Show Notes
Imagine being asked to give up the most effective strategy you have for coping with stressful situations... this is often what it can feel like to people trying to give up self-harm. In this episode, Dr Lucy Maddox talks to Jane, who first used self-harm when she was 14, and Dr Lucy Taylor, who works with young people to try to overcome self-harm. This episode contains discussion about self-harm and reference to suicide. Show Notes and Transcript Podcast episode produced by Dr Lucy Maddox for BABCP Books Cutting Down by Lucy Taylor, Mima Simic, & Ulrike Schmidt https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cutting-Down-workbook-treating-self-harm/dp/0415624533 Websites www.cbtregister.uk for a list of BABCP accredited therapists https://youngminds.org.uk/ for resources for parents and children about self harm https://www.minded.org.uk/ for resources on child and adolescent mental health and development www.babcp.com for more CBT resources You can also listen to our podcast on Dialectical Behavioural Therapy, or DBT, for more on a different approach to self harming. Transcript Lucy: Hi, and welcome to let's talk about CBT, with me, Dr Lucy Maddox. This podcast, brought to you by the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies or BABCP, is all about CBT. What it is, what it's not, and how it can be useful. Today, we're focusing on CBT for self-harm.
We obviously talk a lot about self-harm and we also mention suicide, so please look after yourselves and if you know that's something that's especially hard for you to listen to, then maybe just skip this one.
Jane: I think self-harm is something that is a way to control your feelings. It was a way for me to feel something and know why I was feeling it, and know that I was doing it, and know that I could understand it.
Lucy: That was Jane, who we're going to hear more from in a bit. For this episode, I also went to speak to Dr Lucy Taylor, a clinical psychologist, who has worked for 20 years in the NHS, mostly with children and young people. And who now works in private practice in Surrey.
Lucy T: My main interests are self-harm and cognitive behavioural therapy and how to engage young people that might be struggling a little bit to come to therapy.
Lucy: Could you say a little bit about what self-harm is?
Lucy T: Yeah, I think generally, the way we think about self-harm is on a dimension, and when we look at the literature and we look at the studies on self-harm, we talk about causing deliberate harm to your body. And that might be through cutting yourself or burning yourself or taking an overdose. But when we're talking about the dimension, it might mean also maybe drinking a little bit too much alcohol or not eating nutritionally rich food or restricting your diet.
So, it can mean lots of different things, but when we're talking about it within the clinic, it's a deliberate act of hurting yourself. And sometimes that can mean you want to die, and often that isn't because you want to die, but it is a way of coping.
Lucy: So, it sounds like a bit of a spectrum of experience, actually.
Lucy T: Yes. And I think when people come to the clinic, it's starting to cause problems. So, it might be that we all occasionally do things that actually aren't great for us, but it doesn't necessarily cause a problem in our everyday lives.
When it's becoming more it's affecting functioning or it's starting to affect relationships, or work or jobs or school, or when people are concerned about others, that's usually when they come to the clinic.
Lucy: For Jane, self-harm was first around for her when she was a teenager. But she didn't actually get help until her early 20s.
Jane: My name is Jane, I self-harmed from the age of 14.
People spoke about it openly.
Lucy: Like in your class, you mean?
Jane: Just in general, but it was still very looked down upon. I remember being in school, and I had these colourful bits of material over my arms,
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