I hurt myself today (The Broken Girl)

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A guest post by the Broken Girl.

I have been depressed. I’ve felt guilty. I’ve felt desolated and I’ve bowed my head having been almost broken by life.

I can’t pinpoint exactly when it started. Darkness is a coward who’ll sneak up on you and slowly grow in your soul until you can’t breath.

I read somewhere that being depressed is fashionable. Sitting in the corner of my kitchen, curled up trying to hold myself together as I was swallowed by emptiness and crying my heart out doesn’t seem all that fashionable to me. Cutting yourself in the girls’ bathroom at boarding school because you are filled up with self hate and such a sadness that you can’t keep it in doesn’t seem fashionable to me.

I was around 15 when I started to realize that I wanted to die. Not that death felt like a good thing but it would be an end to all the pain. I was however too scared to die, but also too scarred to live. I was stuck in limbo. once in a while trying to gather the courage to move on.

Once drunk at a party at 16 my friends had to pull me down from the railing on a motorway bridge. It wasn’t until early 20’s I really took the plunge. A big kitchen knife slicing up the arm and under water to keep the blood flowing. I was set on succeeding. Somehow I didn’t. My parents got me admitted to the local psychiatric hospital and that’s where I spent the next 3 months. Are we nearing fashionable yet?

I used to label myself as dark and twisted. I would warn people not to get too close. Those who did I’d push away. I truly was a broken girl.

It took me a year of therapy to get me somewhat functional again. It took me years to discover that it’s okay to be happy. Over years I got antidepressants starting out with bad ones, switching to okay ones and then getting the ones that almost restored me to the girl I was before life happened.

I wasn’t just cured, snap of the fingers, poof magic! It took a lot of hard work and I still have some way to go. I still have bad days where I cry myself to sleep and feel alone and lost. I very seldom have days where I walk through my flat and wonder “where would the best place be to hang the rope?”

The good days are slowly moving in to stay. And what I cherish most is that I can now say that I have days where I’m pretty happy and that’s okay.

The Broken Girl

27 thoughts on “I hurt myself today (The Broken Girl)”

    • Even with all the bad things I’ve still in some regards considered myself lucky. I’ve had an amazing mother who’s been there for me all the way.

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      • That is fortunate. Mine popped her clogs when I was very young.

        I eat black grapes when I feel depression creeping up on me. Don’t laugh, it works for me. I discovered this quite by accident when I bought a big box of them when they were a bit past their best, and then I had to eat them before they went mouldy.
        PS. Wine doesn’t have the same effect, although it’s quite pleasant in it’s own way.

        Anyway, I think you are very brave to talk about it.

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          • You have to eat the skins and the pips, although I tend to swallow those whole. But a handful everyday will do it. I know this works because sometimes I forget, and then I wish I hadn’t.

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        • This sounds a very great deal like something that is right up Leggy’s street. I don’t for a minute believe that black grapes are antidepressants; what I think is going on is that they contain chemicals which alter your gut flora. This is what might be termed a new, happening area of research now.

          Cranberries contain substances which aren’t digested, and are small enough to pass through one’s gut and kidneys unchanged (and have next to no effect on human tissues) yet cling onto the microfibrils of E. coli bacteria, preventing them from adhering to tissues. This drastically reduces the ability of E. coli to cause trouble.

          In horses, a foot disease called laminitis is linked to a diabetes-like condition, which in turn is linked to the animal’s hind gut flora. It is possible to brute-force control this gut flora using a penicillin-like antibiotic that selectively kills off bacteria (yes, I am aware that this is on the far side of blitheringly idiotic with regards cross-resistance) which works, but only just.

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          • Black Grapes appear to contain Serotonin which apparently combats anxiety and depression. Although I didn’t know this at first. I Googled Grapes and Depression when they seemed to be working on me. I think it’s the brain. But I am not going to discard the gut idea, because I believe that most dis-eases are dietary in some way.
            Nuts, if you like. Excepting that I am chronically allergic to Tree Nuts.

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          • Cranberry skins stick to Salmonella and carry them out. They also contain something which blocks Cl. difficile’s ability to attach. None of it works with juices, it has to be skins. So smoothies are far better than juices.

            There’s a lot in berry skins that’s barely been touched on.

            I had a small project on laminitis in horses once. Very nasty disease.

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  2. You have my sympathy, I only suffered from real depression once and it was a nightmare, I didn’t want to die but I couldn’t think of a reason to live. It drained me of all emotion in a way that can’t be understood if not experienced. I was lucky to find an effective anti depressant which I used for a few months and have never needed them since, over 30 years ago now but I have never forgotten it. After that I recognised the signs and could cope with it. Stay well.

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  3. Poppy, I would suggest you take up smoking as the surest way to kill yourself but I’m not a shill for Big Tobacco.

    Second hand smoke, though, is just as bad, if not more deadly. Apparently.

    I’ll come back tomorrow after a think. But my advice is choose second hand smoke. It kills. Everything.

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  4. Depression and/or harmful behaviour is caused by three simple things which mainstream
    education does not teach.

    1) Trauma (violence, accident or poisoning)
    2) Emotions (grief, hate, fear etc)
    3) Psychotic Aggression (non empathy)

    For instance the trauma could be chemical poisoning of the brain causing schizophrenia; the twisted emotion a cause of peer pressure or a compulsive addition; the psychotic behaviour maybe a malevolent external control.

    Counselling and therapy can help one identify the cause of the suffering. It is then a matter of comprehending the cause for direction of cure. With no proper understanding of the found cause, no direction will be found for correct treatment. It is misunderstanding of the cause that leads to incorrect treatment. Incorrect treatment might reduce the symptoms but prolonged suffering still remains.

    It is also important to let go the baggage of victim mentality. Do not dwell on who or what caused your suffering. It is only confrontation that adds to your suffering.

    Lastly think for yourself and do not necessary believe the experts. By thinking I mean use your own imagination where nothing is impossible. It will subconsciously lead you to the right direction to know the correct treatment for the cure.

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  5. ‘I am cracked like glass.’ I thought I shouldn’t read the post, triggers you know, glad I did, thank you for it. Today will be a good day for you, and tomorrow and tomorrow.

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  6. I can sympathize with The Broken Girl; mine was a black dog that stole into my life at the grand old age of fifty-seven.

    Up until then I had enjoyed Life, laughing at those who said they were depressed, then that black dog entered my world. Standing on our local station platform it tried to lead me into the path of an oncoming train. Luckily part of me grabbed hold of a lamp post till the train had gone.

    That episode frightened me so much I walked the streets to stay awake until our local surgery opened. Where I was banging on their doors demanding to see a doctor. Fortunately I got to see one of the more understanding ones.

    Two years later medication and counselling have given me back some sort of life but that black dog still lurks there in the shadows. Waiting to cast it’s spell upon me at my most unguarded moments.

    It can be an unfathomable darkness, full of despair, that I won’t wish upon my worst enemy.

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  7. Yup, been there. Wouldn’t wish it upon my worst enemy (well, a few politicians perhaps). It’s an uphill struggle, you battle it all the way. In my experience, there’s no instant cure. Some try anti-depressants, some counselling….didn’t do it for me, wish it did. I find the black grapes interesting. For me what worked enormously was Vitamin D (my depression is always worse in winter), but I doubt that was the whole story. Diet must be involved somehow, because it affects us in so many ways. I found St John’s Wort and Lemon Balm immensely soothing, but my gp preferred to put me on Prozac, which did nothing for me. In the end, I started to be a bit more selective about who I mixed with. Some people are so draining, constantly using you for their own ends.

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  8. Shambles: a state of disorder; to move with a slow, awkward gait, a butcher’s slaughterhouse. And c/o Terry Pratchett – a magical lens use by witches to detect or amplify magic.

    If this looks messy and chaotic, it’s meant to. Hopefully the images will appear like magic, but if you have the click the link, think, surprise gif … Yay!

    Poppy

    … to the Blue Universe.

    I was being utterly serious last night about you choosing second hand smoke … excuse me, could you hold on a moment?

    Apols!

    This is a quite wonderful universe. I’ve explored three so far. This one is full of interesting people who know all sorts of useful things and who also …

    Who, btw, do not give a shit about second hand tobacco smoke and how many victims it kills according to the con sensless. No guilt here. Twisted and dark? You betcha.

    We’re blue, of course … who wouldn’t be in this war of attrition being waged upon us … but there is also plenty of

    Now, I don’t know much about your past or your depression, except what you’ve written on here or in the Yellow Universe of T-Wittier. I hope you will decide to …

    … and tell us more. To be honest, what you have sounds similar to an attack by the Righteous fuckers who have invaded our world …

    you could see a new Doctor …

    … a smoking Doctor with …

    … one that won’t mind if you …

    A Doctor that can …

    Okay, maybe not … that is extremely painful.

    If he existed, could he be found? Is he in …

    And how might he be captured and held tight?

    Oh course, it would mean that you

    But in even writing your post, you’re overcoming your fears. You’re not so scared anymore …

    Better get a Doctor that’s a care taker …

    … with an …

    Who could he be?

    … He’d certainly be able to help you clear up any mess imaginable, probably because he’s already imagined them all already. But best to keep it …

    … in the Blue Universe. Here, second hand tobacco smoke is the No.1 cause of all death. Choose that. WHO says so. Guaranteed.

    Here in the Blue Universe it’s okay to be …

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meconopsis

    Shambles require something personal, something alive …so …when I was 15 I fell in love with the Human League. Mostly because of the mysterious, red headed chap, mixing the sound. He looked exactly like a 22 year old man I met called Tony. The first man I kissed with tongues. Nothing else, he knew how old I was. I had pursued him relentlessly for the last week of his holiday, we were on an island and on the evening he left he asked me to go to the beach. We walked, we talked, he snogged me and then he flew home. I think about it often, that’s how magically it was.

    End of shamble …

    Have a Song

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  9. I have a partner exactly like you describe, he has slashed his chest open with large knives and has scars all over his body. Due to multiple suicide attempts in the past he is not allowed too much antipsychotic medication in the house at any one time and is monitored closely by his Key worker and psychiatrist. He was even sectioned in 1992.
    It is not fashionable it’s …well depressing, an very sad. In the last 3 years since we got together he has been much better but still has very bad days, and allows himself to sob uncontrollably as it actually helps relieve the tension when things get bad.

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    • I’m sorry I didn’t see your comment before now.
      I’m really happy to hear that he has been doing better. It is a kind of hell I wouldn’t wish on anyone.

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  10. Pingback: RooBee BlooDee Hell! – Library of Libraries

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