Alive

Disclaimer-It's graphic, or not really, deepening on what you see as graphic. And I also want to say, that no, I've never done this to myself. (And if you have, please get help. For your safety)

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Somehow, my mother manages to ruin every scrap of self-confidence I work up. Saying I’m dumb, useless, ugly. I press the cool razor to my forearm.

Am I sure I’m doing this?

Anything to feel the pain.

I let the cool metal penetrate my skin, leaving four vertical cuts. I sigh with the pain.

I’m still alive.

The scarlet liquid drops to the tiled floor, splattering out. I lift my forearm to my mouth and lick the blood, the metallic taste stinging my mouth.

I’m still alive

Comments & reviews · 3
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User avatar
chellelynn
Review

This needs way more feeling. I feel like it was written in boredom, with not enough understanding of such a sensitive issue. Self mutilation affects millions of people, every single day. One little comment alone is not enough to lead to such extremes. However, a build up of these comments every day, even every week, can do it. If you can imagine a person doing this, they certainly wouldn't be as calm as that. Dig deeper into the mental struggle of the MC, whether they should go through with it or not? The tears rolling down their cheeks, their trembling hands, holding their breath before their arm is cut. The anger in the MC's mind, at the mother. Many people do this to themselves to feel something, or to be able to control the pain. They can't control the emotional pain their feeling, the overwhelming sense of worthlessness, of being disgusted in themself, so they find comfort in being able to control their physical pain because it's better than being completely out of control. Perhaps the MC can hear her mother in the kitchen, or commenting something positive on a sibling, making the MC even angrier. And then at the end, perhaps the guilt of having done it yet again. This is an issue that was once a part of my life when I was very young, and I've met many others who have suffered with this, so thank you for bringing light to it.

User avatar
theotherone
Review

Hello there. :)

This is really short, and I think you could really write more on this topic than you actually do. Like writing a flash back to an actual scene where her mother is saying those things to her... Explain why, where, how. Another flash back of something else entirely that somehow puts more pressure on the MC. Doing the actual cutting. Does she has distractions? I don't know if you understand, but we need more substance. Something else to hold on to.
I also have to say that the topic you have chosen to write about is a good one, since a lot can relate to it. And it seems like it's on going in a good direction.

Keep writing!

-Other One

User avatar
sargsauce
Review

This story is far too short to garner much interest. It's a generic narrator with generic suicidal tendencies with a generic insensitive mother and a generic solution to the problem. The descriptions are straightforward and expected and could come from anybody's mouth.

Make the story yours. Breath life into it and make it deep and nuanced, like life, like real problems are. A) My mom tells me I'm ugly leads to B) cutting myself--that's far too simple. There are few life-changing choices that arise from such simple logic.

The fact that you have a back-of-the-cereal-box understanding of the subject shows through this oversimplification. And the thing is that most of us have this elementary level of understanding, so it doesn't catch our attention. Show us more, fool us into thinking you have intimate knowledge of the issue, bring us into the world.

I'm not saying do any of it make the story a novel length, but put some more thought into it and make it a good story.



Life’s disappointments are harder to take if you don’t know any swear words.
— Bill Watterson