Anyone here tried this on themselves? Not out of curiosity, but for reassurance – does this actually…

I did. I scratched out the insults my mother and peers used to say to me with a blade. It got easier when I moved away from where I lived. Even though it was only 50km away, the toxic environment disappeared and things got better

Everyone's experience is different

it's not always for self-reassurance. It's more for self-flagellation

Elena And did that help you cope with the pain psychologically?

I've been there... It all started out of sheer stupidity when I was 11. I went to a friend's house, and you greeted me with a box cutter.

Then, at 12, I started doing it myself. It was just easier to cope with aggression and emotions that way. I did it practically every week for 5 years... Only my husband managed to help me get out of it. He was against it from the start... So many blades went down the toilet. I relapsed a couple of times during my relationship with my husband, just once each time. Even now, when I'm stressed, I sometimes catch myself having terrible thoughts of scratching, pinching, or hitting myself...

Yulichka Sidorik Have you tried replacing it with something else? Have you worked with a psychologist?

Yulichka Sidorik I've tried, many, many times. But it's an addiction that's hard to break on your own. It was easier for me to quit drinking after work than this. Over time, it even became a bit of a routine, a ritual I couldn't do without. I only managed to replace it with a relationship, you could say. I fell madly in love with my future husband and didn't want to lose him at all. But it was still very hard to quit, I'd relapse. While you can still hide fresh cuts/bruises from relatives, friends, etc. for obvious reasons, you can't from someone you're intimate with regularly.

I worked with a psychologist. It all started with a school counselor, but the main reason was different then. Self-harm was only touched on superficially, and to the question 'don't you cut yourself,' it was easy to answer 'no, I don't,' and that was it. Then, the school counselor referred me to a psychiatric hospital for evaluation. I saw a psychologist there a couple of times, then they immediately sent me to a psychiatrist, and I was prescribed antidepressants (but there were other reasons for that). I don't remember if I quit then or not, it's mostly erased from my memory. And then I also saw frequent psychologists.

Mostly from age 14 to 17, my mom struggled with this. She'd throw away razor blades, try to distract me, we'd argue about it, etc.

I've asked this question here before. I realized that people then get tattoos, then piercings, then something else.

Elena You distract yourself from emotional pain with physical pain. So yes, I also went to a saltwater pool afterwards. It's amazing no one noticed.

Yulichka Sidorik So, you haven't had any psychotherapy with a psychologist?

Yulichka Sidorik Not really, just short-lived ones.