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We meet on the common ground of an uncommon age and share out our gifts of dark and light, good and bad, simple joy and not so simple sorrow.

This site is one of many self-injury sites. It started as an attempt on my part to contribute my voice and my opinions in the then growing awareness of self-injury. To use my voice to say that self-injurers are valid individuals and that they are more than a label. To say that and so much more when others were not able or not ready to. It was also a place to provide information and support to other self-injurers. To let others know that they are not alone in their struggle and that there is someone out there willing to listen and who shares their feelings.

Those that visit this site and send feedback are the main reason it has grown so large. They were the reason that every new section that was added over the years was added, they were the reason it kept running. And they are the reason that this site will keep on running in the future.

This site is not pro-self-injury. Neither is it anti-self-injury. It is a place where people are meant to feel able to express themselves without censure. I believe that it alienates more than it helps when someone says "Self-injury is bad" because some people are not ready to stop. They should not be forced. 

History

"Self-Injury: A Struggle" began as a small self-injury site during a time when there were few sites on the subject and none that seemed to specifically cater to the self-injurer. It was hosted on Geocities (service defunct as of October of 2009) and poorly designed. But, from the start I got a tremendous response from self-injurers, some who had never even heard of self-injury prior to seeing my site.

The layout has remained simple and basically the same during all its phases. There were time periods in which not one word was updated. But the e-mails of those needing an outlet and those reaching out for help would call me back to this site.

During one such time in January of 2000 my parents made a deal with me and I got the self-injury.net domain through Network Solutions, my host was the now defunct HostPro. The site was transferred from and I worked from there. New sections were added and others were updated.

Then in January of 2001 I changed my host to JaguarPC and the sites growth came to almost a complete stop. I made another half-hearted attempt to work on the site but stopped trying after my suicide attempt and hospitalization in July 2001. Afterwards I decided to revamp the whole site and do something with it.

After revamping the site I moved to HTTPme and worked on the site sporadically. The site layout was redone for the first time since 1999 in 2004 after having moved to angelnetworkz. Then the site changed to servermatrix.com. We moved to liquidweb.com for two or so years.

Finally, in 2009 there was a site redesign and the site was converted to the Drupal CMS. We had moved to WiredTree and it was time to grow. The site opened its doors to membership that extended beyond just the forum or online support lists. The forum and the site have plans become more connected, with membership being shared between the two. This is when self-injury.net finally moves forward and becomes a community.

We made one final change of host to Linode in 2010 and the site was renamed to 'self-injury.net' so that users would have an easier time remember and finding the site. 

In 2011 after numerous changes and reworkings of the CMS the community is steadily growing.