title: Bloodletting: A Memoir of Secrets, Self-Harm, and Survival
author:  Victoria Leatham 
description: Leatham begins her painful, emotional memoir with her realization, in her late teens, that she was depressed. As her friends and family dismissed her feelings as temporary, she discovered that "harming myself really did make me feel better." The irresistible urge to cut herself led to a life of medication, stays in psychiatric hospitals (she was diagnosed with a form of bipolar disorder) and more self-destructive behavior, including eating disorders, abusive relationships and frequent career hopping. Just as Leatham would start to feel settled in a new city in her native Australia, or one she recently returned to, the compulsion to cut would begin again, resulting in a hospital stay followed by a move to a different locale. More than 12 years after she began her self-harm, she started a program of cognitive behavioral therapy, and although she initially resisted it, she found that "[s]omething had at last shifted and made it possible for me to begin to protect myself." Leatham's searing memoir will resonate with young women struggling with similar problems, as well as those who care about them. <i>(Mar.)</i> <br />Copyright  Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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  [Also by GABRIELLE ZEVIN](part0002_split_000.html#toc-idm467448426976)
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ##### BOOKS FOR ADULTS
  
  
  Margarettown
  
  
  The Hole We’re In
  
  
  The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry
  
  
  
  
  
  ##### BOOKS FOR YOUNG ADULTS
  
  
  Elsewhere
  
  
  Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac
  
  
  All These Things I’ve Done
  
  
  Because It Is My Blood
  
  
  In the Age of Love and Chocolate
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ##### COPYRIGHT
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Published by Little, Brown
  
  
  978-1-4087-0979-5  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the
  public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or
  dead, is purely coincidental.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Copyright © Gabrielle Zevin 2017
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  The moral right of the author has been asserted.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
  a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
  prior permission in writing of the publisher.
  
  