Calm Harm – manage self-harm

stem4

About this app

The urge to self-harm is like a wave. It feels the most powerful when you start wanting to do it.

Join over 2 million users and learn to ride the wave with the free Calm Harm app by choosing activities from these categories: Comfort, Distract, Express Yourself, Release, and Random.

There is also a breathing technique to help be mindful and stay in the moment, regulate difficult emotions and reduce tension.

When you ride the wave, the urge to self-harm will fade.

Calm Harm is an award-winning app developed for teenage mental health charity stem4 by Clinical Psychologist Dr. Nihara Krause, in collaboration with young people, using principles from the evidence-based Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT). It is built to NHS standards and approved by ORCHA.

Calm Harm provides some immediate techniques to help break the cycle of self-harm behaviours and explore underlying trigger factors; build a ‘safety net’ of helpful thoughts, behaviours and access to supportive people; and provides the opportunity to journal and self-reflect. It also provides signposts to help.

The Calm Harm app is private, anonymous and safe.

Please note that the Calm Harm app is not a substitute for the assessment and individualised treatment by a health/mental health professional.

Please also note that if you forget both your passcode and security answer, these cannot be reset as we do not create user accounts. You will need to reinstall the app, losing any previous data.

Calm Harm has been given a new look and updated to the latest technology. We’ve listened to users and enhanced the app’s functionality, adding the ability to make journal entries at any time and the option to select multiple reasons for your urge to self-harm after completing an activity. We’ve also updated and expanded the choice of activities based on user suggestions.

What else is new?
• Users can add activities to a ‘Favourites’ list.
• The mascots are now enhanced by animations throughout the app.
• Choose from a wider selection of colour schemes.
• Easier access to immediate help via the breathe activity, both during onboarding and in the footer of the app itself.
• We’ve removed the option to set a passcode to access the whole app and, instead, the self-monitoring section can now be passcode-protected or accessed via facial recognition / Touch ID.
• Tours explaining key features of the app.

What is staying the same?
• The app is clinically-developed by a Consultant Clinical Psychologist in collaboration with young people.
• Optional passcode-protection (though now only for the self-monitoring section).
• Users choose 5-minute or 15-minute activities (from the same categories as before), counted down by a timer, that are based on the principles of a treatment technique called Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT).
• Users can still record experiences in the log section (now called My Records) and see information such as weekly average urge strength, most common urges, and most active time of day.
• The app is completely free, with no in-app purchases required.
• Users are shown signposts to further help.
• Our commitment to data privacy and user anonymity.
• No need for data or WiFi access to use the app.
• Built to UK National Health Service standards and approved by ORCHA.
• Users can still personalise their experience.
• The option to hide trigger activities.

Ratings and reviews

It's quite helpful, and I really like the feature where it requires your password after just leaving the app for even just a moment. It can be a bit annoying to find a specific activity but it's usually quite fast and the ability to hide certain activities is extremely useful. I do wish the timers would continue even after exiting the app, and that when they finished the timer would have an alarm.

Cute app that actually helps me manage anxiety; however, the password option seems like it should be optional. I assume that it's there in case you don't want people to know what it is, but they could already tell something is strange by the name, I feel? And it's hard to remember when you're in a heightened state of emotion. Other than that, a really superb app with a great design!

This is an absolutely amazing app and has kept my streak going for several weeks now, and I only have a few nitpicks and suggestions. First would be the ability to manually add urges in case you dont use that app but still want to track it (idk if you can already do that) and secondly would be to have the timer run in the background in case for example, you pick an activity like play chess or coloring or something so you can play a chess app which is much more convenient than actual chess.

What's new

We've given some of the activities in the app a refresh, reviewed and updated the signposts provided, updated the privacy policy, and added our Age Appropriate Design Code statement.