New Girl - New Experience

At my internship I have been assigned to another girl...which makes 5. She is an 18 year old girl that is being court ordered to be at my internship site. At my site, you normally leave when you graduate high school or turn 18 years old. However, a few months ago she ran from my site and participated in some un-healthy behaviors, and is now back at my site and in my area that I work with. She has been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and also participates in self-harming behavior. This is the new experience I refer to in my title to this blog. It is so true that once you are in counseling you think you have seen everything and something new comes your way. This last week was my first week spending time with this girl and I found her so interesting and sweet too. She didn't hold back on anything and told me a lot of facts about herself.
She went into discussing the ways that she self-harms herself and the second day I met with her, she showed me the scars and the things that she has done to herself. She has participated in cutting, branding, carving, burning and the list goes on. When she talked about the act of harming it excited her...it was hard for me to understand what I was seeing. She was so excited and she was full of smiles and her demeanor was so happy. She was kind of a true experience for me of what happens with self-harming and what it does for people who do it. This girl also has suicidal ideations, and I won't mention the things that she expressed to me on what she wanted to do to herself and what she wants to see done if she accomplishes it. It sounds weird, but for me it was fascinating and so hard to listen to. She is so young and has dreams of opening a facility herself based around animal therapy, but yet she wants a "fast ticket out of here." I struggle sometimes knowing what to say, how to react and how to help.
I think as my journey continues and I continue meeting with this girl I think so many things will be taught to me. I hope that I am able to help her in some way and see her be happy about other things besides self-harming. I will see where this all leads...every girl and every day is a new experience.