn’t need help. So I begged dad to take me to live with him and he did. For a while everything was going OK actually, but then I don’t know what happened. All the memories rushed back even though I was living far away from mum and her boyfriend. I started cutting again but my dad had no idea, until a few days ago when he came home from work and found me.

I had been taken coke and smoking marijuana and I had slit my wrists and there was blood all over the place. He didn’t understand why but cutting is my comfort when I can’t deal with things.

Anyways now I’m heading back to that school for troubled teens. I so don’t wanna go because I know that I won’t be able to cut myself there. And that’s what’s scaring the hell out of me. But I guess it’s for the best. I hope!

Katie

Copyright, Katie

Cutting feels good to me. I don’t know how I could stop. People who love me have tried threatening me in every way to get me to stop. My boyfriend cried and begged me to stop and said he had enough and the only thing he thought would work is to say next time I did it he wouldn’t talk to me. That didn’t work. Since then I have been hiding my arms from everyone. Whenever someone sees it they tend to look down upon me and I hate it but I go home and do it again. Over the last couple of weeks I stopped but about a week or two ago I scratched then last night I did a deep cut. I cut because I know it’s not going to kill me. It’s something to put upon myself. I used to take Tylenol and Aspirin etc. but I didn’t see the effects of that. I like seeing direct effects like my blood. It sounds really creepy and sick but it’s the truth. If any one wants to talk just email me alright?

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Copyright, Katie

I’ve been cutting for over a year now. I’m 15, generally thought of as happy, bubbly, funny and “a right laugh” by others. But when I forgot to wear a long sleeved top in p.e. everyone saw my secret. Long, deep cuts running all up my arms and on my wrists. It’s horrible, as I’m shure a lot of you will know, the feeling of disgust in yourself when you see the people’s reactions and the looks on their faces. I soon became an “outcast”, “loner” and a “social misfit”. I got called a freak a lot, and people just didn’t understand me.

But then I met Mandy (name changed for personal reasons) and I knew I was not alone in this. She self-harms too. So when were stressed we cut and burn ourselves. Sometimes together, sometimes alone.

It’s nice to have someone understand you and to know what you’re going through. I have a lot more friends now (33 I can count off the top of my head) and people have accepted me, but I keep to myself and don’t show my scars off.

If you’ve bothered to read this, then thanks. I know it’s boring but I just wanted to tell you. Remember, don’t feel ashamed of SI, it’s those ignorant c**** who should be ashamed. You’re no defferent to anybody else and you’re much more special.

 

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