Coming out of Hiding

Hopefully people will respect what I am doing rather than judge me.

When I was seven years old I ran into the bathroom of my babysitters house with tears streaming down my face. Charlotte, the babysitter, had just brutally reprimanded me in front of the three other children she watched. Behind the closed door of the bathroom I could hear the children laughing at the whole situation. "There goes Laura again. What a cry baby." I wanted to scream or throw something, but I didn't.

This time it wasn't just tears. Consumed by the emotions inside me I scraped the skin of my left hand with the jagged short nails of my right hand. As the warm blood crawled to the surface I felt relief. As I held my left hand over the sink I watched the blood drops go down the drain. I lost a part of myself that I could never get back.

Everyone has a way to deal with their inner demons. Self mutilation was mine. I could do it anywhere any time when life became too much for me. The vast majority of my damage was hidden underneath clothing. No one taught me how to do this. I can't blame TV, videogames, or hanging with the wrong crowd...this was just the way I was wired.

I have lived in shame thinking I was the only one. Like you can't understand the appeal of smoking unless you're a smoker, you can't understand the euphoric effects of mutilation unless you're a mutilator. It was like I was two different people at the same time: the logical part argued why I did this in the first place while the emotional side argued I needed the pain on the outside to justify all the pain I was feeling on the inside.

People who did find out thought I was a freak. But what makes my method of destruction so different from those who take their violence out on others, drown their sorrows in alcohol, or overeat? None of these are particularly positive, but in the moment they work. I guess mine is just less socially acceptable. I'm not proud. And to this day I still blame myself for the way I am.

In and out of therapy since I was eight, four hospitalizations, two suicide attempts, and countless medications later I am still here.

I am done being silent. I am done feeling ashamed of a condition I didn't ask for. Mental Illness has this horrible stigma attached to it. People don't think it's real. Why can't I just snap out of it or get over it? Isn't there some magic pill I can take? For me I have been fighting this battle for over twenty years. There are no cures, only a multitude of treatments, and believe me when I say from personal experience it's a grueling trial and error process. But it all starts with me.

I need to stop blaming myself. It is not my fault. Maybe someday I'll actually believe it. I have decided the best story I can write is my own. Call it non-fiction, memoir, autobiography, ect. Next month I will start the healing process by putting down on paper what I have gone through. I think it will not only help me, but so many others out there like me because as it turns out I am not alone.