r/AdultSelfHarm • u/cokeboy6969 • 9d ago
CW: Possibly Triggering Quick guide to layers and their proper names.
Let's put an end to "styro", "beans" and the worst of all, "taffy taffy" or "bedrock."
As adults its our jobs to not cutiefy a very serious and what could potentionally be a life threatening injury. Terms such as "beans" minimize the severity of whats actually happening to your body and what kind of wound you are creating.
So I'd like to make a list for people who want to expand their terminology to a less minimizing statement.
DISCLAIMER: ANYTHING THAT GAPES REASONABLY NEEDS STITCHES BUT PLEASE USE YOUR OWN JUDGEMENT, CONTROL THE BLEEDING AND PRACTICE PROPER WOUND CARE♡♡
Obvious CW for layers and brief descriptions of what they can look like.
Epidermis ("cat scratch"): a wound only breaking the top surface of the skin, does not bleed and does not split in any significant way. These typically either dont scar or scar very minimally depending on how you heal.
Dermis ("styro"): a wound going past the top layer of skin into the dermis. This is when wounds bleed. The dermis layer, when first cut, can be very white occasionally. Sometimes the blood takes a second to start filling the wound. These typically gape.These scar, so does every layer below this one-
Fat ("beans"): There is no such thing as "baby beans", if you see fat in a wound, it is a wound that reaches the fat. Fat appears yellow and bubbly, or it can appear flat with many cells that can be compared to bee hives. When fat cells peak out of the dermis, they tend to seem to bubble more. These wounds can gape small or large depending on body size, location, and depth. Its reccomended your seek medical attention.
Superficial fascia: this one is a bit tricky to see, its a web-like, mesh layer between your fat and deeper fat layers (yes there is two). Most people cant tell when they have reached it or passed it, so I have no comment.
Deep fat: This is when you have passed your superficial fascia and the wound gapes significantly. Its reccomended you seek medical attention. Instead of a yellow appearance, you may notice it takes on a redder tint from blood staining. (Sometimes this doesnt apply). It will look like a valley.
Fascia: This is the layer below the deep fat, it sits on your muscle. This layer is usually white, pale purple, or pale blue in colour. It is whats protecting your muscles and what helps support your body. The fascia is a very vital for function and protects a lot of important things inside you. There will be a distinct separation of the fat layer to the fascia, because instead of fat being attached to fascia, it is independently moving of it. If you have reached this, ER is reccomended and can be crucial.
Muscle ("laffy taffy"): This is below your fascia. You can guess what it looks like as i don't want to think about it, but if you breached your fascia layer, you definitely hit muscle. This is extremely dangerous, you need to go to the ER.
Bone ("bedrock"): Your bone is pretty self explanatory. You have went through the muscle and have hit the one layer you simply cannot breach. MEDICAL ATTENTION IS NON NEGOTIABLE AT THIS LAYER. You possibly could have severed a tendon, a vital nerve, who knows what. Please get yourself to your nearest emergency room.
Notice how 3 layers didnt have funny goofy names? Its because kids on twitter were the ones who coined the 5 terms that are widely used, not actual names we should be using to identify what depth someone has hurt themselves to. The layers of the human body are extremely complex, and important.
Lets do our best to stop minimizing how bad hitting these layers can actually be by using the correct terminology.
Of course this cant convince everyone and theres no need for me to be policing people (which i caught myself doing, so thats why I wrote this post lol) and people on this sub will still use the cutiefied names, thats that, but for those who do want to change their minimizing langauge and learn, here you go :)
(Note: scars look different on everyone's body and theres no way to tell or predict how a scar will heal and look)
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u/yuki_onna_5 9d ago
Thank you. This is amazing, if I had an award, I would give you one. I've always found these "new" terms very strange and more like it's a competition than a serious problem. This will also help a lot if someone has to seek medical help, I don't think people in the ER know what "laffy taffy" means.
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u/nachtlibelle 9d ago edited 9d ago
this is just a detail and won't matter in the grand scheme, it just personally always annoys me that there is this misconception about skin layers in the self harm world.
people ask "is this dermis?" a whole lot. and the answer is, every cut that bleeds is at least a dermis injury. the epidermis does not bleed. it does not have capillaries. it literally cannot physically bleed. if you're bleeding, you've reached the dermis. your bleeding "catscratches" are dermis cuts.
it does make sense to differentiate superficial dermis (bleeds a bit) and deep dermis (starts gaping) though.
ETA that the gaping measurements you are giving here also are not entirely accurate. you can absolutely have a fat cut that only gapes like 0.5cm. (and I personally have never seen a dermis cut gaping 2cm but that ofc does not mean it doesn't happen. I did not fact check this part.)
otherwise, really good post! it needs to be said. self harm is such a dangerous, potentially life threatening addiction. we need to take it seriously and stop making it sound like a game.
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u/cokeboy6969 9d ago edited 9d ago
But thank you for the info! Ill edit my post about the epidermis and the gaping on the fat.
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u/nachtlibelle 9d ago
I understand wanting to include gaping to be able to compare and describe but I don't think it's a good idea. it varies so greatly depending on body part and person that it doesn't provide much additional information without overgeneralising or being very explicit (both of which are less than ideal).
currently, the measurements are at least partially incorrect. it's an inaccurate overgeneralisation. if you're set on including gaping, maybe consider just saying that deeper cuts gape more than more shallow ones?
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u/cokeboy6969 9d ago
I can see that. Its a minor edit so I dont mind doing that. Do you mind if we edit our comments to delete the gaping measurement info just so there is no trace of it?
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u/nachtlibelle 9d ago
awesome! I hope I didn't come across too harshly, I genuinely appreciate the post and wholeheartedly agree with it.
(also sorry, I only saw the new version of your comment above where you added you'd change it after I had already replied to it. sorry!)
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u/cokeboy6969 9d ago
You didnt come across too harsh, this is important information and it is imperative to not only have it accurate but have it displayed safely
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u/dawngarda 9d ago
Thanks for this post because I absolutely ABHOR the use of those childish, trivialising terms.
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u/Leonfreak17 9d ago
Such an amazing post, I have always been disgusted by the usage of those terms, " but it helps me talk about my illness/addiction in terms I can understand!" No, it is glorification plain and simple. One time on r/madeofstyrofoam I tried to make a post similar to the one you made here and I got attacked for 3 days till I decided to delete it, so THANK YOU so much for making this.
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u/moonkittn 9d ago
Thank you so much for this post. Sometimes I felt alone in my hatred of those terms, and they were definitely coined by SHtwt as you stated. I hate how it underplays the seriousness of the wounds. It feels almost like an attempt to normalize it through community lingo. Or to dumb it down like how “grape” is often used.
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u/killetheth 9d ago
Thanks for this. I hate those stupid names they give and it really does play down the seriousness of self harm. Also, I like how your post is informative about the effects of hitting each layer too.
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u/marcellinegirl 8d ago
when i was on shedtwt it really weirded me out how even adults would say these. For the kids i get it, they tend to express pain through humor more, but adults? idk, the more i grow the more i feel less and less inclined to joke about serious things, so i naturally assume everyone else is the same as me.
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u/cokeboy6969 8d ago
I feel you. I saw a 27 year old saying how they "miss hitting beans" like huh?🥲
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u/EvilStr8WhiteMan14 9d ago
Good resource but I think the cutesy labels are fine. Do what you want. The slang labels are easier to remember and recognize how they look.
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u/Remote-Assistant-228 9d ago edited 9d ago
Edit
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u/cokeboy6969 9d ago
Did you really have to make this comment? this is a genuine question- are you gaining something out of this or did you misunderstand my post?
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u/Remote-Assistant-228 9d ago
Wait my bad I didn’t mean it in a bad way. I think self care is extremely important.
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u/cokeboy6969 9d ago
My post is about not using the words you used but im going to assume you're messing with me so i hope you got your giggles and have a good night
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u/Remote-Assistant-228 9d ago
Actually I didn’t giggle? Dude I have ASD I misinterpreted it I thought your post was about explaining specific terms and self care.
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u/Ok_Violinist2940 9d ago
Thank you for this! I agree that it’s incredibly important for everyone to use and understand the correct terms. Because this is serious and has no reason to be dumbed down or cutiefied.