http://ping.fm/IUc4p Self Injury Awareness Day

Self Injury Awareness Day

http://drdeborahserani.blogspot.com/2011/03/march-1st-is-self-injury-awareness-day.html

My friend Faycin A Croud shared this information. I kept the picture because it looks something like a young me. I have been self-harming for as long as I can remember. I used to hit myself as a child. I started cutting in my teens.

People who SI are often trying to:

* Distract emotional pain

* End feelings of numbness

* Calm overwhelming feelings

* Maintaining control

* Self-punish

* Express thoughts that cannot be put into words

* Express feelings for which there are no words

What are the types of self-injury?

* Cutting

* Burning

* Picking at skin

* Interfering with wound healing

* Hair-pulling

* Hitting

* Scratching

* Pinching

* Biting

* Bone-breaking

* Head-banging

It enrages me when people say that those who self-harm are merely engaging in "attention seeking behavior." Indirectly, I suppose that's true. It was a cry for help in my case. But first and foremost it was an attempt to defuse overwhelming feelings and replace emotional pain with physical pain. Sometimes it was also self-punishment.

Self-harm is a complex issue. I am glad there is a day dedicated to educating people about it.

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http://ping.fm/9JQmr Social Networking Meanness

Social Networking Meanness

I don't "social network" much, partly due to being busy but also because of a really distressing mean streak that seems to pervade. Snarking about life, the Universe, and everything is one thing--life is frustrating and I often feel snarky and sarcastic about the way things are too. But being directly mean and attacking whole groups of people verbally is so unnecessary and it really brings me down when I see it. This is kind of a pervasive problem on Facebook in particular. While I understand that meanness is often a knee-jerk reaction to having been hurt, I really wish that people would realize that they are not doing anyone any favors by spewing venom onto the entire world. It may sound stupid but I find these negative energies very distressing, and this is why I don't social network very much. 

My writing sister Rose (she has a book coming out sometime this Spring!) feels the same way but out of necessity for promoting her book she tries to do it although she has said that she usually feels a lot worse after a bout of social networking than she did before she started. People are very quick to attack, to be snide, to generally display their rotten side. You know the world is tough enough without us being assholes to each other too.

I've been accused of being too sensitive my entire life. But I'd rather be too sensitive than to spread gloom and hate all the time. Life is hard enough. We should be supporting each other in our fight through it rather than bringing each other down further.