Bodily Harm: The Breakthrough Healing Program for Self-Injurers

by Karen Conterio, Wendy Lader, Jennifer Kingsonbloom, et al.

Book Overview

Self-injury is one of our society's fastest-growing and most disturbing epidemics. Bodily Harm is the most authoritative examination of this alarming syndrome and the first to offer a comprehensive treatment regimen. Written by the directors of S.A.F.E. (Self Abuse Finally Ends) Alternatives, it clearly defines what cutting is and explains the kinds of emotional trauma that can lead to self-mutilation. Most importantly, Bodily Harm offers...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0786885041
• ISBN13: 9780786885046
• Release Date: October 1999
• Publisher: Hachette Books
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 0.10 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.3" x 8.1"
• Age Range: 13 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 8 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

It's not a cure.

Okay, I know that Wendy and Karen would both back me up in saying that this program is by no means a cure. And as for the expense, well public aide in Illinois will foot the entire bill and the people i've seen go through it don't have much money and are solely dependent upon a mixture of insurance, public aide, and social security. SAFE isn't a cure. It just lays down the tools you can use to get better, and no other program that I've been in has done that. None but SAFE have given me any help in controling the impulses, well outside of the lovely rubber band. Have they stabilized me, yes, but it didn't actually help me. The bodily harm book lays out tools that therapists can use in the outpatient realm to help patients. Impulse control logs, alternatives, not using the "fake injury" alternatives; all of these help. Bodily Harm even says that they believe that most self-injurers can recover in an outpatient setting. And PTSD can have a lot to do with self-injury, but I know that I don't have it and I self-injured for 8 years. Okay, this has turned into a huge defense thing and not a review- but still. I will forever love and charish what SAFE gave me, because it gave me back myself- nothing more or less. And, inside the bodily harm book they do have what the success rate is, if you're willing to look for it. I believe it's like 3/4ths, but I may be wrong. If any therapist really wants to know how they can help self-injurers I advise you to call up the SAFE program and ask if you can observe for a week... and this will be the end of my rave and rant.

bodily Harm Review

Bodily Harm is a very comprehensive book that actually has some wonderful thoughts on self harm. It gives excellent concrete ways in which to stop self harm. It reaches the real reasons for this behavior, yet teaches that its an inappropriate coping skill. Sometimes those with this issue don't realize that self injury can result in death. Great resources made available for a little addressed disorder. I especially liked the fact that the authors could be so removed and authoritarian yet you could tell in everything they did that they cared.

Finally someone who understands

I was hospitalized for self injuring and the social workers got me into a program called SAFE Alternatives, so I read the book. The book let self injurers know that we are not alone. This book talked about the SAFE program and how they help you to find tools(5 Alternatives) to use to help fight the urges. I never fully understood why I injured myself until I read this book. I don't have to feel ashamed when someone sees my arms and asks what I have done. You never know who could be a self-injurer until they let you know. I was injuring for nine years and noone knew until a year before I went to SAFE. I went in March 1999 and it was the best decision I could ever had made. Thank you Karen, Wendy, and staff.

Thank you Karen and Wendy!

What can I say about this awesome book that saved my life? I was browsing in the bookstore one day and I noticed a book on self-injury: Bodily Harm. Having been a self-injurer for a long time I thumbed through it to see if this book could offer me anything. The book was absolutely amazing. It explores the types of people who self-injure, the reasonings behind the self-injury and it contains an explanation of the S.A.F.E. (Self Abuse Finally Ends) Program TM. Founded by Karen Conterio in 1985 S.A.F.E. offers hope for self-injurers. After being hospitalized too many times, and after years of therapy, I decided to attend the S.A.F.E. Program in Chicago. There is no review that can communicate how S.A.F.E saved my life. I am now living as a whole person, without self-injury, for the first time in my life. I owe Karen and Wendy my life. I HIGHLY recommend this book not only to self-injurers but to their families and friends as well. I even more strongly recommend attending the S.A.F.E. Program. Thank you Karen and Wendy - I love you both!

Complete and Very Helpful Book

Having recently gone through the SAFE Alternatives program myself, I can say that this book follows closely the inpatient treatment program and ideas, and would probably be very useful to people who cannot afford the program or who have been denied access to it for whatever reason. I agree with other reviewers who say that the program is presented as a "cure," which I don't quite think it is. What I do think it is, and what this book is, is a wonderful starting point on the road to real self-understanding and ending of self-injury. It's not a cure-all, and it's not guaranteed. I have injured since completing the program, but I have done so far less frequently and far less severely. The urges are less pronounced and I have more tools with which to deal with them. I recommend this book especially to family member of self-injurers as a way to understand the phenomenon, and also to people who are themselves injurers, because it is far less triggering than other books on the same subject.