Clueless

C14

TRIGGER WARNING 

Throughout the year, I had taken apart sharpeners to get the blade out because just scratching myself or snapping my skin with a rubber band wasn't giving me satisfaction anymore. I wanted to go bigger. I sat on my bed one night within that dreaded school year and stared at my palm that had a single razor blade resting in the center. I was aware of what I was about to do, 100%. I knew that it was going to hurt, I knew that if my family ever found out, it would hurt them. Especially since my sister, Britini, had done the same thing and a year previously, got over it. I knew what the consequences were, I just didn't care.

In my mind, they didn't care about me, they could all care less about how much pain I was in. I thought in their eyes, I mean nothing, because that's how I viewed myself. I viewed myself as worthless and a complete failure, not them. I put those thoughts in my head because I needed to make up a reason to do it. I didn't have a reason (not that there are any reasons to do it in the first place) to hurt myself, I just wanted to feel something because I hadn't felt anything in a long time.

I allowed my thoughts to get the best of me and silently cried in my room until I decided to make the first cut. At first, it felt like nothing, just a small paper cut on my arm, nothing insanely painful. Then it became a sick game. I tried to see how many cuts I could make before the pain was too much to handle, until I couldn't take it anymore.

After I reached that level, I put the razor down and just looked at my arm. The cuts weren't big enough for stitches, but they were enough to scar. The blood that trickled down my arm, in my mind, was like art. I thought it was beautiful, and maybe that's why I was so into it. I had followed accounts online that said that cutting is beautiful and I oh so desperately wanted to be beautiful.

The next day when I would go to school, I would evidently have to wear long sleeves for the obvious reason. The day after, it's always a hassle because your sleeves rub against the raw wounds from the previous nights and you would be uncomfortable the entire day, not that depression didn't already have that covered. Each time I mutilated my skin, I would gradually make more and more cuts just because the sadness was getting worse and worse and all I was doing about it was hurting myself.

The very first time I cut, the next morning my sister came in my room to wake me up and saw my arm. I could tell that she was mad, I could tell she was scared, I could see every emotion that she had going on from her tone of voice and facial expressions. She yanked me out of bed by the same arm that had been cut up the night before and told me to wait in the living room while she called my mom at work.

My mom got home within 10 minutes despite working 20 minutes from our house. I was pulled outside and forced to show her what I had done to myself in shame. The way the both of them reacted wasn't something I would encourage others to react like because it only made me more confused.

Although they were both angry with me for not telling them about my mental health, they were speaking more out of panic and it genuinely scared me. They were jerking me around and just asked me the same question over and over in an aggravated tone that grew more impatient each time they asked.

"Why?" As if I know.

Whenever I told them that I didn't know, they didn't believe me and asked again.

"Why?"

Did they not believe me? Or were they just spewing out words like a sprinkler? With each "why", I grew more panicked and anxious and it made me not want to answer even more.

"Why?"

If I knew, I would tell you. How can I tell you something that even I don't know? I don't know this feeling, I don't know how else to control it, I don't know what's wrong with me, I just don't know.

I was never taught how to deal with depression or what to do if I felt this way, no one took the time to tell me. Why are you taking it out on me? Yes, I cut myself, but it's my body. It's the same thing as a tattoo, painful and permanent.

At that time, I blamed them for adding to the stress. Their reaction helped me find ways to hide it better so that they wouldn't know what I was doing in the middle of the night. At the time I was longing for another reason to cut, I just wanted to fill the empty spaces with absurd apprehension and judgements.

If I hadn't gotten caught, would I have cut deeper the next night? If I had accidentally cut too deep, would I have bled out for one of my family members to find me the next morning? What would they have done? What if it were my little brother? Or Dennis? What would their reactions have consisted of?