Welcome to Scar Tissue, one of the growing, but certainly one of the best, self harm support communities online. At Scar Tissue we believe in providing a safe, comfortable and and open atmosphere, and our non-judgemental approach has already help ed hundreds.

You're welcome to explore the site, download leaflets and factsheets, communicate with other members via our two moderated forums and generally join the community. While it's easy to feel like you're an outcast when you're dealing with self harm, at Scar Tissue we hope you'll realise you are far from being alone. Whether you want help in reducing or stopping your self harm or you just need a place to vent about what's bothering you, everyone is welcome. We do have a few rules and guidelines, but these are to ensure the safety of our members and their emotional well being. We do not condone the encouragement of self harm or suicide, though we do recognise that self harm is used as a coping mechanism.

The Scar Tissue community is very much like a family; no matter where you are or what you're dealing with you'll always find someone to talk to, and plenty of people to give you support. Our members have proved thousands of times that there is hope for beating self harm and we hope that we can be the first step in helping you to get through your self harming.

On the site you will find access to books and articles discussing various forms of self injury and depression; current news regarding self injury and injurers rights; frequently asked questions about why people self injure and what can be done to help them as well as a list of links to other boards dealing with similar topics. We also have a range of great information on dealing with self injury (whether you're a self harmer yourself or know someone who is); stopping self harming; distraction techniques and advice on getting professional help.

I hope you find what you are looking for here, and if there are any questions or suggestions you have, please contact me.

The links page has been updated and we now have a comprehensive list of useful resources, from self harm to healthy eating; bipolar disorder to places to walk. Check them out, and if you have any you think could be useful drop me a line.

We've been doing some work on the resources and helplines page and have created a list of international telephone helplines, websites and information on local groups providing face to face support. We want this to be one of the best resources on the web, so if you know of any suitable links or can think of any groups who would like to be added to the site, please let us know.

We are trying to build a section for coping strategies and distraction techniques. While this is pretty basic at the moment we are working on it, but we would love your input. If you have any hints or tips you'd like to pass on, have struggled with stopping certain things or have an inspiring story about stopping self harm, please email us at letters@scar-tissue.net.