Ok me and my girlfriend been together for bout 3 years and a half. we are almost 18 now. in january. and the problem is, i used to cut myself to relief the pain that i had from my parents and just blow of steam from my girl. two months later we got into a big fight and wanted to try it and people were telling me she was doing it. so icalled and just we talked and fixed it all. like a month later her family was calling her stupid and retarded for doing it. i got mad when she did it to, but ill never call her stupid. so she started to cut herself more, cause of it. so i told her to stop and forget bout it and she didnt so i started to do it again and then she agreed to stop. ok now oct. 1st we got into a hug fight and told her dad that she cut herself. and he was blaming his self for it. so then in the morning he told her she cant talk to me or call me or see me and it hurt her she doesnt care bout her dad or family now. i told her why doesnt she and she said she doesnt know why she cared in the first place. that hurt me alot. so couple nights ago her dad was drunk and was threating to throw her cell and iod out the window while driving back home from pasadena. i havent seen her for a while and its causing us problems so we fought today bout something that happened and i told her i was gonna hop in the shower and she said she was too but when she does she will hurt herself so i called her and she picked up and i said babe dont do nothing and she was crying just leave me alone. i broke down i couldnt do nothing. so i called her dad the man that hates me! and he started to blame me and say he was gonna kill me and everything. he cussed me out and said he will find me if i run. i told him ill let him. so he was at work and i was texting my babe tell her i will always be there and she was treating me like sh**. i couldnt do nothing but cry i love this girl and dont want her hurt. so i called a friend to help her and she did. just asking someone what should i do im hurting now i dont want her to leave me. thanks - angel

Hi Angel,

People cut themselves for a lot of different reasons and they rarely mean to actually truly hurt themselves. However, they often get carried away and end up severly hurting themselves.

One thing that may help is called, "Cognitive Behavioral Therapy."

This is a kind of therapy where the believe is that: we learn to react to stress a certain way and so everytime there is stress there is an automatic need to react the same way. In the therapy sessions you learn to react differently to stress.

For instance a person may fail a test. The test failure makes him think. "I'm stupid" Thinking "I'm stupid" then makes him think "Nobody loves me." Thinking that then makes him think "This hurts" then cutting himself relieves the mental pain.

Cognitive Behavioral therapy teaches the brain to think like this:

Person fails a test. The test failure makes him think, "I didn't study the right material"..."The test was very hard"..."I need to talk to other people in the class and get some help for the next test"

This helps people take the negative focus of of themselves and begin problem solving.

Your girlfriend needs real help. She is clearly not coping. You were right to call her father, but perhaps next time you should get some help in approaching him. It may be useful to talk to one of your school counselors about how to get some help.