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TW: Self harm: My 18yr old talked about self harming

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TW: Self harm: My 18yr old talked about self harming

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Yampots

TW: Self harm: My 18yr old talked about self harming

There has been several incidents of self harm in the past few years. Yesterday she was feeling very low and wanted to harm herself. But instead of going ahead she talk about it…it was a rocky start, but eventually we were able calm her & she didn’t do it.

 

She has been staying at her Aunts place for the past 10 days. Her younger brother got positive for covid so we moved her out for few few weeks. There are no other children at her Aunt’s place & her Aunt treats her like her own.

 

First when she felt the need she harmed herself, & then messaged us in a where there is me & her dad. We panicked but didn’t show it to her. When we tried to call her did not answer instead messaged us back saying talk to her through messages.

 

We did that & eventually we were able to convinced her to make a plan to help keep herself safe.  We felt that it’s good that she wanted to talk. Previously we would only know about it much later😔

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Janine-RO

Re: TW: Self harm: My 18yr old talked about self harming

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HI @Yampots , 

 

I'm so sorry to hear that your daughter has been having such a tough time - it sounds like you are loving, compassionate, and caring parents. The fact that you were able to have these really difficult conversations with her is such a protective factor for her- we know that when young people are able to open up to the people that they love about what is happening for them, they usually have much better outcomes than those who aren't able to tell anybody what's going on. 

 

Self harm can be very confronting for parents, and it sounds like you were also having to deal with a lot of other stressful things like your younger son having COVID and her having to move to her Aunt's house. We often hear from young people that they turn to self harm as a coping mechanism, and I'm hearing that this may be the case for your daughter as well. 

 

We have some resources to help parents to support their teens who are experiencing these urges to harm themselves: 

 

Self harm and teenagers

Positive coping skills for self-harm

 

It sounds like you and your family are already doing a lot of what professionals suggest to support their young people-  and it is wonderful to hear that she was able to make the decision to keep herself safer. One thing that can be very powerful is having a safety plan that she can make either alone, with a counsellor or therapist, or even using an app like BeyondNow

 

I also just wanted to let you know that I had to make a few small edits to your post, to keep it in line with our Community Guidelines.

 

How are you feeling today, @Yampots ? We're glad you were able to come here and open up about what's been happening for you - it can be so isolating and scary when our kids are going through tough times. We're here to listen, you're not alone Heart