Story #31

I was about nine years old -- my uncle had shot his wife, and my mom had just received the call saying he was arrested. I remember standing there looking at her and my father, as she cried. They wouldn't talk to me, and soon I was taken to a cousin's house to get out of the way. I thought I had done something terrible, so awful that they wouldn't even tell me. No one would tell me anything.

I was about ten years old -- my maternal grandmother was dying of cancer. I was taken to my grandparents' house every night as my mother held a bedside vigil. I remember a lot of family members sitting around. I was called back to my grandma's bedroom. I stood by her bed, and didn't say anything, not even a wish for her to get better. She soon died. After the funeral, my mother had the family over to our house. All I can recall is playing. So much sadness, and I just remember having fun.

I was about eleven years old -- my sister and I received a call from my maternal grandfather's neighbor. Since my grandmother had died, his neighbors looked for the living room curtains to open as a sign that he was OK. This day, the curtains weren't open. He was supposed to be going to the mountains for the weekend, so we assumed he had just left without opening them. We drove out though, and walked through the house and didn't see anything unusual. As we were getting ready to leave, the neighbor asked if we checked the bathroom. My sister told me to run in and look. That's where I found my dead grandfather. I ran out and hid across the street, watching from a tree as my mother came from work crying, the police arrived, and the hearse pulled up. If I hadn't found him, maybe he wouldn't have been dead?

These three events were long forgotten to me until a couple of years ago. I'm currently 28, and have been cutting since I was 15. I have been in and out of mental wards since I was 14, mainly for depression and suicide attempts (some of which were just cutting marks that my parents found). I was diagnosed early on with Bipolar Disorder. In 1998, I became obsessed with hurting myself to the point of cutting two or three times a day at work, and admitted myself into an excellent hospital I had heard of. After a week-long inpatient stay to calm myself down, I started three weeks of the hospital's day-patient program. It was here that I was diagnosed with BPD. I had never even known other people cut themselves, let alone it was a disorder trait.

The diagnosis to me was a blessing and a curse. I finally was able to stand back and see myself -- my behavior, my actions -- and understand what the underlying factors are in me. I learned that because of the three events mentioned above, I developed a huge amount of guilt and indebtedness aimed towards my mother, which to this day causes me to hold in any ill feelings towards her and manifests itself in my cutting. I learned that I had been using suicide during my teen years as a tool to become more popular and more loved by my peers. And I learned that if I stop before I cut, and try to define what moment triggered my self-esteem to fall to such depths that I would want to hurt myself, I usually won't cut. However, I also became much more self-conscious of who I open up to. I now constantly asking myself whether I'm trying to be open and honest with a friend, or if I'm trying to manipulate that person into feeling a certain way about me. I've lost a few friends because of "problem dumping," so I'm not too eager to tell people I have BPD and that I cut and as a result, I don't have much of a support system.

I did go out on a limb, recently. I saw a press release for the USA Network movie "Secret Cutting" shown on May 30. I e-mailed it to four friends of mine who know I cut with hopes that they would watch it for more of an understanding about what I go through. None of them watched it. One friend even responded with an "Ewww!!" It's still a secret that no one wants to talk about. I didn't cut myself this past week because of anything I saw in the movie (I just cried a lot during it) - I cut myself this week because the friends I'm closest to think what I do is so unspeakable.

I'm currently not seeing a therapist, though I should be just for someone to talk to. I was scared away from therapy when I admitted myself to the hospital in 1998. First, I saw my therapist that morning and he didn't think I should be admitted -- he thought that I could work through it on my own. Then, after my month's stay, I came back to him saying that I wanted to see a female therapist because my therapist in the hospital was a woman and I felt like I could talk to her more openly. She had even recommended one of the doctors at the hospital for me to see. Instead of embracing this as a step towards healing, he saw this as an issue I needed to work through and refused to pursue it. It was at that time that I stopped seeing a therapist, when I realized that any independent thought I had could be seen as "an issue." I moved to Florida soon afterwards to distance myself from my mother, and haven't sought out professional help in the year and a half I've been here.