I Used To Sleep With A Razor Under My Pillow

I used to sleep with razors in my bed as a preventative measure to stop myself from cutting. Weird – I know! You would think that keeping them within arms reach would encourage me to cut, but I found solace in knowing that they were there. Wanting what you can’t have makes you want the prized possession even more. I found that having razors in my bed left me with two options: I could cut; or I could go to sleep sans cutting. I found that when I didn’t have the razors next to me I would crave them, think about them, and think about what I could cut myself with. When I had them with me, I wouldn’t get that urge.

I never actually cut myself with razors; I was just always tempted to. Something always stopped me from doing so. Whenever I was sad or miserable on a daily, I would get the urge to harm myself. I used to read a lot about this subject, I delved right into my psyche and thought surely it is normal for everyone to want to do so. How could I think about this every day and other people not? Surely they had the same mind track but just did not act on it. I read about other peoples’ experiences, often they cut to feel something or to stop them from feeling numb. I could not relate to this, I found my reasoning to be the complete opposite. I felt too much – my heart would race, I wanted to so badly rip it out of my chest, throw it against the wall and stomp all over it. I wanted to feel nothing, I wanted to feel numb. The only way I felt that I could calm myself down was to cut. To let it out – let the blood flow from my body as a form of release. Then I could focus on the pain, focus on something else for a change.

I became obsessed and would dream about cutting. Dreaming about it felt good. I could almost feel the enjoyment of piercing my skin without thinking to myself that I was psychologically ill if I physically cut. As much as I loved the concept, the idea of cutting scared me. It still does. When you hear of other people cutting it screams depression and attention. In fact, I know it screams ‘CRAZY BITCH’ – that I so desperately did not want to be. I knew myself that I was sick but I didn’t want other people to know. Moreover, I didn’t want to admit to myself that I was devastatingly going insane because I felt that at the end of the day no one would care except myself. So every day I would grit my teeth and bare the pain. If I felt the urge to cut I would scratch myself silly with my nails – but to me that did not count as hardcore cutting. Once I felt the pain of the grazed skin surface I would instantly snap out of my ‘crazy’ and realize that it did hurt – that the pain lingered. It was not instant and over with. It was constant.

Some sick part of me fantasized about the scars on my arms and legs. I would flirt with the idea of what would it be like to show my scars off to other people. Evidentially, this was a cry for help as much as it was a release. I always thought if I were to cut I would do it on my thighs so no one would see (a way to convince delude myself into thinking it wasn’t an attention scheme). However, I still always envisaged the arms. I used to love the red marks that came up after I would scratch myself. I loved that everyone could possibly see them when I stretched out my arm. Yet, when I caught someone glancing at them I instantly started to feel ashamed, weak – no one likes to see that kind of thing. No one gives you the attention you need such as an “are you alright?” I felt like they judged me in a more “she’s gone crazy!” way and would avoid the issue altogether. It became unspoken. This is not what I wanted. I was confused with what I wanted.

Now I rarely think about cutting. Keeping the razors accessible in my bed helped me get over it. I finally chucked them out when I came to my senses. I felt disgusted in myself that I knew the reason why they were there. I realized that I must have been really sick for it to even consume my mind at length. It went from being something unshakable that I thought about every single day to hardly ever thinking about it. It still upsets me that years later, I get sporadic urges to cut myself. Sometimes, when I feel that urge, I still pierce my skin with my nails. I wonder if I will ever completely stop thinking about it and when I will start respecting my body completely. I am still flawed, I still have my up and down days, however, I know deep down that I cannot hurt myself. As much as I hate myself at times I can never bring myself to do the things I think about.

The fact that I never properly cut but had the urge to makes me feel ashamed. I feel that I was caught in between. I wanted to cut but I could not even achieve that. I could not claim to be a real cutter. It often crosses my mind that I was a chicken for not being able to do so. On the other hand, maybe I have enough self-respect without completely realizing. These days, I feel that my old thoughts’ regarding this was a ploy for attention. Counteractively, I never told anyone. So maybe it is just a fantasy of mine – I love pain, I love feeling. Part of a fantasy is that you dream about it but you rarely undertake it unless it is within your means and are willing to do it.

Maybe one day when I can count myself as happy, I will never have this fantasy again.