MutilaTori Amos.... Here's the deal: I need, in less than an hour, feedback from anyone here (and I wager there are tons) that has ever cut or mutilated themselves. Tell me your reasons. Tell me your thoughts. You're going to be famous if you so request.
I recently suffered (and am still recovering) from an epic psychological break-down at work, where—among other symptoms—I became incredibly accident-prone; I've got scars all over me (symbolic, I muse). Does that count?
My friend Erik was in a band, they did this song, "I wanna cut myself". During the song he would slash himself up with a razor.
"Riply" Go on. I'll be featuring you in something I've been slaving over for 3 days now. Spidergoat: Relate anything that's got you unhappy, this very moment. There is always somehthing. Could be love, money, Trichomoniasis or worms. There's this tinkle of crystal I keep hearing where I'm smashing your face through glass.
Does over-exercising count? The physical effects are very very damaging. Reasons and thoughts? Wanted to escape debilitating thoughts of God by wearing myself out.
Greenberg, Sounds fitting. Now. Where have all the cutters gone? I bet there's a cutter forum somewhere... http://ehealthforum.com/health/forum228.html
Where to go on from here—that's the question. I'm being pulled in all directions, as I've been trying to deal with my "impregnation"—which all feels like Alien, hence my moniker. I could even have tried Rosemary's Baby as a moniker, since I'm still feeling quite possessed and unable to shake off the "disease". And the worst of it is that my subconscious mind has, or seems to have exploited the situation and is sending me these constant barrages of obscure messages—or is it... ? Madness. And like a scorpion's tail I wonder if I'm stinging myself. Or is it a battle of wills? And if I should so much as rest for a day and go vegetable, I'll fall in a spider's web or in quicksand. And the little love I had for mankind—which was always quite thin—is all but evaporated; my trust is utterly depleted.
i used to cut quite a bit. but i haven't in a little while. i was realy depressed a while back, suicidal really, and cutting just felt good. it helped me somehow. i dont know how, but it felt good to feel the pain physically that i was feeling emotionally. ive been through alot of bad things in my life, that had just left me mentally and emotinally drained and i felt dead inside. cutting helped me to feel something, i didnt care it was pain, it let me know i could still feel. i really cant put the way i felt into words, but i tried. its hard to describe
So the whole point of cutting is to feel something overwhelmingly powerful? Why must it be pain? Why not velvety peace? Or a mystical glee of enlightenment?
Sounds like NiN/Johnny Cash: "I hurt myself today. To see if I still feel. I focus on the pain. The only thing that's real." By the way, I only knew one cutter and I think she did it for attention. She was infatuated with the aesthetic of self-mutilation. She even made sure to cut a bingo grid on her wrist before the first time we met so as to present herself properly. Sure, she had other problems too, so it was a bit more complicated. But, attention is a lot of it, in my opinion.
Riply: Because that's what the magz say. See, Avril will be on Ryan Seacrest tonight uncertainly certain that she, like, totally cuts because she feels nothing. Never mind that the absolute feeling of nothing is death, yet that never occurs to them becuase the reasons for cutting are neatly thought out for them. If you truly felt nothing, you silly snot, you'd do nothing. I'm going back to its roots. I imagine the reason for it is varied at best, but fundamentally tied to a rage of some sort. Remember, for example, Oedipus gouging his eyes out. Btw- "And like a scorpion's tail I wonder if I'm stinging myself" I'm going to quote this in my work. Do you mind?
Hey, Just because it's depressing, doesn't mean that its not grotesquely fascinating. I know people that cut themselves, But i don't know why they do it. I'm more of a "stare into your own eyes until you fall over kinda guy"
Anger, release, care. If your life is blank and you have nobody to focus rage at but yourself, if there's nowhere especially interesting to go but to the uncertainty of pain - well, yeah. I don't think it's really a reaction to "feeling nothing." I haven't, know people who have. The magazines say it's borderline attention whoring, I'd agree for two of the three people that I "know who have."
Sure, girl one out of the three ransacked a bathroom last New Year's Eve, gashed her wrist and walked back through the living room bleeding because she was fighting with her date. Her arms have ridges from the keloid scars. Girl two never really went into details, but didn't have any visible marks. If she did anything out of authentic desire instead of a need to manipulate others I'd be surprised. Three I won't talk about, because he's close to me, but I don't think that can be ascribed to attention seeking.
Outer pain is a distraction from inner pain. Or attention seeking behaviour that's not life-threatening. Or sexually exciting.
