Hiromi_X
"I wish I had an Emo lawn..."
News has reached me underneath my rock that it's fashionable to make jokes about cutting as an affectation of self-loathing teenage suburbanites. I'm sure people who tell such jokes do so because they believe they are throwing rocks at self-indulgent poseurs, but I think it's more than that. Who are the ones who tend to cut themselves? Young women and girls. I don't see anything funny in what I perceive as a general tendency to trivialize and devalue the things that young women and girls go through. More significantly, I still have the scars from when I used to do that myself. It annoys me to hear cutting dismissed as empty-headed and melodramatic self-indulgence. I mentioned cutting in previous posts; I will elaborate on my story to counter this scornful trend somewhat.
It was something I did when my usual depression dipped toward suicidal ideation. I first started in my early twenties. Alcohol was involved in my rape. My attackers kept pushing drinks into my hand until I began to waver in and out of consciousness. Off and on in the years afterward, I tried to stop drinking. But when I was unable to stop, I felt worthless. I felt that I was born with something broken and deformed inside, and that made people abuse me. I couldn't get at my deformed and broken essence; that was invisible and incorporeal. However, I could get at it indirectly by destroying its container.
I stopped cutting during my mid-twenties, but started again last spring as the toxic secrets I had accumulated over the years began to overspill their internal bounds. At that time, the cutting episodes were preludes to my attempted suicide. I spent a lot of time doing two things that would erase my presence from the earth: I did a lot of research on suicide methods to find the cleanest, quickest, and most effective ones, and I hacked away at myself bit by bit until the timing was right to destroy myself in one fell swoop. I remember feeling a sense of exhilaration late one night as I went out to buy a packet of double edged razors. I couldn't wait to see the blood flow.
After I survived my overdose, I looked at the tangle of angry red slashes and purple half-healed welts on my body and felt complete shame at what I had done. Someone told me about scar-reducing products that you could get in drugstores, and I used these for a couple of months until the scars faded to fine white lines. I'm still afraid of what people would say if they see these scars. Given my methodical nature, many of the cuts appear in orderly right angles to each other. They have an unmistakably deliberate look.
I have permanent reminders of my insanity engraved into my body. I wonder where the comedic potential is in that. When I express fear of what others might think, I am encouraged to dismiss condemnation as ignorance and stupidity. "Fuck 'em." I fully agree with the logic behind this sentiment, and I advise others who express similar concerns to do the same. But given the number and variety of my crazinesses, how many people am I going to have to write off? How many times am I going to have to say, "Fuck 'em"? It does not feel good to come to like someone, and, should that person prove judgmental, be forced into the position of writing him or her off.
Comments
I have this fantasy of living a life without shame. It's just a fantasy. I can consciously confront my own life and say to myself, "Self, this is who you are and it is rich and good and true." But the rest of me may not hear it. Certainly the other may not hear or care and heap their scorn upon me, or said pathology.
I have thought perhaps living a life that is open might in its nature filter away those who who would refuse kindness and empathy. This is not so.
My ideal of a life without shame is a fantasy; like porn. A retreat from reality. But like most porn, it's not really how things work.
That said, reality is currently very painful right now so I am off to do some heavy reading at literotica.com.
That's my rockin' Friday night.
1. Posted by pinkpantyboy on October 19, 2007
My ideal of a life without shame is a fantasy; like porn. A retreat from reality. But like most porn, it's not really how things work.
No! I won't listen to this kind of thing from other people.
I have this fantasy of living a life without shame. It's just a fantasy. I can consciously confront my own life and say to myself, "Self, this is who you are and it is rich and good and true." But the rest of me may not hear it. Certainly the other may not hear or care and heap their scorn upon me, or said pathology.
Okay, we'll shout together -- "FUCK 'EM." I figure, if enough people yell loudly enough in sync, then it won't just be a fantasy. And hell, even if it is just a fantasy, live the motherfucker.
2. Posted by Hiromi on October 19, 2007
It does not feel good to come to like someone, and, should that person prove judgmental, be forced into the position of writing him or her off.
Nope. Not fun at all. And comedic potential is limited.
The way I've come to look at it is that there is, at any given time, a limited number of people that I care what they think of me. Anyone else, if they got a problem... Yeah... Fuck 'em. And you can always do the trick my gramma taught me. Look 'em dead in the eye and say how rude they are. Just that. No need to elaborate. It's one of the 'female' bonuses. Works best in groups of 3 or more, but will work in one-on-one.
3. Posted by Darkneuro on October 20, 2007
I've been known to cut too, less so in my adult years but still now and then. I think there's more dysfunctional people than not, so I really want to know where the judgmental people get off being judgmental, when undoubtedly they have their own dysfunctions.
However, I find that in opening up to people, while there are judgmental prats out there, most people will have something in their life that they can relate to it. While I dread the times someone judges me (happens particularly in connection with my having herpes), more often than not I'm pleasantly surprised.
4. Posted by Nadia on October 20, 2007
I didn't know it was more prevalent among girls. I used to do it when I was a kid, but I didn't even hear the term 'cutting' until I was in my 20s. Actually, I didn't hear the term 'emo' until about the same time.
5. Posted by rufus on October 20, 2007
"Me, too" on all counts - I've noticed the derision/condescension that is shown toward the signs that people are in pain. I don't get it. I don't condone it. Like Rufus, when I was doing it, I didn't know cutting was a thing. I mean, not for other people, a thing with a name. I thought it was just me, doing what I thought would help me with my problems. I also still have scars from that--obviously self-inflicted scars--and I'm not at all sure I'd have anything better than "hell witcha, then" to offer someone who wanted to give me (or anyone) crap about that. But I also make some effort to not confront people with that view, those thoughts, about me.
Other people choose differently about theirs--there are girls here with *astonishing* scars, open wounds, and in a few cases, outrageous cyst things, and I just want to shout at the people around them, "Have you done ANYTHING to help this girl? Anything at all?" But... those girls also chose to wear sleeveless tops and whatnot, which gives me some questions about what it is that *they* want for themselves. They're not hiding.
6. Posted by Holly on October 20, 2007
I didn't know cutting was a phenomenon until I went into therapy. It was just some weird thing I did that I was ashamed of.
But... those girls also chose to wear sleeveless tops and whatnot, which gives me some questions about what it is that *they* want for themselves. They're not hiding.
My therapist said that a lot of people will choose an area that is generally not seen, like the inner thigh, and will limit their cutting to that area. My behavior was more disordered in that I hacked at whatever piece of skin was available. However, I wasn't so disorderly that I'd let the scars be seen.
When I was in the looney bin, there was a girl who had made very deep parallel cuts into her forearm. Her arm looked like a hot dog about to be put onto the grill. It was absolutely horrifying. She sat next to me and her arm unnerved me so much that I got up and left. She kept giving me dirty looks after that.
I can only think that such people are in so much pain that they simply can't be bothered to mind social conventions.
7. Posted by Hiromi on October 20, 2007
I've had a lot of a friends that injured themselves because of depression, and whenever I hear people making jokes about being an emo cutter it makes me sad. It's really clear to me that they don't understand what situations produce that kind of behavior, and that really wonderful people can do these things to themselves. Educating the world is too big a task for me, but if anyone I know/like makes and inappropriate comment about pretty much anything, I try point out that it's rude and I find it offensive. I've found that most people are pretty receptive, some people are just idiots though.
8. Posted by Aimee on October 21, 2007
Someone once said, "Dating anyone over 25 guarantees they'll come with baggage. The best you can hope for is to end up with a matched set."
I never did the cutting thing, but I certainly have my fair share of self-destructive behaviours. Sometimes more, sometimes less, but they always lurk just on the other side of the closet door. I think everyone has their monsters, and people who say they don't are either lying to you or not self-aware enought to recognize them.
9. Posted by Tina Marie on October 24, 2007