Your self-harm scars belong to you; it is your choice when, if ever, to show them or hide them from the world. For those days when you would rather keep things under wraps, it's helpful to know what sort of self-harm scar cover-up options are at your disposal.

When you experience a panic attack, the physical sensations are so intense they often cloud your judgment. For example, you may hyperventilate while the room seems to spin and your heart is about to race out of your chest. Some people may also feel like they're cornered in a flight-or-fight situation and may even self-harm during a panic attack. Why does that happen? I'm not sure I have the answers, but I can offer my personal insight.

A self-harm mantra may not be the magical cure we wish it could be, but it can be a powerful tool to help you focus and stay motivated on the road to self-harm recovery. Here are a few ideas to help you choose or craft your own healing mantra.

Whether you've slowed down due to the pandemic or thrown yourself into the sea of new responsibilities, you might feel emotionally exhausted as a result. This is completely normal, though it might become an obstacle on your road to self-harm recovery. Burnout could easily become a trigger and exacerbate self-harm urges, so it's important to recognize the signs and take action before it's too late.

Self-harm relapse can happen to anyone, whether you've been self-harm-free for one day or 100 days. Being zero days clean from self-harm doesn't mark the end of your healing journey. If you keep calm and take things one step at a time, you can—and will—be able to move on from this detour and continue with your self-harm recovery.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and we've almost reached the end of it. Each year, I see more and more people opening up about their struggles, encouraged by themed conversations on social media and beyond. However, I feel self-injury is particularly difficult to talk about publicly, so self-harm stigma is still going strong. Why are people so afraid of self-harm?

I am not a licensed therapist or medical professional; I cannot tell you how to use cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) for self-harm recovery. But I hope that, by sharing my own experience, I can help you decide whether it is an option you should investigate further for self-harm recovery.

Most people associate self-harm with self-imposed physical injuries that can be seen on the surface of one's skin. However, self-injury can come in many other forms and include behaviors that are much more complex. For instance, some people may use binge eating as self-harm, or they may struggle with an eating disorder like anorexia or bulimia that fuels their self-injury.

As a self-harmer, you can easily become convinced that choosing to hurt yourself, rather than others, is the right thing to do. But if there's one thing I learned from my own self-harm experiences, it's that hurting yourself to help others rarely works out the way you hope it will.

Narcissism and self-harm may not seem like an obvious pair. After all, most narcissists think extremely highly of themselves, so engaging in self-injurious behaviors might seem like a counter-intuitive action. However, there is a form of narcissism where self-harm is more prominent, and some might even use it to manipulate their victim.