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Why cutting?

After perusing several message boards and blogs on the topic of cutting, I am filled with a sense of sorrow at the confusion and stigma that is continuously spewed at not only the subject, but at the people suffering through this self-destructive behavior. Several years ago, I was one of the growing number of cutters.

A particular post I came across was written by the mother of a teenage girl; her daughter was participating in self mutilation. She spent a paragraph explaining how disappointed she was that she couldn't find a solution to her daughter's "problem". Each sentence of "concern" seemed to whisper a secret mantra: "It's not MY fault!" It was apparent that this woman was embarrassed that her daughter's cutting was reflecting badly upon her as a parent.

She ended her post by voicing her frustration on not understanding why someone would hurt them self intentionally-as if the concept was too alien and ugly to truly contemplate. The ironic thing about the post was that it was coming from an avowed, recovering alcoholic. Immediately, I felt the heavy burden of sadness, because I realized how many people claim to be unable to fathom the concept of self-injury.

In fact, in a society of vices that faces alcoholism, drug abuse, eating disorders, and abusive relationships, it seems that cutters still seem to ostracized from those who participate in more conventional forms of self-destruction. What we usually discover is a gross lack of empathy when it comes to any deviant behavior, but I often feel-from personal and observed evidence-that cutters receive even less than the average allotment.

It's arguable that pain is the ultimate universal experience. I have never come across another human being, that has grown past infancy, to be untouched by it. You would think that pain would be the easiest emotion to empathize with, but the tricky thing about anguish is that while it is a universal condition, it is also such a personal experience. Even if the pain of two people is birthed from the same source, neither will totally understand what the other is feeling.

Empathy (Webster: http://www.merriam-webster.com /dictionary/empathy) is defined as being able to "vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another...without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner".

In plain English, it is being able to project yourself into an experience without having to have the literal experience.

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