Self-Harm and Nail Polish

Special thanks to the lovely ladies who shot me over pics of their polished nails!!!

A woman in my Catholic Moms group mentioned that her daughter (who self harms) has recently channeled her compulsion to cut into picking at her nail polish instead.  To celebrate her success (and to motivate her to continue channeling her feelings in this manner), I purchased a bunch of polishes in different hues and finishes.  

That got me thinking...

This young woman chose to pick at her polish instead of cutting herself in the same manner that a smoker might choose a stick of gum over a cigarette.

Is it possible, then, that other young women (who are statistically the highest at risk for self-harm) would benefit from raking (using your thumb to scrape away sections of nail polish)?

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So I started asking around and the responses I got surprised me.  

First of all, self-harm apparently happens a lot more than I'd originally thought.  It also happens in ways that differ from person to person. Since I have no self-harm experience, I was only familiar with what gets shown on TV: razors, hair pulling, and smacking your head/face. Through the kind (and brave) messages that got sent from various people, I learned that scratching, burning, stretching and even stabbing at one's self are forms of self-harm.  

When I asked for their various coping mechanisms, they ranged from rubber band snapping to painting to crocheting to using a punching bag.  One person even stands under an ice cold shower!  However, when I mentioned polish raking as a potential channeling medium, almost none of them had tried it.  

I've reached out to a few local clinics that deal with young women who self-harm and a couple said they'd be interested in trying nail polish as a potential channeling medium.  If it's something that DOES prove beneficial to their patients, I'll look into expanding the ministry further.  

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Thoughts?  

I imagine this would be very beneficial to at-risk young women, and nail polish is a relatively cheap coping mechanism.  Something like this should be able to garner a corporate partner (I'm thinking OPI through it's OPI Cares charitable fund) and I can even see an annual Cut the Stigma event that would raise money and awareness for these folks.  

Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself, but I'm looking for feedback from those of you who are more experienced / smarter than I am in this regard.  That being said, I feel like someone has lit a fire under me and I can't settle down until I see this through.  ​​

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