HEALING

All three students have stopped self-injuring.

For Anna, it took an epiphany during junior year. “It was a wake-up call,” she said. “I told myself, ‘I’m 21 years old, I’m a grown-up, and I’m going to graduate soon—but I’m dealing with things in a non-healthy way.’”

Wanting to learn how to cope the way “normal people do,” she said that began to visit UHS, complaining initially of suicidal thoughts and then addressing her self-harming.

She continues therapy once a month and has not hurt herself since last December.

“I give myself little goals,” she explained. “It used to be that I told myself ‘you can’t do it, you can’t do it,’ and that made me want it more. Now I don’t say no; I just give myself five more minutes to reevaluate and see where I am. Normally within five minutes, those intense waves of emotion usually have dampened.”

For Elizabeth, she said her friends have supported her through her self-injury. “Instead of internalizing it and taking it out on yourself, I tell a friend, take my frustration out in words, or listen to music, or dance to it,” she said, smiling. “You don’t normally think it helps, but it’s just trying to ease the need.”

As someone free from self-injury for two months, Elizabeth stressed building a community of supporters. “It’s important for them [self-injurers] to know there is a friend out there that they can trust,” she said.

Still, the urge to self-injure does not always go away permanently. “It’s easy to return to those behaviors after not doing it for some time,” said John, who has not injured himself since sophomore year. “Being vigilant is important.”

—Staff writer David Song can be reached at davidsong@college.harvard.edu.