A recent local newspaper article reported that the rate of self-harm in the Derry area is twice that of other big cities in Ireland and Britain.
It reveals that during 2007, the local hospital had 935 self-harm attendances which equals 2% of all attendances at its Accident and Emergency unit. Suicide rates in Northern Ireland have also steadily increased over the last three decades.
Growing up, teenagers feel pressured to fit in, so pressured that they would do anything from being anorexic and self harming to suicide attempts. Why is it that so many young people self-harm or think about suicide?
Sunita Singh Hans and Amanda Chambers interviewed an 18-year old and a 15-year old in Foyle who felt that self-harming and taking an overdose was the only escape from pressures to ‘fit in’.
An 18-year-old who did not wish to be named shared her story:
What age were you when you started self harming? Probably 16. Yes, I was going into Lower Sixth Form.
Do you think people would self harm because of the way they look? Yes, absolutely. People who self harm have very low self-esteem, anything could set them off. A snide comment about what they are wearing or their weight is just the incentive a self-harmer needs. I know someone who self-harmed for years because she was bullied for being fat.
What started you self harming? From first year I had a best friend, we were more like sisters. We told each other everything and she practically lived with me. As we got older we changed. She became very rebellious, drank a lot and constantly got involved with older men. It got to a stage where I had to stop our friendship. It was too much stress for me to deal with. When we stopped speaking I found that I had no friends at all. It had always been her and me. I found myself so lonely with no one to talk to. This led to depression and inevitably self- harm.
What feelings did you have when you wanted to self harm? It was always dread. I was very teary but I couldn’t voice how I felt. It was always in school, the people in school were so self-involved. They never asked how you were. They only ever noticed me if I was crying, which I did a lot. I just felt a compulsion to cut myself, a really strong desire, like an addiction.
Did you tell anyone? Not for the longest time. I use to wear a cardigan in school to cover my arms. The first person I told was a friend from school, that wasn’t a good idea. She was so freaked out that she ignored me, laughed it off and changed the subject. This made me worse. It felt as if she didn’t care .
What made you stop self-harming? One day I was on the bus, sitting at the back. I subconsciously lifted scissors out of my pocket and started slicing my arm, I didn’t even realise I was doing it, I looked down and saw that I was bleeding all over the place. This really shocked me, I couldn’t believe I hated myself so much. I stopped then. That was last December.
Do you ever feel like self harming now? No, not recently but at the start of the summer I was having such a bad day, I was so depressed, I couldn’t even bring myself to self harm, I just wanted to die. I was sitting in the Sixth Form, I couldn’t stop crying, I totally freaked my friends out. It didn’t help that I was writing a suicide letter. My friends went straight to our year head which led to me getting counselling.
What advice would you give to people who self harm? Don’t do it. There are other options. Talk to someone, anyone. Teachers, friends or parents.
A 15 year old girl from Derry reflects on taking an overdose and admits to still wanting to die when she feels low.
“I was confused and upset. Things were happening with my friends. I felt like I was just being pushed and pushed into a state. One night I went overboard and took some pills. I had such an awful night. I was so sore. My whole body was in agony when I woke the next morning. Then when I was walking to school I felt so angry and I just kept taking more tablets as I walked along.
“I ended up collapsing in school and then went to hospital. I lay in agony for a week in hospital. No one had listened to me. I had been dobbing school but no one asked me why they just shouted at me for doing it. When I tried to talk to friends about how I was feeling there was no point because they thought people that self-harmed were something to joke about. I also know loads of people who say they self-harm to be cool so they didn’t take me seriously.
“I saw a psychologist for a while and that helped. I have really good friends now who tell me that no matter what time of day it is if I’m feeling really low to phone and talk to them.
“A lot of why I think I have done all this is to fit in. I used to starve myself to get to a certain size as well. I wouldn’t eat for days on end just to be thin. Everywhere I went girls seemed to talk about weight and diets. I still feel the pressure but I’m eating healthily again.
“I still get extremely low and sometimes I still wish I had just died that day. That feeling doesn’t last long. Mostly for a couple of hours. It’s when it goes on for a couple of weeks that it’s really hard. I try to occupy my mind by doing something else or talking to my friends. Sometimes I look at photographs that make me happy. Before I took the pills I self-harmed quite a lot with anything sharp. I did it where no one could see it on my body.
“If I was asked to give someone advice who was considering self-harming or suicide I would say…. “Don’t do it. It is not worth it and there is always someone out there to talk to.”
Obviously, these stories shows that not fitting in can cause people to feel so lonely, right down to the point where they self – harm. This would then make people want to fit in so badly that they react by dieting until they’re anorexic, not realising that the right thing to do would be to talk to someone about what they’re going through.
When you’re a teenager, you begin to think of the type of person you want to be, and others around you may pressure you into being somebody you’re not. There is also the media, which doesn’t help. It shows in magazines and on TV the airbrushed celebrities that people like to call their idol. And so they feel so pressured into wanting to look like them they change everything about themselves, which is wrong.
People usually begin to self-harm because they feel lonely, and left out, or a dramatic event in their life may have just happened. However, what they don’t realise is that there is always somebody there to talk to, whether be family, friends or even teachers. Nobody should feel pressured into being somebody they’re not – being yourself, inside and out, is what truly matters, no matter what anyone may think.
Self harming or taking an overdose is not the way to go. There are loads of organisations out there to help young people cope with stressful, negative situations.
