Hope Is Real
Listening Is The Language Of Love

When I was a kid, I LOVED to play with bandaids. To me, they had magical healing powers when in reality, they just kept the yucky stuff out and prevented infections.
At the age of 12, cutting became my bandaid for the things in life. When the hate, anger, abuse, fear, and betrayal became too much for me to handle, I would cut. Rather than deal with the problems, cutting covered those things up so it wouldn’t affect me too badly. It started off slow, only cutting every so often, and then every little thing eventually became an overwhelming issue.
Time and time again, I tried to quit cutting. I would last anywhere from 2 weeks to 6 months. I would eventually always come back to it and for the life of me, I couldn’t figure out why! Giving in after quitting would only frustrate me more and I often would ask myself if quitting the habit was even worth it.
It had been 6 months and 2 weeks since I last cut. For weeks, the urge to cut had been building and this particular night, I gave in. I cut myself 4 times on my upper thigh before collapsing on my bed in tears and exhaustion. I began my ritual of grumbling to God about giving in again abd the regret of doing it after so long of stopping when I finally just stopped and thought about WHY I couldn’t quit once and for all. Then it hit me.
I may have given up the act of cutting but I didn’t give up the reasons why I was cutting in the first place. I was only pulling back the bandaid a bit to let the wound air out and heal for a bit before I slapped it right back on!
That night I seriously took into account the reasons I was cutting myself. All the way back to the first break of skin. The reasons why I cut when I was 12 were different reasons for why I was cutting at 16. I realized I would have to give those reasons from back then and now to God if I ever really wanted to quit cutting.
So I did.
It has been nearly 7 months since that night. That night I ripped off the bandaid completely. This period of quitting has been different from any other time. When I think about cutting now, it’s in the past tense and I can honestly say that I don’t even get the urge to cut anymore. God has takens those burdens from me and I don’t feel the need to cover up the hurt and the pain anymore.
Without cutting, I have less stress, fears, and worries. There is still some there, don’t get me wrong. But it’s not an extreme anymore.
Without cutting, I’m free.