"You're so emo…"

"Oh, don't cry like a little emo. "I'll go home and cut my wrists" you should say."

"You listen to emo music."

"Don't be like that emo over there"

I've heard them all, trust me, and each time I hear them I get so many feelings in my stomach. I feel fire at the rage, complete turmoil in me. I also feel sadness and confusion, thinking back to the days when I fell into the 'emo-wrist-cutter' days, and the still livid scars on my wrist (few enough of them) never cease to remind me. I am used to hiding them, and no one but one of my friends know of my secret.

Yeah, I call it a secret. I don't advertise it, but my parents and the school know. A moment of momentary weakness sent me there. But I don't want to talk about it.

My real reasons, phew, I can't even name them all. It wasn't a big thing, like a parents divorce, or abuse, or anything like that. It was more a whole bunch of little things building up… until one HUGE thing just rocked my world into pieces. A girl who I thought was my sister, blessed by fate to meet, left me for the crowd. The crowd we had sworn against, the girl whom I had loved like a sister for five years. Gone with one day with a honey coated lie on her lips.

She hasn't come back. I'm not over it, half a year later.

Well, the cutting started soon after. I'm not going to give you all the grisly details, but I did. Not many, but enough to feel the sting, watch the red. Not too deep, not enough that wouldn't heal over and look accidental by the time morning came. Thank you, over protective parents.

So, that was vague I know. But I am not here to discuss me. I am here to discuss the hate on emos, and the jokes. Many people think that self-harm is something to joke about, that over emotional freaks have to do. Maybe you don't know that it actually fuels the blood to flow from their wrists. Maybe you don't know about the choices that they make, and they can hate themselves for it.

I know a few from over the internet, and a few from RL. They hate it, I know. But it's not like we can control it much. For me, too many tears had been cried that they no longer came, nor did the sweat leaking from my pores from exercise. Blood was the next best thing, and the pain would fade physically as it did mentally.

Until you are hooked by the blood addiction, you don't know how hard it is to find a substitute for the relief that the pain brings you. You, if you don't cut, you don't understand. I don't like when you joke about my tears, my agony, everything inside of me being a massive wall.

None of us like it when you make jokes about our wrists…

And for our music? Go ahead and make fun. For some of the groups, take a listen to the lyrics. We can relate to them. We can feel the same, we can yell our agony out with the pounding music. As for some of the heavy metal Goth/emos, you know, that is pure adrenaline rushing into our veins and takes the pain away.

That is what the music does. And if you say that we cut because we want attention, (Which is a small group by the way) it is a desperate measure. They are saying that they are to afraid, so hurt that they cant say the words on their own. They need help, they need rescue. They don't need more jokes to add to the hurt.

We don't like it when you joke about our pain.

We don't like it when you laugh at our music.

We don't like it when you say our tears are just jokes

We don't like it when you say our blood is worth wasting

We don't like it when you make fun of us

Please, accept that 'emos' are just hurting inside, enough so that they could bring themselves to harm themselves, even when they may start out afraid of pain altogether.

We are not only just like you.

We are worse off.

We are in pain, and we just want you to stop hurting us more.