Sharing

Here is something I wrote a few weeks ago. I never thought I'd post it. But I guess I was wrong. I feel like such a shit doing it this way, but here goes.

Today was a bad day. I've had so many good days recently I'd forgotten what it feels like. I think I've forgotten how to cry it out properly.

If ever this particular entry reaches the light of day it will have been on an impulse click. "Publish Now," and then I scurry off somewhere to not think about what I just shared you all. the content will be half forgotten, and I'll do it because I feel I should in a single moment. I may well regret it later.
On February 19th 2007 I sat on my bed with a small vegetable knife in my hand, shirtless. I pressed the blade against my neck. The cold was thrilling. It wasn't sexual, not really. It was more like an adrenaline high, my heart pumping faster as I moved the knife lightly across my skin, down my chest. I poked my nipple gently, then up to the shoulder and down the sensitive skin of the underarms. It's the anticipation that makes it, the cold blade travelling down with the promise of a proper release soon. I put the knife on my forearm and scraped a short line downwards towards the back of my hand.

The blood didn't come right away, but I wanted to see it. I'd self harmed before a little, and in some way the object was to shed blood, but just enough, to watch it ooze from the underflesh in cheerful, cherry red droplets, perfectly round and catching the light like half forgotten Christmas baubles.
This day was different though. It wasn't enough to concentrate all my bile and rage into that one line, so I gouged out a word, the first line becoming the horizontal line in a capital T. The word was HATE, untidy and with the A very small, as I didn't leave quite enough space. I don't think I'll ever forget how delicious it felt. The long, slow, utterly exquisite pain, blossoming white hot as the knife carved through a thin layer of skin, then spreading out in a rush of warm tingling. You know what they say about agony and Ecstasy. Where the lines crossed was the best, the knife suddenly slipping into an already burning hotspot, igniting another gush of pain.

I was literally trembling by the time I had finished, although spraying on the disinfectant was an altogether more unpleasant type of pain. I had less control over it.

That was how it started for me. I couldn't self harm for a while after that, having taken up too much space. As with any addiction you learn tricks to maximise your pleasure. I took to rotating zones. Upper arm this week, lower arm next week, and by the week after the upper arm has healed enough to carry one.
There are rules too. My friends spotted my first attempts, so I lied, humoured them. I openly showed them the shallow slices on my forearms and assured them I was doing what I did cleanly (true) carefully (also true) and that I wasn't going any deeper than what they saw, but while the small nicks and scratches were good for a quick thrill, the really long deep pleasure came from the deeper cuts in the soft flesh of my upper arms and inner legs. There are fascinating things about it, senses are on hyper alert, and there's a golden moment after the cut, but before the blood, where you can literally stretch the surface skin apart and see pink, live, hairless flesh underneath.

I took periodic breaks, to make sure that I wasn't too dependant on my new addiction, and in late spring 2009 I found myself having to cut deeper and deeper to get my fix, so I ditched my habit, just like that. In September 2009 I made a brief return, cutting two or three deep cuts into my upper arm, and watching the blood droplets tremble with surface tension before catching them with a tissue. I went through so much tissue my parents must have thought I was masturbating 6 times a day! It didn't stick though, and until the time of writing this the urge to cut, carve, gouge, had forsaken me.

But it's back. Like an old itch, a temptation in my ear and I'm resisting it. I'm not sure why, I just am. Perhaps I shouldn't.

But someone'll notice if I do give in, someone'll spot the cuts this time, and I don't completely trust my restraint.

So I'm blogging instead.