First time you ever experimented with self-harm?

I started because my wife is afraid of outward aggression so instead of punching walls or throwing things I started taking it out on myself because I couldn't do it externally. I've earned a few scars from it over my battling with my Depression and aggressive tendencies but I'm getting there. I've been at least a month or two clean now that I have this new med working.

It was many years ago, mainly to see how it made people feel better and how people could become addicted to it. I didn't understand it at the time and so I didn't do it for several years later. I've self harmed about 3-4 times in my entire life but the last couple of times have been closer together in occurrence and they've left scars.

I now understand why people do it.

I was about 11 maybe younger. I was trying to play a piece correctly and couldn't so hurt myself to punish myself.

The first time I experience self-harm. This may seem stupid and idiotic but at the time it seemed like the best thing. I was at my Great Aunts house when I was like 10. I was one of those kids that went through drawers because they were very curious. I found this drawer with a ton of miscellaneous objects including a few blades. I didn't know what they were but I knew what they did because a friend of mine from school had lines on her wrists that she told me she had made with blades, so that's what I assumed they were. I decided that I wanted to be just like her. She was pretty, blond, skinny and super smart. She also had lots of those red lines on her body so I thought the first step was to make those lines on my body. I chose a very dull blade at first because I didn't want to cut into my skin just yet. I just wanted to experiment what they looked like on my body first. I liked how they looked. So I grabbed another blade and pressed really hard. I had a moderate pain tolerance so I liked how it felt so I made tons more on my wrists, stomach, thighs, and hips. Basically, my great aunt saw and brought me to a hospital where they bandaged me and put me on suicide watch. They then transferred me to a mental hospital for about a month. They thought they couldn't get through to me when I was actually telling the truth. I told them that I liked how they looked and felt. I didn't even listen to the other responses. I knew my answer and didn't want to lie about it. After they had decided that was alright again, they let me go. My parents actually never found out because I was spending the whole summer with my great aunt and a few weeks after I left her house (with all of the blades in my bag) she actually died. No, I had no influence on her death. She was very old and very sick. But this was my first experience with self harm, but most certainly not the last.

I first tried in June 2014. At first it was just two little scratches above my ankle. And now I were jeans and sweaters everyday to hide my scars. I wish I could stop. But I'm a nobody. Now don't think that I want attention In fact I really don't. I'm ashamed of what I've done. Looking back. I realize that my first cut was made for stupid reasons. Now I look back and try to remember what it felt like to be carefree. But whatever. According to everyone one I told. I'm just an attention seeking bitc*.

Trying to smile

I have the most vivid memory about my first time self harming.

I was watching the movie Holes alone in my mom's bed. I'd been anxious and stressed and had a read a book that described self harm recently. In my 11 year old mind that seemed like the best idea. (I totally ignored the whole point of the book: help is there, you aren't alone, it's addictive, hurting yourself is a cycle...). I had my ballet shoe sewing kit with me, and, well it happened. That song from Holes will forever be imprinted in my brain.

It was a few months before I started high school. I remember that in that point of time, things were going pretty well in my life, but I was suffering from a dark period of depression and one day I decided I had enough.

I knew self harm was bad, and I knew it was something people used to relieve themselves of mental pain. That was pretty much it. (I didn't have any friends who did it, neither was I exposed to it much through television or other places).

After I did it, I started sobbing. I knew I'd gotten myself into something awful.. and yup, I was totally right. Years later I still deal with it. I also still have the scar from the time I first did it, and it just makes me really sad for my younger self looking at it.

in middle school i used to rip off the top of my nails so they would be jagged and then scratch my arms as a punishment

I remembered this for the first time recently (I dissociated most of my childhood memories) and was shocked that a child as young as I was at the time of the memory would try to harm themself in such a serious way. I don't know how old i was exactly but it was really young. I tried to amputate one of my fingers by wrapping an elastic band around it to cut off the blood supply. Then I lay in my bed and waited.

I was so starving for someone to care about me and look after me and see how hard I was trying to be everything good. I was being neglected and abused and i desperately needed someone to protect me and look after me like everyone did to my mum all the time, and I equated her being treated as the center of the universe and me being neglected, as being because she had a disability. I was so desperate that damaging my body enough to create an obvious disability seemed the only way I could get the nurturing I needed (my own disability was not diagnosed at that time so no one believed it was real and accused me of faking it).

I hadn't realised it would hurt but I endured it until the pain was so bad that it was making me unbearably nauseous and the finger was Incredibly swollen and discoloured before finally giving in and going to ask my mum for help because I couldn't get the band back off by then.

All I felt was shame and that I was a pathetic failure the for not having been strong enough to endure the pain for long enough for it to work. The fact that I thought I could amputate a finger like this seems so childish (although I was a very young child so that is not surprising) but the fact that such a young child would do such an extreme thing shocks me. I must have felt very desperate to do it.

My methods of self harming gradually matured as I grew older and eventually became cutting quite deeply. I have some pretty awful scars from it. I haven't actively self harmed in about 3 or 4 years now though. I stopped when I finally got hope that I can have a future where I feel comfortable in my body and I didn't want any more scars to ruin that. I do still neglect my needs which is a form of passive self harm but I am working on that.

I'm not sure I can truly remember the first time I self harmed. I've always bitten my nails, since I was little, it was a nervous habit that I never could control. I'd bite them until my fingers bled, until my fingers throbbed because it was a reminder to me throughout the day, the pain kept me focused I guess? It helped to calm my anxiety in new situations, the pain was comforting.

The first time I left scars was with tweezers, I can remember heating the metal on my lamp and then pressing it against my hand so it blistered. I did it over and over in the same spot until it left a permanent mark, something I could see all the time. It wasn't even really about the pain, that one, it was about the scar, the mark on my skin. It made me feel lighter, better.

The first time I cut it hurt so badly for days afterward. I did it on my hip so no one would see, I carved four marks there like tallies because I kept messing up and I needed to punish myself for it. I could barely stand to wear jeans because the material made me want to cry out in pain. I didn't want to sleep on my side because it hurt so much, but I did anyway because that was the point. I haven't cut on my hip in nearly two months and still I flinch if anything brushes up against it because I can still remember the pain.

If you asked my family they'd say I'm a wuss when it comes to pain, I cry basically at the tiniest scrape or bruise, but when it's me causing it I crave it, and I hate that about myself. I want to stop, but even after two months of harming on pause, I know it could all crumble around me in an instant, and I don't know how to make that feeling go away.