For mental health resources and support, call or text 9-8-8 or visit the .
Payton Carter is 19 years old and about to start her second year at Texas Tech University. She鈥檚 enjoying her college experience, but school hasn鈥檛 always been a positive place for her.
In middle school, she said she struggled with being bullied on top of the hard and emotional changes you go through at that age.
鈥淲hen you were an adolescent, your problems felt like life or death,鈥� Carter said.
Looking for social connections, she turned to Instagram and Tumblr. She said she scrolled through social media with little supervision. A girl she didn鈥檛 know started following her, and she followed back.
鈥淪he started posting very graphic content about self-harming,鈥� Carter recalled. 鈥淚 was a very impressionable young girl. So I self-harmed for the first time. I was in the fifth grade.鈥�
The average age for starting to self-harm is 13, according to one often-cited that analyzed the behavior in over 40 countries.
Carter鈥檚 friends found out and told her parents, who helped her go to therapy. But she said she still struggled with self-harm off and on through high school.
鈥淎lmost every time something went wrong, or something bad happened, that's what I would turn to,鈥� Carter said. 鈥淚 don't know why I did it.鈥�
She said she now thinks her unchecked social media use likely worsened the mental health challenges she needed help with.
It鈥檚 estimated that around 17% of people will self-harm in their lifetime. It鈥檚 most common among adolescents.
Self-harming is , but it could correlate with one, like anxiety or depression. Known cases of those afflictions increased by 23% for Texas kids in 2020, according to data released in August by the . More than 500,000 young Texans were diagnosed with anxiety or depression that year.
Anecdotally, self-harming behaviors also increased in Lubbock during the pandemic.
is an assistant professor of couple, marriage, and family therapy at Texas Tech. He also practices at Desert Sky Family Therapy. He said the emotional effects of the pandemic could lead to self-harming behavior.
鈥淭he number one reason that individuals may participate in non-suicidal self-harm is to alleviate some type of overwhelming or negative emotion,鈥� Brown said.
He said it can also be a type of self-directed anger.
is another therapist in Lubbock who works with marginalized youth, at Phoenix Moon Healing. She said since the pandemic began, she has seen more kids with depression and anxiety about school and their futures. In her experience, the severity and consistency of self-harm has recently changed.
鈥淏efore, it might be, like, 鈥業 don't really want to be here,鈥� Luna said about what she hears from patients. 鈥淏ut now it's like, 鈥業'm going to steal my parents' pills and take them.鈥欌��
She said she has also seen a concerning increase in middle schoolers self-harming together.
鈥淏ecause if you hurt yourself, then I'm gonna hurt myself,鈥� Luna said. 鈥淎nd I maybe had heard that one time before, but this was escalated to a pretty drastic experience.鈥�
These behaviors can be , which is why knowing about them is important.
If someone you know is hurting themselves, it鈥檚 helpful to make them feel supported and not shamed. Finding healthier emotional releases can make a difference.
Payton Carter has worked on coping mechanisms that help, like journaling. She said she also looks for joy in everyday moments.
鈥淕etting to listen to a new Taylor Swift album, getting to talk to my friends in our car for, like, five hours. You know, just small things in life that make it worth it,鈥� Carter said. 鈥淎ll of those things are reasons why I don't self-harm anymore.鈥�
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