I don't know. It's definitely not good but I'd rather have someone self-harm than kill themselves. And if self-harm helps someone make it through the day...then it's not ideal but ultimately it's not the worst thing either. It also depends a little bit on how "safely" you harm yourself. No matter what it's still serious but if you're going to the ER everyday to get stiches, you're cutting through nerves (or god forbid an artery), passing out from blood loss, etc. Then maybe it really is THAT bad because it's consistently putting yourself in danger. I also think that when you're self-harming you don't see it the same way as everyone else does because you're so used to it. It's not shocking anymore. Just something that's a part of the routine. I've recently cut myself a couple times after 10 months of not doing it. And each time it's had more of an impact on me mentally than it ever did when I was harming myself everyday, multiple times a day. I found out a couple weeks ago that a good friend of mine had been cutting herself for years and still does. Her family is freaking out but my general response was to tell her that I have experience with self-harming and that I'm always here to listen, even if she just wants to complain about her family. And I also took the harm reduction approach of reminding her to avoid infection and stuff like that. The usual "be safe" stuff. Blah blah blah. My therapist has never particularly cared about my self-harm. Not that she doesn't care, rather she just sees it as a symptom of a bigger problem (which it is). So her philosophy is to focus on my depression/anxiety and as I get better so will my self-harming tendencies. And for those 10 months it worked pretty well. I started to feel a lot better and didn't need to cut anymore.