Teenagers with wounded souls, how can we help them?

Increasing numbers of teens self-harm to cope with life's challenges. By cutting themselves, individuals relieve psychological agony and lessen anxiety. They may find self-harm narcotic.

Self-harm is “an injury caused intentionally by the person themselves”. The purpose is not suicide and is voluntary. Self-harm is not suicide, thus distinguishing it from suicidal behaviour is crucial. Ironically, the teenager self-mutilates to make “life to hurt him less”.

Youth self-harm is a global public health issue due to the rising number of reports (Zaragozano, 2017). Self-harm sometimes involves cutting, burning, pulling out hair, itching, or eating harmful substances.

Self-harm can be linked to clinical conditions like depression, anorexia, or borderline personality disorder. In some circumstances, self-harm occurs without a clinical cause. As teens get older, these behaviours seem to increase. These are more common in women.

Skin wounds, scrapes, and burns are common self-harms.
Why do people self-harm?
We stated at the start that physical self-harm is psychological. Teens express psychological suffering via self-harming. One could call self-harm a "non-verbal form of expression of suffering" (Zaragozano, 2017).

Up to 6 motivations could explain self-harm. We shall teach them using a clinical case.

Adolescents should seek help from family, friends, or someone meaningful. In self-harm, 21-year-old Andrea says, “if you go and leave me, I will hurt myself.”

As punishment. Andrea says, "I cut myself because I disgust myself, I cannot achieve good things in life, and I do not deserve my family." They treat me wonderfully! Look how I appreciate them for their help. As a terrible girl, I cut myself. Andrea's thoughts are very disordered and distressing.

To reduce psychological discomfort. The patient typically says, "Sometimes the only way to stop feeling so much anxiety is to hurt myself." So I can concentrate on the cut's pain rather than my anxiousness. The agony is more tangible.

Similar to parasuicidal behaviour. This behaviour does not promote suicide. Call it “a flirtation with actual suicidal behavior.” Andrea says, “I cut myself very close to the last scar. I always attempt to get deep but don't! I cannot commit suicide. Thus, despite agony, the person has reasons to live.

They feel terribly “empty”. This mood is often associated with borderline disorder. Even excruciating self-harm would fill the void. Andrea says, “sometimes I feel so alone and empty that I hurt myself. I feel more alive. I feel more than emptiness.

Every self-harm is clinically significant. Thus, self-harming behaviours, regardless of reason, require calm and deliberate attention.

Teens generally struggle with conflict resolution, thus problem-solving programmes target that. Our teens learn to identify and characterise problems, generate solutions, implement them, and evaluate their impact.

This situation works well with cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT). It aims to change how adolescents view important events so they can be healthy and well-being-promoting.

Social skills training tries to transform teenagers' relationships. Effective and aggressive communication is the goal, not self-harm.

Family therapy may have great benefits. Its goal is to improve family communication to resolve issues.

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