Skin picking

I want to encourage you to explore this area with a qualified therapist. Here at NOCD we use a treatment called habit reversal training. There is hope!

this isn't the same but I used to obsessively mess with my hair. run my fingers through it over and over. pull at it. pluck it out. it's some kind of anxiety thing that's a cousin to skin picking, I forget the name. I stopped doing it when I did research on my hair type and started taking care of it properly. I have pretty curly hair so when one of the steps to taking care of it was... "don't touch it. don't even run your fingers through it." I tried everything to stop doing it. it was hard at first, and I messed up a lot--for months!--but eventually I quit entirely. I think having some kind of an incentive not to or a goal you're trying to reach (unrelated to but including quitting) helps a lot. so, I'm not sure what that would look like for you, but if you find something truly meaningful, it could really help

I’ve been skin picking since I was 10 and just now got it under control. I’m 32! My biggest advice is to get into ERP to treat the underlying OCD. Second, the only way to stop is just to stop. But that didn’t happen immediately for me. I picked both when I felt anxious about certain themes and just absentmindedly when my mind wondered. To start off, if I was anxious or just caught my hand wandering toward my skin to pick, I would say “nope not now!” And snatch my hands away. Id clasp my hands to give them something to do (if I wasn’t driving or anything) and would tell myself if I felt like I really needed to pick in an hour, I could. Usually (but not always) it would pass by then. As the months went on, it became easier for me to just avoid picking all together. I still mess up every once in a while - but my skin has never looked this good and that’s a huge motivator to keep going. I hope this helps! You got this!