Does it hurt? How can you bear the pain?

Pain is what keeps you coming back for more. It's like sometimes when you're just walking down the street, and you trip? That sudden jolt of reality is all you need to snap you back to life. Well with me, I would live all day in a daze, and one swipe of the razor, and I was alive again.[female, 18, 5 years SIB, senior in high school]

Yes--in actuality I hate the feeling of the blade in my wrist. But the physical pain is nothing compared to the emotional pain.[female, 14, <1 year SIB, secondary student]

I don't always feel pain while I'm cutting. If I am tremendously angry or upset, my body goes numb from the emotions. I can't feel anything. But most of the time I feel pain. It's the pain that makes me feel better. The pain that gives me that release.[female, 16, 4 years SIB, high school sophomore]

Absolutely, at times. Sometimes the pain FEELS good; sometimes it hurts and makes me want to stop. Most of the time it's a surreal type of pain that allows the pain I feel inside to come out. [female, age 36, 30 years SIB]

Anyone who says they don't feel pain is either lying, or really numb. Of course I feel pain. It's the body's natural reaction to let me know that I'm in danger, and to move away, or stop doing what I'm doing. That's probably why I continue. [female, age 13, 3 years SIB, middle school]

Not really. I'm sure if someone else was doing it to me, I'd feel it, but when I'm doing it it's a way to numb out all pain and I'm not even aware of the pain I'm inflicting on my skin until it's all over. [female, age 33, 23 years SIB, BA in Human services]

Not when I am actually making the cut. I just kind of feel this overwhelming peacefulness and silence. It hurts a little bit after, but it's a good kind of pain--like a memory of something I did that made me proud. [female, 18, 5 years SIB, secondary school honor student]

Not really. I feel SOMETHING; I can feel the blade, but it doesn't hurt. Sometimes that scares me; I'll look at what I've done, and wonder why it didn't hurt. A couple of times, I've felt absolutely NOTHING physically. It hurts the next day; like a "cutting hangover," and then it hurts to the point I can't stand it until it heals.[female, 19, 2 years SIB, college student]

[i feel pain] sometimes. when i am calm. i tend to cut slowly then. but when i lose it, become overcome with adrenaline. i feel like i am under remote control. i scream and cry and jump and stamp and shout and start punching walls. i try to keep shouting in my head not the fucking scalpel, but it doesn't work...i go back and forth but every time i give up.[male, 17, 9 years SIB, 12 years education]

sometimes i feel pain, but it will usually be later in a "session," after i already feel guilty about the act. usually by that point i stop because i become anxious about the cutting. [female, age 23, 6 years SIB, BA]

[I] never [feel it] until all the pain inside has vanished. Then [I feel] a slight sting. [female, age 20, 8 years SIB, college sophomore]

moderate [pain]....but the more pain....the better rush of peace.[male, 26, 1 year SIB, some college]

I have never felt any physical pain stronger than the emotional pain that I live with. Pain -- in my eyes, I am not supposed to feel it. When I was little and I would get hit or bashed, or bruised, pain there is unclear, but after that I stopped feeling it. I cut my leg and just look at it, but feel no pain. Sometimes it's scary. I mostly feel numb.
My boyfriend didn't believe me that i couldn't feel pain so he poked my arm with a broken guitar string, (which they happen to be a little sharp). He poked it in my arm and i did nothing and he kept pushing and the string popped through and popped out the other side. He just stood there stunned.[female, 20, 12 years SIB, some college]

I used to feel pain in the beginning but now I feel none. There is so much concentration in the act that I don't think about the pain, I block it out. I think if I considered it I would feel pain but I don't. [female, age 18, 2 years SIB, college student]

It hurts when I first do it and when I am watching myself do it but after a while it feels good and I can feel the "release". I just watch the blood for a while then I wrap it up and act like nothing has happened. [female, age 18, 4 years SIB, HS senior]

No. I grit my teeth and do it. Whatever I choose. If I start to feel the pain, I just grit my teeth and proceed. There is no physical pain that can compare to the emotional hell that I feel. [female, age 29, 10 years SIB, Junior with honors at a university]

Not at first. When I begin to feel the pain, it's almost as if I finally realize that I am alive and have any feelings at all. That's when I stop . . . when I begin to feel ANYTHING. [female, age 34, 2.5 years SIB, teacher]

Not pain, no. Not the same as pain that is not self-imposed. I think I'd use the word satisfaction more than pain. I don't want to die, I know that. [female, age 27, 19 years SIB, 1 yr. college]

Pain? Yes, only not like someone telling you something bad or deliberately hurting you. It's unexplainable right now...ANGER yeah anger fear misplacement a cry for help but no pain. [female, age 21, HS graduate]

Sometimes it hurts, but it's a good hurt. Sometimes I don't feel anything; I just see the blood and see myself doing it. It's almost like an out of body experience. [female, age 22, 2 years SIB, special education teacher]

When I'm actually doing it I don't feel any pain; I feel excited when I see the blood and I feel relieved when I feel the warmth of it pouring down my skin in a soothing river. I don't usually feel pain until the next day when my clothing touches it; sometimes when I clean it I feel pain but it never lasts more then thirty seconds or so. [female, age 23, 17 years SIB, college student]

Yes and no. I can't dig the knife into my arm or anything; that does hurt. But when I am doing it, the pain that does happen almost feels good, unless it turns into *too* much pain. But, then again, pain doesn't bother me too much at anytime. [female, age 16, 4 years SIB, HS junior taking college classes]

Yes and no. It is a different sensation. I usually don't feel the pain until the next day...while I am doing it there's just this bored interest in watching myself bleed...maybe I feel I might as well bleed physically the way I do emotionally. [female, age 22, 19 years SIB, 5 years college/high school honor student]

Yes, and if I don't, I get upset, often repeating the act again and again until one of the cuts bleeds a lot and looks like it will scar. Very rarely do I just say, "It doesn't hurt", and give up. [female, age 18, 4 years SIB, HS honor graduate, college freshman]

Yes, but not as much as "normal" people would. I feel pain, but it doesn't hurt. You know? [male, age 14, 2 years SIB]

Yes, that's the point. But its not like hurt pain, it's more of a soothing pain it calms me down makes me feel better. [male, age 26, 12 years SIB, AA degree]

No, not really. I am so angry that my physical pain is engulfed by my emotional pain. People have seen it and asked me, I have explained but no-one understands. Once I was so angry, I started to cut my wrist in lunch break at school. [male, age 17, 4 months SIB, 12 years education]

I enjoy it. It's a stinging pain, not harsh, that let more blood than I expected. It's very soothing; it calmed me when I was going hysterical. It took my emotions and made them concrete -- something that I could physically drain from my body. [female, 16 yrs, 6 months SIB, sophomore in HS]

I think I become so fascinated with it that the pain is the last thing on my mind. Truthfully, I enjoy it way too much. . . . A lot of times I don't want to stop and have to make myself. [female, age 19, 6 yrs SIB, jr in college]

When I burn myself, it is very very painful, but I have complete control of the pain. I can remove the cigarette whenever I want. [Sometimes] everything else in the room seems to disappear as if i were floating in an ocean. [female, age 19, 4 yrs SIB, college student]

Not pain of the cut itself....I concentrate on the pain of my life, which fills my mind. I don't feel the cut until later. [female, age 16, 2 yrs SIB, HS sophomore]

Yes, but it takes away the emotional pain for a while and it takes away all the black inside. [female, age 22, 8 yrs SIB]

I feel pain, but it's minimal. It doesn't bother me at all, I guess I kind of like it, but not like I get off on it. I feel like it just comes with the territory, I suppose to the extent that I need the pain (such as it is) as part of the SI ritual--if it didn't hurt at least some I wouldn't do it. [female, age 16, 2 yrs SIB, HS senior]

If I do feel pain, I think that I deserve it. [female, age 32, 24 yrs SIB, Master's student]

I feel pain but it doesn't affect me at all. I focus on the goodness of cutting and the feeling it gives me. [female, age 16, 9 months SIB, 8th grade]

I feel no physical pain only emotional pain. At times I feel as if I deserve what I am doing to myself. Maybe because I've let family or friends down or my grades aren't good enough and that I'm not good enough to be alive. [female, age 17, university freshman]

Sort of... though I get disappointed when the pain ebbs and I am left with only a warm feeling around that area (my pain threshold is rather high) and when even that warmth fades... [female, age 19, 2+ yrs SIB, university student]

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