FirstSigns

The seventh and final part of our series from the article I wrote for HCPJ last year. Self-injury can be seen as a compulsion, but it is not something that just ‘happens to’ a person or is out of their control. Self-injury is a choice; the person is choosing to cope as best they can. [...]

Part six of my article published in the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal last year. People who work with clients who self-injure need to be prepared to give up their preconceptions and accept that self-injury has a purpose, a function and that it is a ‘valid’ way to cope for those who feel they have [...]

The fifth part of our series, first published as a single article in the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal last year. Because self-injury is experienced as a coping mechanism, it is a mistake for carers or professionals to push for a cessation of the self-harming behaviour. Those who are trapped in the cycle of self-injury [...]

As promised, here’s the fourth part of the article I wrote for the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal: At first glance it may be hard to see how hurting oneself can make one feel better. Is there a ‘high’? Some kind of ‘rush’? On the surface, it is hard to see what is good about [...]

Today we bring you the third part of my article published in the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal last year. The media tend to focus on young girls who cut themselves. Women’s magazines and teen magazines for girls reflect their audiences, so naturally stay focused on girls who self-injure. By contrast, men’s magazines hardly touch [...]

The second part of my article first published in the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal (HCPJ) published by the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy (BACP), in January 2009: At FirstSigns (LifeSIGNS) we define self-injury as a coping mechanism – something a person learns to rely on to help them deal with intolerable distress. We [...]

This article (to be seven blog articles) was first published in the Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal (HCPJ) published by the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy (BACP), in January 2009, and is reproduced here with permission. With some surprise, we find it has been re-published within the Encylcopeia Britanica, under self-injury. Over the next [...]