Finding healthy alternatives to self-injury can be stressful. Sometimes, it’s tough finding someone who understands the emotions and thoughts connected with self-harm. Many people hate thinking about counseling or talking about their self-harm because, well, it is too personal. So, if you’re too nervous to jump into therapy or tell someone you self-injure, where can you go? What can you do? Why not dive into a good book? A TV show? A movie?

This week, I'm focusing on healthy alternatives to self-injury as a followup to my previous article about using natural supplements to calm anxiety and self-injury urges. Contrary to popular opinion, I do not believe that cathartic techniques suggested by many treatment centers, books and websites are beneficial to coping with self-injury urges. These techniques can include: snapping a rubber band against the wrist coloring on your arms with a red pen holding an ice cube to your skin hitting, punching or breaking items.

In my last video blog post, I explained how and why anxiety can lead to self-injury; how many people who suffer from anxiety often engage in self-harming behaviors in order to cope with their anxiety symptoms. In this video, I focus on natural vitamins and supplements you can use to combat your anxiety, and therefore lessen your urge to self-injure when triggered by anxiety and panic.

This week's topic coincides with last week's topic - safe self-injury alternatives. In this vlog, I talk about managing self-injury urges in a healthy way, by using impulse control logs specially designed by S.A.F.E. ALTERNATIVES®, the world-renowned self-injury treatment program.

When you've got an urge to self-injure, it's good to have an alternative list of healthy coping mechanisms to use. This helps you avoid physically harming yourself when dealing with dfficult emotions. In this video blog, I discuss several healthy alternatives to self-injury behavior, and talk about some common controversial methods and whether I think they work or don't work to stop self-injuring.

If you pick up a book, or look up a website to read the facts about self-injury; you will often find that it is almost always linked to Borderline Personality Disorder. That's because people with BPD often act impulsively in a self-destructive way - generally through alcohol abuse, drug abuse, promiscuity, over spending and gambling or self-injury.

I have noticed that a lot of people think that only young adolescent, teenage girls self-injure. It's one of the most inaccurate stereotypes facing self-injurers. And I'm not the only one who feels this way. When I asked current self-injurers who visit my site what they thought the biggest misconception about self-injury was, a majority noted it was the perception that only teenagers self-injure. As an adult, I can attest that adults self-injure, too - and, in this video blog, I aim to dispel that stereotype!