dermatillomania-compulsive skin picking, anyone? - Page 4

[ellasmama2007]

idk but stress makes the picking so much worse for me. i hate it!!!!!

[The4OfUs]

I don't pick my cuticles or bite my nails, I pick the skin *around* my nails, up towards the top of the finger where it meets the sides of the nail bed. I do this until it bleeds sometimes.

The ONLY thing that has ever gotten me to stop it is acrylic nails. Or tape around my fingers. Because both things provide a physical barrier (the acrylic makes my nail too thick to dig into the skin), and enough of a reminder to me that I shouldn't be doing it sch that I'll stop. But I don't want to have to pay for acrylics and fill ins or home done press on nails every 2 weeks, and putting tape on my fingers every day is, well...I just don't do it.

I've been doing this since I was about 15, and I'll be 35 in September. That's a LOT of picking. Sigh.

[kallyn]

Heather, along with the cheek chewing that I talked about already, I also do the biting the skin around the nails thing. I used to do it so much when I was younger that I would bleed and my fingertips would ache for days. It's not as bad now, but I still do it. :/ You are not alone!!

My sister does it to the skin on the bottom of her feet.

[EarthMamaToBe]

Oh. My. I had no idea! The selective hair pulling, removing the "wrong" ones I have done as long as I can remember! I was SURE I was the only one. I also scratch/pick at my scalp but I do not pick elsewhere. I do bite my nails. The hair thing though, I had no idea anyone else did this! As a child I chewed the ends of my hair until my mother cut it.

[marimara]

This is so weird, why do do this to ourselves????? I do it too, have done it all my life. Fingers and lips are real bad. Face- I only pick occasionally in 'sessions' because I don't want scars and 'force' myself to not do it. But my 22 mo old dd is starting to do it, should I take her to the doc? I absolutely do not want her to get like me! I am addicted to lip balm because of this and cannot have long nails or else I'll shred myself.

I also am a left-handed artist. I also have tacticle defensiveness??? I hate tags in my clothes and cannot wear certain fabrics and don't like touching chalk....etc....She is the same way it seems, she tells me her hands are icky and holds chalk the same way I do, like I really dont want to touch it. She is starting to pick her nose compusively and she picks scabs, she even picked my scab today...with the same trancy look in her eyes that I know all too well..

I am faily sure that I have other OCD related 'quirks', my husband tells me all the time that I have OCD. Do you think I should get her help while she is still young? and maybe get myself some help while I am it?? We have free medical care (military)..

[The4OfUs]

The weird thing for me is that I have NO other OCD type things, I'm not tactile defensive or anything. I'm actually a little bit on the sloppy side. I don't care where things get put away so long as they are put away, I don't have any ritualistic repetitive things I do. I'm pretty laid back, overall - except for the picking. I was almost thinking of pricing out stupid press on nails again, just to get myself to stop. Maybe if I wore them for 6 months or so I'd forget about doing it. Maybe not. MaTape on my fingers daily seems like it would be a hassle, I'd have to redo it every time I washed my hands, etc. I dunno.

I was intrigued by the traumatic event thing, and realized that my mom was diagnosed with a stage 3 breast cancer and had a radical mastectomy when I was 14, then underwent almost a year of follow up treatment. And I started doing this around 15. Seems pretty coincidental, huh?

Fascinating. And aggravating. I think next time I'm out shopping I'll price out nails. I'd have them super short anyway, so maybe it would be worth it to stop picking.

I htink if eithe rof my kids started doing this, I'd just find other things to occupy their hands with for a while to see if it could distract them...I wouldn't necessarily address the picking aspect, but just try to distract them from it, you know?