Non Suicidal Self Injury (NSSI): Helping Kids Who Cut Themselves

Helping Kids Who Cut: What's the Problem?

Teenage cutting is an emergency situation that calls for immediate intervention. Self-medicating—no matter how it is demonstrated—is an escape mechanism for numbing out-of-control emotions and ending the pain of feelings that cannot be explained or understood.

(Warning: this article contains a graphic image regarding the dangers of self injury.)

Kids who cut themselves want to stop but lack the proper skills to help themselves. The good news is most self-injurers can quit if they receive the proper intervention because self-harm is a disorder similar to overeating or abusing drugs.

As parents, our task is helping kids who cut to break this cycle:

• Emotions burgeoning to the breaking point
• Self-injury
• Temporary relief
• Back to the breaking point

Help your child stop running on this destructive treadmill of pain, and supply them with coping techniques by employing these parenting tips for a child who self-injures to end the emergency of self cutting.

911 Help for Self-injurers

If your child was drowning, would you investigate methods to save him or her or throw a life preserver? If your child is self-cutting, throw the life preserver – quick. (See below for a toll-free information hotline number.) Once a child is safe, you have time to research available help and support for stopping deliberate self harming actions.

Some red flags to watch for are children who begin wearing inappropriate clothing (for example, long sleeved garments in summer time) or act as if they are hiding something. Self-injuring behavior can become addictive and may cause other problems like scarring, infections or excessive blood loss. 

Get professional help to identify and treat the root issues of the self injurious behaviors. Most health care professionals label self-injury as Non Suicidal Self-Injury (NSSI), but most parents call it "help me, Jesus” time.

Self-injurer Triage

Health care professionals use triage in emergencies to classify, prioritize, and treat patients. Follow this same concept with kids who cut themselves. The three stages of NSSI are:

• Superficial: pinching or scratching skin
• Moderate: cutting or burning skin
• Major: cutting off body parts.

Three triage steps for helping self-injurers:

1. Signs kids are crying for help: self-hitting, head-banging, or self-injury. Get professional help quick.
2. Active listening to determine what the self-injuring child is communicating by cutting. Evaluate the severity of self harm inflicted. Is there time for behavior modification techniques, counseling, or other preventive measures, or is immediate intervention and emergency care needed?
3. Deal with core problems rather than bandaging wounds. External symptoms like self-mutilation and self-injury signal internal issues like inability to express emotions appropriately, anxiety, depression, or low self-esteem.

What's the Answer?

Some self-injuring children have found help from techniques like these:

• Joining support groups and getting help from others with the same problems.
• Journaling - because moving feelings from inside the body to an external source acts as a safety valve to release the build-up of toxic emotions. Many feel they can stab the paper with words and save the skin.
• Choosing safe alternatives like markers or pens for decorating rather than cutting skin.

The most important step is for these children to be able to admit they have a problem and ask for help. Once the root cause - or trigger - for the self-injuring behavior is identified, they can work with a mental health professional to learn appropriate coping techniques and ways to stop cutting.

Keep in mind that any coping techniques treat the symptoms but do not cure. The best answer is to seek professional help from a mental help professional and to develop a plan of long-term strategies for helping a self-injuring child stop cutting. The best parenting tips for a child who self-injures is to stop the behavior, diagnosis the symptoms, and treat the causes so you can end the emergency of cutting behaviors and self-injury.

Disclaimer

This article is for educational purposes only; it is not medical advice.  Consult with your health care professional if you suspect your child is cutting or performing other self-injury behaviors.

Fortunately, most parenting problems are not as serious as self-injuring. Combating childhood fears like being afraid of going to the dentist or helping kids learn to stop wetting the bed are challenging enough for most of us. What is the most pressing issue you are facing with your kids? How are you coping?

Resource material: "What Is Cutting?," article reviewed by D'Arcy Lyness, Ph.D, 06/2012, KidsHealth

S.A.F.E. Alternatives: Self-injury Information Hotline: 1-800-DONT CUT (1-800-366-8288)

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Do not cut image by jblahblahblah under CC-BY-20 via Flickr
Self harm image by 30 d a g a r m e d a n a l h u s under CC-BY-ND 2.0 via Flickr