The Weirdly Normal Process of Going to Hospital for Self-Harm

Content warning: self-harm, psych ward admission, suicide attempt mentioned briefly This is not medical advice. It is based on my experience going to hospital after self-harm plus my understanding of when cuts need medical attention. I am writing this because a lot of what exists around self-harm and hospital is either too vague to be useful or too sanitised to feel real. I do not want to write a crisis pamphlet, I want to explain what the process can actually feel like when you are the person sitting in ED after self-harm and provide some guidance to those wondering when their self-harm needs hospital treatment When I speak of self-harm a lot of the medical treatment (stitches, etc) is specific to my experience of cutting but other aspects of it around how hospital staff treat folks presenting for self-harm are more broadly applicable regardless of method If you are actively unsafe right now do the boring obvious thing: Go to ED, call emergency services or contact a crisis line.…