I vowed to cut myself for the last time when a very sharp razor took me to the hospital and the nurses kept whispering “attempt of self-extermination” to each other, while I said back, helplessly and repeatedly “I WANS’T TRYING TO KILL MYSELF”. That trip to the hospital left me with a big scar on the inner part of my left arm, which made me wear long sleeves from 2009, the fatal year, to 2013, when I got a large tattoo that just happened to cover the cut they didn’t properly stitch – a common practice, apparently used to shame the so called self-extermination attempters.
When I was 15, a friend who years later would become a boyfriend, and whose rejection would serve as a catalyst to that hospital trip in 2009, noticed some fresh scars just under the hem of my skirt – which made me pull down the skirt immediately and try to make that moment go away. It didn’t work, and he said ‘I don’t know why you hide it. If you do it at least own up to it’. I honestly don’t know what he thought self-harm was but I just sat there in silence until something else caught his attention.
It is now 2017, I’m 28 years old and I have cut myself again. Having to wear long sleeves in the Brazilian weather (even though it’s almost Winter) has not been fun, and having to be careful around family and friends is just being plain humiliating.
I’m in pain, the sort of pain I cannot bare. The feelings of loneliness and inadequacy trap me inside of my bedroom because I don’t know where I want to go from here.
Tears flow so frequently they no longer serve as relief. The fear of being pitied keeps my isolated and my attempts of social interaction have been disastrous.
My friends and I get together every Friday to watch a drag show on TV. On the last time I did manage to leave the house to our weekly event I spent most of the time curled in a blanket by the toilet in the master bedroom suite, because I drank too much, had eaten too little and smoked pot on top of it, obviously.
I do not want to cut myself again, but there’s not enough Xanax in the world that will make me feel comfortable in my own skin right now. And this is why I’m writing this, in the hope I’ll reach someone who feels the same way and will give me the comfort of knowing I’m not that alone.
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