Why do parents do what they do?

[KarkatLuv]

On here I have read so many stories of how parents reacted when they find scars. Do they actually think that punishing you and being angry at you will solve the problem, do they not realise they are making a horrible situation worse. I have only ever cut once or twice, but If my parents ever saw scars I think I would die, have a panic attack and die right there.

[Fractured Silhouette]

Some might think it helps, some might not. Varies from parent to parent.

Unless they learn to understand, they will never realize that they are just making it worse by getting angry.

They do what they do because they don't know what else to do, usually because they are very ignorant. To be fair, their hearts are probably in the right place. They probably just want you to stop before you cause serious harm to yourself. Once again, varies.

[FullyAlive]

Parents react badly because they're scared, scared to death that there's something hurting their child and they can't stop it. They can't keep it way, they can't protect their child. A parent spends their life protecting their child and suddenly there's this thing that's hurting their child and it's out of their control, and they don't know what to do. So maybe they shout and scream and punish them because they hope it'll make them stop, they don't realise that they just need to take some time to understand, all they realise is their child is being hurt and they need it to stop.

It's fear, causing irrational behaviour they know the punishments won't work but they don't know what else to do. You need to sit them down, get them some information and talk to them. Once they understand how to help they'll be less angry. But remember the anger and upset isn't at you they love you, they're angry at themselves for feeling like they've let you down.

[Mortal Coil]

Parents don't understand it at all. They're ignorant and as a result only do things that make the situation worse. They do it because punishing you is the only way they know how to react to you doing something that they don't like.

[ChaseThisLight]

In my opinion; parents rationalise our scars or cuts etc as their failings. They blame themselves and in doing so over-react. It's such a serious illness; misrepresented by the media and parents as being unnecessary cries for attention.

imo this site needs a guide for parents and dealing with their children. Thoughts mods?

[KarkatLuv]

imo this site needs a guide for parents and dealing with their children. Thoughts mods?
that would probably be a good idea

[FullyAlive]

imo this site needs a guide for parents and dealing with their children. Thoughts mods?

This is a teenage help site why would a guide for parents dealing with their self harming children be at all useful?

[MemoriesLost]

I ask myself this question every single day of my life. I have no answers.

[EmptySoul]

I believe that this site should have a parental guide to issues such as this so that we can get an idea of what parents react like and then make a descision of wheter or not we feel comfortable explaining to our own parents what we are going through. Just think that one day we will be parents and if our child does something like this than we will want to know how to hel pthem. By learning know what parents go though as we fight our own inner battles and demons we will be making oursleves better parents when or [I]if[I] the time ever comes and our child or maybe even our best friend starts self harming. It never hurts to be prepared for what dcould come.

[Altiier]

Parents react badly because they're scared, scared to death that there's something hurting their child and they can't stop it. They can't keep it way, they can't protect their child. A parent spends their life protecting their child and suddenly there's this thing that's hurting their child and it's out of their control, and they don't know what to do. So maybe they shout and scream and punish them because they hope it'll make them stop, they don't realise that they just need to take some time to understand, all they realise is their child is being hurt and they need it to stop.

It's fear, causing irrational behaviour they know the punishments won't work but they don't know what else to do. You need to sit them down, get them some information and talk to them. Once they understand how to help they'll be less angry. But remember the anger and upset isn't at you they love you, they're angry at themselves for feeling like they've let you down.

Thats the most intelligent answer I've found to this question...

[Silent Tears]

My father flipped out, and punished me. I tried to explain to him, that I didn't need punishment. I needed someone to be there for me. His reasoning was "No. Because, that will make you think that THAT(cutting) is how you get what you want!" I told him many times, that all I needed was someone to be there for me. But, no. He didn't listen, and shut me out. If parents would pull there heads out of there asses, and actually listened to their children... then we wouldn't have as many problems.

[UnknownError]

Mine freaked out and my mum called me psychotic lmao. Then they bought me a 3ds and never mentioned it since. :/

[XxNINJAxX]

They way I like to think of it is like when a parents new born coughs the parents freak out thinking something's wrong with the newborn, so when a parent discovers their child self harms they freak out because its never happened before so they don't know what to do besides the first think that comes to their head which could be numerous amounts of things

[Croconaw]

My parents don't know.

[ElectricStar21]

It all depends on the type of parents. If they understand, it shouldn't be a problem. I know mine too well to tell them the truth about me.