The Hurt I Thought I Could Control

Cutting myself was never supposed to happen. It was never supposed to control me or take away areas of my life I didn't know I would later need. It served as flesh and blood toned bandages on wounds my heart couldn't comprehend.

Hurting myself started when I was nine. But it didn't start with knives or razors. It started in a fit of rage, so desperately needing to hurt something. But I couldn't hurt anyone else. So, I threw my head back and with all the force I could, I slammed it into the metal post of my bunk beds. I wasn't nearly as overwhelmed by the stars floating in my eyes as I was the feeling of relief exhaling out of me. At last I had erupted the full might of the searing anger and hot apathy that had been carried in my soul. It was liberating. I had gotten away with letting out frustration without hurting another person or getting in trouble for feelings I was taught were wrong.

At nine years old, I wasn’t just walking on egg shells, I had grown up on them. Any slight infraction could set off a father whose mental disease I still cannot fully diagnose. The confusing disparity of a mother whose overflow of love allowed her husband’s mental games, made it clear I wasn’t someone worthy of proper defense.

Let’s talk about the word “bullied” for a moment. The word does not do justice to the pain it causes. To this day I can’t toss aside the mocking inflections and scrunched up false boo-boo lips that accompanied the whining falsetto of the unsympathetic and gaslighting listener. To be bullied, and then be teased for being bullied by someone else is the epitome of injustice the average bullied victim must go through. So, my anger grew. When I finally couldn’t control the bullying, I tore into my own flesh, because that was something I could control.

And my self-loathing caused an apathy for myself no number of tears could force to matter. “It doesn’t matter” isn’t something I just said. I once sliced those words into my arms when I was thirteen. When you feel you don’t matter to others, you need to matter to yourself, but I could not master this concept.

Over the years I thought if I could just accomplish certain things, if I could find my niche, or a place to belong, maybe then I could stop. Rather than deal with my issues, I chose the easy way out and allowed the self-harm to steal things I was meant to do because in the back of my mind I wasn’t even good enough to do the things I was good at. I was asked to be a singer in a youth band, but I had to stop because no amount of being told my voice rivaled Amy Lee’s could make me see my worth. I loved performing and I loved challenging my voice, but I quit the band and I quit music. Even listening. What had once fed me and kept me going, I refused to hear.

I thought if I could meet a man who would care about me, a man who wouldn’t belittle me, but hold me, then I would stop cutting. But I met a man, a good man, a man who believes I’m beautiful when I know I’m not, and I’ve been married to him for ten years, but that didn’t make me stop. Nothing I could do or accomplish could make me feel like I mattered or was loved enough to matter to myself.

I was 25 when I finally quit. My little boys were growing up with a mommy vacant of real joy, because life hadn’t dealt me a hand I hoped for. But that wasn’t their fault. And unless I wanted to repeat the upbringing I was given, something needed to change. Then a stranger who knew nothing of my life spoke to my soul one night, “Go home and show your babies that God loves their mommy.” The confirmation for my heart that anything I ever did, if not for me, must be done for my babies struck the part of a good mother’s heart that beats only for her children.

Why do people choose to hurt themselves when others do it so much better? It isn’t for attention. Please don’t ever assume that. In the fifteen years I self-harmed, only four people ever found out. It wasn’t for attention. It’s just that self-hatred is such an easy thing to possess. We look to other people for a perfect kind of love, as If a perfect love from an imperfect person can give us our worth. But how can an imperfect person ever do anything perfectly? We can’t. Therefore, our parent’s lack of perfect (or any other kind) of love can never be what we rest our self-worth upon. Sometimes, no matter how much we hate to be bullied, we bully ourselves… Self-harm doesn’t just take on physical attributes. What do we think of ourselves? What’s our opinion of the people we are? Do you bully yourself? Answer these questions and see…

1. Do you make fun of yourself? if everyone’s laughing, this may not be such a bad thing, but if you’re mercilessly picking on yourself, well. STOP.
2. Do you criticize the way you look and behave? Do you think your ugly? Fat? Stupid? Untalented?
3. Do you belittle yourself when you make mistakes? If yes, give yourself some grace.
4. Are you angry at yourself, but you’re not sure why? Maybe you’ve done some stupid things in your life. That’s okay, everyone has. Some of us just got away with it better.
5. Do you want to hurt yourself? Be honest. Do you? If so, that’s okay too.

Every day you can overcome one of these mental or physical battles is one more day you can change the space around you. Maybe you won’t change the world, but if you allow your own self harm to control you, how will you ever know what you could have accomplished?

As for me, I haven’t cut myself for five years. The scars are almost all gone, and I can change the lives around me by looking into their pain, empathizing with them and reassuring them they can get through it too because I did. One day at a time.