Dear Frank,
My secret reads: It hurts to do jazz hands after I cut myself, but the show must go on. I sent you my secret several years ago shortly before coming to college.
I am now a senior in college and a lot has changed. I am majoring in vocal music performance and specializing in opera rather than musical theatre, so no more jazz hands! But more importantly, I have stopped cutting and am on the road to stopping self-injury totally.
And even more importantly, I have used my experiences related to my secret to help the others who have the same secrets. Over the past three years, I have not only become increasingly more open about my experiences, I have also worked to raise awareness among college students about the stigmas related to self-injury as well as organizing campus-wide events in conjunction with campus counseling services in which people who suffer as self-injurers can come and talk openly and give voice to their secrets related to SI.
Looking at my life now and looking at my secret from the past, it seems like it is an image from someone else’s lifetime. Someone else’s story. But there it is… a reminder of how far I have come and the fact that even then, even in the darkness, I knew there was more… that the show would go on. And thankfully, it has.