3/2/2009: Self-Injury Awareness Day...

I posted this on The Z and on Facebook. The one on Facebook had a little orange ribbon that said, "SURVIVOR" through it. :)

I still struggle with the idea of being an addict. I see all of these people whom I know and are on that show "Intervention", and I think to myself: I'm not an addict. I never was.If we deny our past, we'll never move forward into our future. I started scratching my arms and wrists when I was twelve. The first night that I did so was because my dad had called me fat and stupid. You can be mad at him if you'd like, but I'm not anymore. For far too long, I allowed other people to influence my perception of myself and my beauty. What I have realized in the past six years is that learning to love yourself takes time. In the end, I believe God spoke truth when He said that I was "fearfully and wonderfully made". Too often I allow myself to be convinced by my own mind that my addiction to self-injury was never "that bad". I bare scars, yes, but most of them are easily concealed, faint, and nowhere near the scars I have seen on some of my good friends. What I've had to learn is that we're unified in our addiction, but we're unique in our walk and our recovery. We can offer support and we can understand each other. We can be there when something goes wrong, pray when someone goes too far, rejoice when someone is freed... but the simple truth is that none of us can be the same. It just doesn't work that way.I was addicted to self-injury. For many weeks, months, and years I could barely get through a day without hurting myself. I carried tools in my purses and stashed them around my room and my house. I hurt myself in the bathroom stalls at school. If I went a few days without, I felt like I was losing my mind.I was a self-injurer. I could define myself by my addiction, but I have always known that I am more than the sum of my addictions because I have been saved by the most amazing person to ever walk the face of this planet.The best I could ever do on my own was to cut myself, to binge and purge, to drink and do drugs and shoplift. The best I could ever do on my own was to destroy myself. I now walk a new walk. Jesus is my hope. He is my strength. He is my everything. I was a self-injurer. Now, I am free.