I remember the day I first cut myself. I was in 7th grade and had just gotten hit by a boy in my class. I had seen people on Instagram cut themselves, since some post it all over social media, and I had never heard of the idea of cutting myself until then. I thought it would be a good way to release all the pain I felt from being bullied so much, all the pain I felt from feeling ugly and fat and worthless.
In the middle of my 8th grade year, my parents discovered my scars. I had been using some of the knives from the kitchen, so they had to hide them from me (even to this day I'm not allowed to touch them).
I was clean for about two or three months, and then I relapsed. This time, it got worse. I found blades; I would break apart pencil sharpeners or steal them from my dad's workbench. I kept them in my wallet with me at all times. I even cut myself during class once.
I'd have to say my freshman year was one of the worst years of my life. All I could think about was cutting myself, I was addicted to the way it made me feel and loved how I would feel released every time I did it. I had never felt more free, able to express myself, and important than I did when I cut myself. I felt that if I could make myself hurt, it would stop others from being disappointed in me. Only that didn't happen, people were still disappointed, I was still disappointed. I began to look to drugs for relief; the first time I ever got high I was 13 and it was off cough medicine. After that, I would sniff sharpies or laundry detergent. Then things got even worse, I began to steal my mom's prescription drugs. The first time I OD didn't "succeed" as I would have called it at the time, I ended up just throwing up everything in my system and everything not in my system. I ended up staying home for days on end because my body was dying from everything I was doing to it. I had lost 20-30 pounds. I didn't sleep at night. Everything was crashing down all around me.
Then my parents found out again.
At the time, this was what I considered to be the worse thing that could happen. I didn't want my "love" to be taken from me. I didn't want to loose my release. I didn't see that I was hurting not only myself but everyone around me by what I was doing. I didn't know it but several of my friends started cutting because of me. That only made me feel more responsible and drove me to the point where my third attempt of suicide almost actually did kill me.
I had to leave the school I was at and go homeschooling while I recovered. And now I've been clean for a whole year now.
It takes determination, sticktoitness and obedience to get clean from this. If you really want to be clean, then you will be clean. :) keep fighting, don't give in. Your life is worth more than you think. Don't learn this the hard way, learn it now. Forgive all those who hurt you and forgive yourself, because that truly is the only way you can move on successfully with your life.
