Hey there

No you don’t deserve how you are being treated. No you are not over-reacting. No cutting is not foolish; it is an expression of the pain you feel. Yes it is okay to feel confused. It sounds like so far you haven’t found anyone who is willing to listen. Many are good at giving advice, but few are good at listening. My own family has perfected the art of selective listening and they simply tune out everything I say that they do not want to hear. They still do this and I am 42 years old now. I made it out of the other side of daily mental and emotional anguish and torment, but I still carry that earlier person with me and still need to learn empathy for who I was. If you are not being heard with empathy, then you are not being heard.

In short, as for myself, I was a self-hater for decades. In my teens I tried to eat my pain away and then in college starved myself. I started cutting much later in graduate school. Actually it would be more apt to call what I did slashing with force. I constantly thought about my own death, but really the thought of having never been born appealed to me the most.

I cannot speak for anyone else, but self-hatred was at the core of my pain, the constant feeling that I was dying inside. I also suffer from a major anxiety disorder. I didn’t look for help until I was already married in my early 30s. My wife saved my life because she convinced me to start a path that has led me to ten years of a wonderful marriage and a beautiful daughter.

There is hope.