EATING DISORDERS AND SELF-HARM
SELF-HARM : WHAT IS IT ?
Self Harm is a broad term for many acts which cause personal harm whether deliberate or not. It can
incorporate a wide spectrum of self abusive patterns. These can range from failure to give attention to ones
own emotional or physical needs, right through to more direct forms of self-laceration, burning, or injury
through taking toxic substances. Self harm can also include eating distress and addictive behaviour.
The principle of self harm is that it is used for emotional regulation in someone who has difficulty regulating or tolerating feelings, and is associated with borderline personality disorder. Little is known about self-mutilation, a frightening and yet quite common act of abuse. Often called attention-seeking and manipulative, it could better be described as the expression of an inner-scream.Self harm is not an attention seeking behaviour.
Self-inflicted injury involves cutting, burning, scratching, or gouging, and could be viewed
As a symbolic way of expressing deep distress - a non-verbal form of communication in
which the feelings are externalised through the body where they can be dealt with in a
more visible way. Yet because of its very visibility self-injury is often treated with
mistrust and fear.
No accurate statistics are available about the numbers of people who self-harm since few people are willing
to admit to have caused the injuries themselves. Health care professionals feel helpless when faced with
self-inflicted wounds and this may cause them to blame, rather than support, the person involved. When
time and resources are limited, it is easier to make judgements and use labels rather than spend time
looking for possible causes of distress. Ultimately is it the individual's way of coping with the level of
negativity they are carrying, so with help, understanding and support, a person can learn to regulate their
emotions more effectively and develop a more appropriate form of behaviour.
Different things work for different people and holding an ice cube in your hand or flicking an elastic
band incurs pain but it is not as dangerous and wont scar!
SELF-HARM : WHY DO PEOPLE INJURE THEMSELVES ?
We all self-harm although not necessarily in conscious and direct ways. We may smoke, drink, or have some
form of eating distress, find ourselves in abusive relationships, or simply we deny our own needs. We have
found many ways to distract ourselves from feeling. Hard physical work or intellectual thinking are
energy consuming occupations which can use up lengthy periods of time. Our time may be taken up being
busy, or being distracted - anything rather than finding ourselves alone with our thoughts. The idea of such
aloneness can seem very threatening to many. We may end up physically or emotionally overspent and
vulnerable to becoming ill.
Women
Women are conditioned by family and society to take care of the needs of others,
putting themselves last. Women are frequently portrayed as weak victims in need of protection. Our true
worth, opinions and strengths are grossly undermined. We sometimes feel ourselves to be unimportant,
often silent witnesses to the many abuses imposed on us. In this way we lose a sense of our own identity, our
power as women, and individuals with rights. In order to survive we dissociate ourselves from our own
authentic needs and seek to control our neediness through, for instance, controlling our size and shape by
denial of food and nourishment. We may have been so traumatised by our experiences that we become
fragmented - so disengaged from our feelings and bodies that they are experienced as separate from us.
When it has never felt safe to experience feelings, women self-injure to maintain this sense of being separate and for some, to try to end their neediness.
Men
Trying to conform to a macho stereotype may leave men unable to experience their emotions and detached
from that valuable part of themselves. Men are more likely to express their anger overtly, but males locked up
in institutions - especially if they have been abused - may express their pent-up feelings through self-injury.
Young People
Young people find themselves under severe pressure from families, school, and their peers to conform and
achieve. With decreasing prospects, even for the higher achievers, many express their anger through
aggression and acts of destructiveness. For others, feelings of powerlessness and lack of self-worth may be
expressed through acts of self-injury.