Patients and care providers have difficulty getting control of self-injurious behaviour. Nonetheless, there are patients who have succesfully stopped self-injury.

The aim of this study was to gain understanding of the process of stopping self-injury and to identify the determinants contributing to that achievement.

Semi structured interviews were conducted with twelve women with a long history of severe self-injurious behaviour who eventually succeeded in stopping that behaviour. The data were analysed based on of the Grounded Theory Method.

It was found that the process of stopping self-injury consists of six phases:

1. - the phase of connecting and setting limits: feelings perceived as unsafe are explored, and ways of strengthening feelings of safety are pursued. This sense of safety allows patients to reach out more to others and themselves;

2. - the phase of increased self-esteem with a further deepening of contact with the self;

3. - the phase in which patients “learn to understand” themselves: increased self-understanding makes patients realise they can control their own lives;

4. - in the phase of autonomy patients make active choices to increase control of their lives and immediate environment;

5. - the phase of stopping self-injury: learning and using alternative strategies other than self-injury to cope with unbearable feelings;

6. - the phase of maintenance focuses on preventing a relapse into self-injurious behaviour.

Contact was identified as key to all phases of the process

Interventions should focus on making contact, encouraging people who self-injure to develop a positive self-image and learn alternative behaviour.