Parental negligence and fast changing lifestyle is responsible for the violent behavior (self harm) among youngsters and teenagers believe leading sociologists of the valley.
Kashmir valley has been witnessing manifold increase in self harm incidents among young boys and girls. Psychiatrists said almost 70% cases of self harm by young boys and girls are being treated daily.
Laila Qureshi a Psychiatrist from Srinagar held families responsible for adopting western culture. “ The alien culture doesn’t suit us they do not have time for their own kids this is the reason children’s lacks emotional touch with their parents and they can’t ableto share about these serious issues with their parents,” she added.
Dr Khurshid ul Islam, a leading sociologist and Associate Professor of management and public administration said, “Some children take this extreme step because they were not able to achieve what they aspired.”
“When a person decides to be alone and far from madding crowd those are the signs that there is a problem in his or her life.”
The rate of self-harming recorded is higher in girls compared to boys. ‘Girls harm themselves three times more often than boys’. Common signs of self inflicted injuries have been depression, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder(PTSD) followed by change in behavior and eating habits.
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Fiza, (name changed), a 12’th class student said, “I was in seventh grade when first time I harmed myself due to family issues.” “I used to feel bad when my father shouted at my mother for no reason and when I couldn’t do anything but hurt myself, which pacified my anger.”
“When I cut my arm first time, it was the only thing that made me feel good and relieved me of my anxiety,“ said a person who wished not to be named. “Today I won’t say that my life is all sorted out. When you dig yourself into such a deep hole like I did, you can’t expect to just come out of it that quickly and easily,” he said
Saima, mother of a victim, who wished to remain anonymous said, “I was shocked when one day i accidentally saw my daughter’s arm, that looked exactly the same as if, someone had put a thousand lines on her arm.”
“The concept of depression in Kashmir is different. Usually if we tell our parents that we are suffering from depression, they think that either he has become accustomed to something or he has been deceived by a girl,”said Sahil Shafi, who recently came out of it.
“This is an important reason why children usually hide such a big disease from their parents because they are afraid that our parents will doubt us and that is why they are forced to take such big steps,”he added.
Dr Maqbool Bashir, Associate Professor Psychiatry said, self harming is common these days. “The majority of people who self harm are teenagers and adults especially girls. Girls harm themselves three times more than boys and the main reason behind self harming among girls are family problems and sexual harassments, after talking with these kind of patients they tell us that we are sexually harassed by a person who is very close with our family. If we tell our family about all this, they will hold us responsible for it.”
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