I was that kid in high school who assumed that they were invincible. When my friends were having panic attacks about eating a quarter of a weed brownie, I was laughing while overdosing on twelve pills of ecstacy. It never occurred to me that I could die. It never occurred to me that perhaps, smoking crack actually wasn’t vital to my adolescent experience. That my private school upbringing and privileged background were what I should have been grateful for, not something to be rejected by means of self destruction. See, self destruction has always been my first response. It comes easily to me, naturally, automatically, and most of the time, it takes every fiber of my being to fight it.
What most people don't understand about the self destructive ones is how vulnerable we are. Our souls are naked, terrified, and when in doubt, we will back off and retreat. Most importantly, we will do nearly anything to avoid hurting another person. Instead of angrily taking our day out on a stranger, you’ll see us chain smoking, almost as a sacrifice. If someones gotta hurt, it might as well be one of us. If we hurt ourselves this much, no one else has the power to do it instead. Its a backwards kind of psychology, but it makes sense. When you’re a jerk to a self destructive person, I can almost guarantee that when they’re smoking or drinking later, they’ll be saying to you in their head “I hope you’re happy, it’s your fault you made me do this.”
Which is what it all boils down: wanting to be loved, wanting not to hurt. We’re not good at loving ourselves, but that doesn’t mean we don’t try. We’re sensitive, we jump to sadness easily, and we’re quick to blame others for our internally directed anger.
Often, we’re just trying to even the world out a little bit. Some very fortunate people are some of the most self destructive. If you get angry at us for our behavior, it is confusing for us. The reason why we’re being self destructive is to protect you from ourselves. We know that the only people that we want to take our abuse, well, is ourselves.
In my case, I know that part of my subconscious is perplexed by how easy I have it. I know that my life is beautiful and blissful compared to most, and for some reason my brain can’t seem to conclude that this is “fair.” As a result, I try to even the score, and take my anger out on myself instead of the world. I’m not saying we’re smart by doing this, but we are a soft population of people. Much softer than most would think.
It isn’t easy being self destructive. It’s one thing to feel like you’re against the world, but feeling like you’re both against the world and yourself is a very challenging place to be.
Don’t get angry at a self destructive person for being the way that they are. From your angle, it doesn’t make sense, simply put. From their side it feels both logical and routine. They are full of emotion and do not know where to put it.
If you would like to try to help someone who tends in this direction, try communicating this idea.
It isn’t about who should be the recipient of this pain, sadness, and anger, but rather, where it should go. This negativity shouldn't have much power at all, besides being used for fuel. Instead of having to put this hurt onto a person, you can work to put it through an outlet. This is healthy, painless, and possible.
