Venting Why do people care if I cut myself???

[SpiderMolt]

It's stupid because I honestly don't plan on killing myself, so why can't I cut??? I get that it's an unhealthy coping mechanism, but it actually helps me! And at least I'm careful not to go too deep or do too much. I don't cut anywhere that can't be easily hidden, only my thighs. It's so annoying when other people make a big deal out of it. Like, why does it matter?? It's my business and my business only.

 

[TangentiallyAlive]

in my experience, people want to be helpful but are grossly misinformed on how to do so. Cuts are pains that they can see, so they act on those rather than the internal pains that they cannot.

 

[Life_and_Death]

typically because it can still cause nerve damage ect
just general freaking out, but for the few times there is a reason, its typically because its "not nothing"

 

[rih]

Empathy is a regular trait for people(usually taught growing up), caring for someone will always occur even if you don't want it to.
Cutting is extremely unhealthy, not just physically but the mental anguish and addiction formed can cause ripples effects; On a basic level when you see someone hurting themselves, if you care about them you'd want them to stop subconciously due to this feeling. It can make people uncomfortable so it gets channeled into a way to try help, this is also the same trait.

They aren't trying to be annoying don't confuse people's concerns with them trying to high road you.
I hope you aren't suffering too much either way i'm glad you're being safe with it.

 

[sugarb]

It's stupid because I honestly don't plan on killing myself, so why can't I cut??? I get that it's an unhealthy coping mechanism, but it actually helps me! And at least I'm careful not to go too deep or do too much. I don't cut anywhere that can't be easily hidden, only my thighs. It's so annoying when other people make a big deal out of it. Like, why does it matter?? It's my business and my business only.

Instinct. Me right now, even- I logically don't care if you cut yourself or not. However, I still physically winced at the thought of a knife cutting into someone's thigh, and as much as I have zero investment in you, my lizard brain still thinks "must protect from harm" and is distressed at your suffering due to common human decency. Literally at this moment I am resisting the urge to discourage you from cutting because it'd just annoy you lol. It's a similar thought process to seeing someone get hit by a car and rushing over to help.

As such someone who cares about your well-being and is in a position to do so will generally try to stop you from hurting yourself.

 

[CozyTime]

In general the state of mind that you have been in/is in is so unfathomable for the majority of people you will ever interact with that they fundamentally can't understand that cutting can be a positive (compared to alternatives).

It demands a certain level of empathy (intelligence) of people to be able to put themselves into your situation despite never being close to anything similar themselves that most will fail to be able to do.

We understand what you feel and I had similar things that made sense to me in these moments because they were always better than the alternative and kept me going for another week etc.

I believe a huge step for recovery for some people is learning to listen to yourself, for me one of my first steps was giving into an unhealthy habit because it distracted me from my thoughts which I knew were more dangerous and ultimately it was by far the best choice.