All throughout 7th and 8th grade, I continued to secretly cut myself. No one knew, and no one noticed. In 8th grade, a friend of mine was going through a very hard time and tried to kill herself and spent a couple times at an Inpatient Unit. My friends confronted me about always seeming depressed but as soon as I would try to open up, my problems would be compared to hers and they made it seem like I was only acting that way to get attention and that I was jealous that my friend had all of their attention. That was an instance where I blew the situation way out of proportion in my mind, and made everything worse for myself unintentionally. I went off the deep end… I cut myself every single night. I cut my wrists and thighs. The situation that happened with my friends did not make things worse because I knew they were only concerned and wanted to help, but being in the state of mind that I was in, I caused myself even more pain because I didn’t know how to handle myself in any other way.
Fast forward to July 27, 2013, I was sitting on the bathroom floor of a Holiday Inn Express, in Pinetop Lakeside. I was on vacation that week with my grandparents and the 27th was our last night there. I sat on that floor with my blade in hand and cut myself on my thigh, one “X” about 3 inches in length and 3 inches in width. I knew that after I cut that I was never going to take a blade to my skin ever again. I wanted to stop because I wanted to go into my freshman year with my past behind me. But of course, it followed. I never did cut again, but the feeling I had and the urges did not go away for a very long time.
I never wanted help. I never asked for it from anyone. No one knew what I was going through. To be quite honest with you, if my Humanities teacher didn’t notice something was wrong and sent me to the social worker’s office, I would most likely still be in the same dark place as I was nearly 9 months ago… I walked into Mrs. Graika’s office, unsure of what was about to happen. I never planned on pouring my heart out to this woman I had never met before. I never would have thought that I was going to have to tell my mother. But all of that happened. I walked out of her office that day with my mother and we went home. A couple weeks later, I started seeing a counselor. It helped, a little… But deep down I knew I could never recover unless I was ready too.
July 27th, 2013 holds a lot of meaning to me. It shows me at my weakest, but at the same time, my strongest. Recovery is the most difficult process any person can ever face. In the end, it only makes you stronger. I am a stronger person that I was 9 months ago. I am not the same person.
-Unknown