Discursive Essay

Good evening, my name is Cora. I am going to talk to you today about self-harm. Some of you may think this topic is irrelevant to your own lives but, in fact, the group with the highest rate of self-harm are young women aged fifteen to nineteen. Also, it is believed that two in ten teenagers self-injure at some point in their teenage years. Look around you now… Roughly six people in this class self-harm. Now so you think it’s more relevant? Research shows that half the people in the UK know of someone who has self-harmed but according to expert, Simon Armson, a large proportion of us have little or no understanding of it. So in the next few minutes I hope to fill you in on what you need to know about self-harm.

For those of you who don’t really know what self-harm is, it is very broadly defined as the deliberate attempt to physically injure yourself without causing death. Self-injury can take the form of burning, scratching, cutting, biting, scalding, poisoning and ripping hair out. Although very damaging and distressing eating disorders, unsafe sex and alcohol and drug abuse are not officially counted as self-harm.

So now that you know what it is, how do you feel about it? For many of you the notion of deliberately cauising pain to yourself and putting yourself in serious danger is baffling. However for others it may make more sense. Krysten, who has been diagnosed with depression said,

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“I remember starting out small, wanting to see how much I could take”

Tanya, who is fifteen, said her friends did it and thought it must do something for them so once when she “felt down” she tried it. However I think it is significant that a year eleven pupil said to me,

“I feel sorry that some people would rather feel pain than feel nothing!”

Yet, to end feelings of numbness is not the only reason for self-harm. Motivations vary from distraction from emotional pain or painful thoughts or memories to calming intense feelings. Some people self-harm ...

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