Asperger's and Self-Injury

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My advice: Don't. Seriously, don't. It may work for seconds or minutes after the act; but it's addictive, it leaves marks, and it's not a good way of handling emotions. Take it from me (and I should know): It will make you more unhappy than you were before. I would suggest finding some way to "escape" instead... reading or movies or a special interest. Escaping isn't emotionally very healthy, either; but it's better than hurting yourself, since there is an extremely bad social stigma associated with self-injury, and this results in isolation and being even less able to seek help than before. (As I've said elsewhere on the site, my self-injury problem, combined with depression, caused me to be expelled from college and kicked out of my apartment--I'm back in college now, thankfully.) Naturally, the best idea is to find help and to attempt to deal with the underlying issues, whatever they may be.

when i get really mad with myself for being broken i often hit myself in the head really hard. it make me feel alot better. i also often find mysel scrating and when i get bit fall out of my head of skin and stuff where i have scated it off i hate it.

I also hate all the dead skin and i wish i could purge myself of it.

jammie

Pain is the awareness of life. It's as natural as breathing. Not only does superficial selfinjury allow me to get a high, stave off suicidal thoughts, and allay more serious thoughts of mutilation, it brings me closer to a greater state of awareness. People spend their lives fleeing from pain. I say embrace it.

I can't. I've tried it like you say but it didn't work. I was upset by this. What works for one doesn't work for all, unfortunately.

Only the Eleventh, renaeden. Only the Eleventh.

i agree, i self harm(to different degrees) but would never suggest anybody do it. I mean, i first self harmed at 13(1990ish) but i'd never heard of it before as it wasn't something in the media and no internet either. I was really low and i just had the urge to cut, so i took the blade from my pencil sharpener and cut my arm with it.
it's something that just would overtake me. Now i manage to stop myself mostly- though i still skin pick. The best thing i find is kicking cupboards!

Seriously? The blade from a pencil sharpener was what I used, the first time I used a blade... weird coincidence.

And I say... well, it probably does help you do all those things; but it's probably not the best way. Social stigma--scars all over you, and folk looking askance at you--mightn't matter as much to an Aspie as to most; but it exists. What you say almost sounds like some sort of masochism... not the sexual sort, but the sort where pain and pleasure in the brain are a bit mixed up; and pain actually triggers "feel good" chemicals as well as "stop doing that, it hurts" messages. I don't know; it's there to a small degree for me, too, or I wouldn't have ended up injuring myself in the first place.

If you insist on hurting yourself, be careful... keep things clean and make sure what you're doing isn't to the extent that you need medical care (both because that means it's dangerous, and because you'll probably end up in a psych ward for a week). Find safe ways--run five miles, or use a rubber band (like has been said earlier), or use something you know you can't hurt yourself badly with (i.e., a thumbtack instead of a razor blade). Be also aware that it is addictive; and you may find you "need" it to live life normally. Also be sure that any underlying issues--maybe like, with me, depression--are being dealt with; because self-injury simply isn't enough to deal with those sorts of serious things.

I used to do it a lot, though I haven't done it in years. It always happened during a meltdown.

I don't want to discuss the sort of meltdowns I have had, but I will say that self-injurious behavior was a part of it. And it was done for attention, mostly done with small cuts and burns. I would get so upset at what I've done, that I feel that the situation was way out of line and need to calm down others around me. Basically, I did it to try to get control of the situation. Turn people from a mad or angry state into people who were seriously concerned about what I was doing. And it happened always with people who were close to me. I was never suicidal, because I have such a fear of death. Suicide was never an option.

My best advice is to find someone you can trust and talk out your emotions and problems. That works for me quite a bit, but the person should be understanding. Also, try to work out the problem with a support group, if need be.

- Ray M -

MELTDOWNS ARE SCARY

Last edited by hyper_alien on 26 Apr 2006, 11:39 am, edited 3 times in total.

I used to do a bit of self injuring. It started when I had a bad day at school, cut myself with the granite of my pencil, then broke it and used the wood. After that, I occasionally used a bottle cap from a beer bottle to scratch myself. I stopped a few weeks ago, I do not truly know why I did it, but I did. Usually while I was depressed.

Yup. This usually calms me down.

A cold shower, or maybe banging on a drum set for a while usually stops me from injuring myself. In some cases though, I'm not really able to controll my behaviour.

I too have had many many issues with cuting, most of the time it seemed that i had no control over what i was doing.. especialy once i started to cut..... I have many scars now on my arms, I try not to do it any more.... I locked all my knives up in a safe.... yes every one in the house, and when it was really bad any and all sharp objects were locked up too, man that got anoying!

i gave the Key to a close friend of mine, who always helps me in anything i run into, including suicde, once i was stuck in the hospital for a week, then my family found out about everything.....

I am so ashamed of this too, for Like someone else who posted, I am a Christian, and I know that self injury is NOT glorifying to God, and I am trying the hardest i can to stop.....


another thing however i ran into last week was in the shower, turning it to the hotest that the water would go....(it is 130 degrees F) and I just let it burn my back.... for about 3 or 4 days my back was red.... it was burned like a sunburn.... it was bad....

True for me-I'd cut w/exacto knife, just enough to draw blood & cause physical pain. When I would get scratched by the cat, I disliked it but also found it grimly satisfying, to a lesser extent.

Makes sense to me, based on subjective experience & remembering well my thinking back then. Suppose it works to "trick" oneself into another mood/mode. Not recommending it, of course-but I can see how it's not the same for every individual. I did want to feel valued by others, but cutting didn't really improve that situation.

Well put. I didn't have to escalate & cut worse to get the minimal mental relief that it provided. I had meager resources, things were really bad back then. Haven't found self-harm addictive personally. Negative thinking/bad feelings about self linger, been unable to break that longer-standing "habit".
Have wanted to die-just never enough to dare. Too scared to die, but life feels too awful so often. Lack better ways to react, other than to get way too upset/mad/sad. Smoke a lot more, now that I quit cutting-if it's not one thing, it's another. Opinions vary about that trade-off, but it was my decision.
Many years later, I finally have regular counseling and an AS dx, life is better in general. Urges to self-harm are diverted to alternatives that bother me less. Like: Screaming into a pillow. Running hands under very hot/cold water (washing dishes, if not too trembly to keep from breaking things), holding something frozen, or taking a shower. Breaking down cardboard boxes which need to be flattened for recycling (gets aggression out, plus one might get cut on cardboard by accident anyway). Taking nap in afternoon & waking up to view of stars out the window (before turning on indoor lights). Watching lights of cars & trucks that pass by. Petting the cat, even if it wakes her up. I loathe exercise, so it's a challenge to find activities that function for my personality.

I started self harming autumn last lear, because I'd been trying too hard to socialise and make progress. I either get depressed from being stuck at home all the time, feeling like I'm going nowhere, or when I'm around people and they're doing all these relationship kind of things that I have no luck with.

I'm depressed because I have bad anxiety in social situations (because of some very bad experiences in the past), and feel I'm years behind most people. I want to have a relationship, to have kids, and be a father to them, and have somewhere to focus my energy that isn't entirely selfish.

Pretty soon after I'd started my mum got in touch with the local psychology department on my behalf, hoping to get some kind of counselling or therapy.

For the next 6 months the NHS passed me round departments - getting my hopes up, then failing me again - no-one would consider me because they don't have a clue about ASDs.

So I kept self harming, things gradually getting worse. I'd tell myself 'I feel worse than I did last time so I'm going to do 6 cuts instead of 5' and then I'd do 8, because I still felt bad after doing 6.

One time I felt so bad after cutting that I held my arm up against the wall and punched it a few times. I heard it crack. Luckily it was only a hairline fracture, not something that needed the bone to be set and put in a cast (No way was I going near a hospital with all those cuts on my arm), but it was swolen and hurt if I moved my fingers much, so I couldn't use the arm for a couple of weeks, and had it in a sling.

Mum's been great, and her complaining has finally got someone off their arse. Still waiting for an apointment though. I did go for an assesment with Relate though, who I'd definately recommend, as they've all had training specific to aspergers syndrome. The only thing is, as a charity, their sessions cost them £40 a go, so they ask for a donation. I can't really afford that, so I'm waiting to see what the NHS comes up with.

I've not harmed in the last month, and I've been 'coming off it' for the last 3, but that's because the Relate assessment let me get a lot off my chest (even though it wasn't actual counselling), I've got better at spotting and avoiding things that trigger a major depression (probably an aspie thing where focusing on the thing that makes you depressed is all too easy), and I've had a bit of luck picking up a couple of tricks for conversations, thanks to spending a couple of weeks in understanding company. I feel kind of low, but that's more because I want to be back around people and making progress, instead of because of lack of progress.



At the beginning self harming can be the only thing that keeps suicidal thoughts from going too far. The first couple of times the release it gives you is amazing, and you feel calm and untroubled shortly after cutting (probably because of the endorphins released to counter the pain do the same thing as heroin), but then you get frustrated that it doesn't work later on, and you start to make a real mess. It's worth learning (not just learning of) other coping strategies earlier on when you're depressed, and finding help as soon as possible, considering it can take months for help to actually be available. Just having someone around to talk to can make a lot of difference, so it's worth making the effort to find someone early on. There are people who will willingly help. Because it makes them feel useful you won't be a burden to them.

http://www.recoveryourlife.com/
http://www.relate.org.uk/