Major Self Mutilation:
Major self-mutilation refers to acts that severely damage a
significant amount of body tissue. These are usually injuries that
can only be inflicted once, such as eye enucleation, facial
skinning, amputation of the limbs, breasts or genitals. Major
self-mutilation is usually inflicted upon the self while in a
hallucinatory or "zombie-like" state. This can be caused by mental
retardation, schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, or the influence of
drugs or alcohol.
Sometimes major self-mutilators are unable to explain their
injuries. In a case reported by Goodhart and Savitsky in 1933, the
subject was a 16 year-old girl who had suffered from chronic
encephalitis for eight years prior to the described incident. She
was found by her nurse holding her right eye in her hand and
claimed that it had fallen out while she slept. Two hours later,
her left eye also "fell out". She appeared to experience no pain
and appeared unconcerned by her eye enucleation. Later, she would
confess that she had felt "hypnotized" and gouged her eyes because
of an "irresistible urge."
When patients can give explanations, they frequently deal with
sexual themes including transsexualism, control of hypersexuality
and homosexuality. In a 1931 article, Lewis describes a 28-year-old
man who was hospitalized after a castration attempt resulted in
significant loss of blood. Severely depressed and terrified of
homosexuality, he had attempted castration several times in the
past. Of one of his attempts he said, "I thought I was a terrible
person....it seemed that it might prevent me from indulging in
sodomy."
Another frequent motivation cited for major self-mutilation is
religious guilt . Such reasons can include, commands from God or
the devil, identification with Christ and punishing oneself for
sin. In such cases, a bible verse shows up surprisingly frequently:
Matthew 6:22-23: "What I say to you is: anyone who looks lustfully
at a woman has already committed adultery with her in his thoughts.
If your right eye is your trouble, gouge it out and throw it away!
Better to lose part of your body than to have it all cast into
Gehenna."
Interestingly, eye enucleation as described here has been found to
"occur only in Christian cultural areas." Favazza searched for, but
was unable to find, a single case of self-enucleation in China,
Singapore, Hong Kong, India, Japan, or in the aborigines of
Australia or natives of Papua New Guinea.
http://wso.williams.edu/~atimofey/self_mutilation/Definition/What_is/major.html
