t want to die. This girl said she was too terrified to tell her parents that she had been hurting herself for four years. Lindy Garnette, director or child and family mental health services for the National Mental Health Association said that these dramatic gestures are not teen-age rebellion or blotched suicide attempts. Most of the children suffer from much deeper problems like anxiety, depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder. These episodes can worsen and result in permanent body damage or accidental suicide. Most of the time this happens because they feel out of control. Children need to realize what they are doing and take control of their lives. One psychologist instructed Tricia to draw on her arms in red ink as a way of replacing the cutting and burning. Children can also replace the cutting or burning with hold ice or lesser pains. I think that a lot of what is said in this article is true. I myself have a daughter who is now 16 and used to cut herself as a way to relieve pain. She felt as if she could not live up to what was expected of her. Her so-called best friend was going behind her back and talking about her because she was jealous. She didn’t think she was measuring up to what we expected of her. Her grades were slipping and she was failing two classes. What didn’t help was the fact that she had a teacher who was also telling her she would never amount to anything and she was stupid. The person who noticed this was the school nurse. I was called to the school and had to talk to the nurse, principal and counselor. Kristin was asked to join us in this discussion to determine what needed to be done. She started crying and let everyone know how she felt. I was very sad for her and understood how she felt. They them gave us some information on counselors and let Kristin go home early. I took her home and had a long talk and she promised that she would never do that again. It has now b...
