SELF HARMING/SELF LOATHING

When a child has experienced trauma their sense of self is deeply impacted and if they haven’t had appropriate opportunities to process these experiences in a warm and empathetic relationship they may feel that they were to blame for what happened to them which increases their sense of shame and guilt, as they try to manage these big feelings by self-harming.

Children and young people self-harming is becoming increasingly common and has a chemical impact on the brain.  It’s key to remember not to berate these behaviours as ‘attention seeking behaviours’ and instead keep in mind that often self-harming is a complex response to trauma.

Often when this starts in childhood it can continue into adulthood unless the trauma has been processed.

What are the most helpful things we can do?

FOR CHILDREN

• Don’t tell the young person that they are attention seeking as this will increase the shame and isolation- remember that all attentions seeking behaviour is actually attachment seeking behaviour and shows they have an unmet need.

• Be empathetic - notice if the child or young person is struggling and let them know you care for them

• Don’t try to force them to change as this will increase their feelings of powerlessness

FOR ADULTS

• Recognise that the person is expressing pain of some kind. Often they haven’t got words to describe the pain and so self harm can act like an expression of this feeling.

• Recognise that there can be peer pressure to self harm and peer pressure to look ‘right’ which can lead to adults who always feel that they don’t fit in and are not ok. They need love and acceptance from warm and kind people around them who speak encouraging words to them.

• Sometimes they need to access professional trauma therapy to process the childhood trauma that led to the trauma symptoms.