Jezebel 
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New York, 8:54 PM
Sat Nov 7
20 posts in the last 24 hours
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08/13/09
For those Jezzies who have had experience with self-harm, any advise on what I should say/do? I'm concerned about her in general, but how concerned should I be about this specific behavior?
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I also systematically pulled my hair our. It's called trichitillomania. I would be bored, and next thing you know, fistfuls of hair all around me. Apparently it's a behavior related to OCD/ anorexia, in that people who do it are trying to control something when they feel as though they can not control their general environments.
I didn't and still don't really have issues with my shape or size... I don't know why I did it really...I just stopped one day...I think I discovered slam poetry as an outlet (advised by my therapist.) That really helped me.
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And it definitely (especially with cathartic cutters) can lead to suicide.
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I can't find the link on the Economist website right now, but a few issues ago they did have a summary of a study that showed that those influences can flow both ways. It was a study in which teens played either a video game where cooperation and helpfulness was awarded, a more typically violent and competitive game, or a control puzzle/tetris type game. Then they were told to select puzzles for another teen to solve, and told that the other person would be rewarded money for the number of puzzles they solved. Teens who had regularly been playing the cooperation game were more likely to pick out easy puzzles; the competitive game was linked to selecting difficult puzzles. There were also some other tests and controls set up.
I think it's impossible to NOT say outside influences effect individuals. If they didn't, it wouldn't be so easy to create social norms and culture.
08/13/09
I've recently been through another round of depression. (I seem to have the genetics for it.) This time, although I very definitely experienced body image issues, I wasn't particularly inclined to cut.
I agree that photoshopping is an issue, but I think that blaming it for self-injury is an oversimplification that ignores key issues.
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For example, books featuring perfect little characters with happy endings contributed to mine.
I still agree that we can point a finger at photoshopping in magazines as causing a plethora of problems, not just cutting.
08/13/09
to me, cutting is less, i'm not pretty and i will mutilate my ugly body but more, oh god, my emotions are running so high and i can't express them and i can't turn this off and if i feel pain i can feel something else - relief, pain, calm, something i can name. i would love to hear from people who have struggled with self-harm for their views.
that said, young women are bombarded with so much bullshit that media images can be a factor in getting to the point of feeling so dysregulated emotionally, but i would throw in too the minimization of women's feelings - if you're angry, you're a bitch, if you're sad, you're being irrational, if you're upset, you're unladylike. young men too - i think of kids who bang their heads when they are feeling overwhelmed.
i think we would be better off not by banning photoshop, but by allowing women to express their emotions without belittling them, facilitating coping strategies, and treating underlying issues, rather than reducing a really distressing activity to "the media makes her not like her body, poor thing, let's stop them from hurting her".
08/13/09
In my case, it was entirely due to feeling completely out of control and trapped. I could control what I ate, therefore I did. Once I was out of that negative situation, I gained ten pounds and stayed at a healthy weight since. In other words, my own eating issues had everything to do with control and my life. Once I took control of my life and was able to make decisions about myself and my body, the anorexia stopped being an issue. It was no longer tempting to count calories or restrict - I didn't feel a need to do it anymore.
My point here is that it's dangerous to make these sweeping generalizations about why people hurt themselves. Yes, there IS a body issue, but it's not the only issue, and instead of trying to understand the cause from experts and tv shows and morning talk television, why not ask the people who are doing it? Almost invariably body issues are a symptom of something else, but not ALWAYS.
08/13/09
I can't say whether other girls might be triggered by the media, but that definitely wasn't it for me. It had way more to do with my own life, my own father's expectations of me than the media's expectations of what a woman should be like.
Most of the other cutters I met (and they came out of the woodwork when I shared my scars, which I did, openly) were people who didn't give two shits about magazines. Goth girls, farm boys, girls who would rather run around smoking and screwing than spend a day shopping and flipping through fashion mags.
I actually think I'm more self-conscious of my body now (at 25), when I have a job and there are unspoken rules about what to wear, how to look, etc., to be respected - than I did at 17, when I could dress however the hell I wanted and be totally authentic and creative and make no apologies. Cutting had nothing to do with my body and everything to do with my emotions.
08/13/09
I do agree that the extent of the photoshopping is messed up, and that it results in unrealistic body image. But I think if that acts as a trigger for self-harming, there is definitely something more going on.
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I mean, yeah, there's a lot wrong with those magazines- but this seems a little Twinkie Defense to me.
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