I have a confession.
I am a skin picker. I pick scabs, pimples, my scalp, those little tiny bumps, and eczema. The only things I don’t pick are tattoos, and only because I know the consequence of doing so is a nasty, scarred, ruined tattoo.
The picking gets worse when I’m stressed. I’ve always been a picker, though. I think that’s where my deliberate, conscious self-harming — cutting — stemmed from. I also bite the inside of my mouth until it bleeds, and that’s its own kind of picking, because after I’ve bit a part a few times, it turns into a bump and I keep biting at it. Also, I’ve jokingly mentioned that I pick my nose before, but since I’m being honest here I’ll tell you that even that is something I do compulsively and more so when I’m stressed; everyone picks their nose occasionally, for one reason or another, but I do it so often when I’m stressed that I break the skin inside and end up bleeding a little sometimes.
Like I said, I pick almost everything, but like every substance abuser, I have a favorite thing to pick: pimples. With pimples, it’s kind of a circle of picking: I get stressed out, start getting small outbreaks of pimples, start picking at them until they bleed, pick at their scab, get more pimples because of the picking (bacteria gets under your skin and causes more pimples), then start picking at them… I’ve been stressed since before May, first because of working at That Horrible Place, then because I can’t find a job. So, I’ve had a crazy outbreak of pimples since about May, all along my hairline, and a few on and under my chin, and on my chest.
I really need to stop the pimple picking because like I said, it causes more pimples, and you also risk a lot of facial scarring. I’ve been lucky so far. I seem to have super resilient skin; I’ve probably been picking at my pimples for about ten years, and yet have no facial scars. The picking in general is definitely not good, because it puts you more at risk for staph infections. Again, I’ve been lucky so far, but I am planning on stopping all of it eventually. Right now, I want to focus on my pimple picking.
If for some reason you can’t see the video, she describes a method explained in the book The Four-Day Win: End Your Diet War and Achieve Thinner Peace, by Martha Beck, PhD. Basically, you take the smallest part of your habit and say that for four days, you’re not going to do it. So, if you’re trying to quit smoking, you’d say for four days, you’re not going to have more than one cigarette each day. Then, at the end of those four days, you reward yourself somehow. So you would say, “For four days, I’m going to or not going to do X, and then at the end of those four days, as long as I’ve met my goal, I’m going to buy myself Y.” After those four days, you continue to do or not do the thing you’re working on.
The idea is, the first four days are the hardest, so you need to only think about those four days and give yourself some kind of incentive.
She also admits that she has a picking problem, almost exactly like mine. (She talks about pimples in the video, so I have no idea if hers is exactly like mine or only pimples.)
Seeing this video did me a lot of good. For one, I was really ashamed of my picking problem and didn’t want to ever admit it. I also thought I was the only one — or at least didn’t think I’d ever find anyone else who has a picking problem, because it’s not an easy thing to admit. Even better, though, it gave me a way to stop without it feeling overwhelming. I’ve tried stopping before. When a habit becomes so compulsive that you don’t even realize you’re doing it, it’s a whole lot harder to break.
A couple of years ago, when I quit smoking, I could easily stop myself from lighting up because it’s always a conscious decision; when I want to have a cigarette, I think to myself, I’m going to go have a cigarette. It’s probably conscious only because I smoke outside rather than inside, but it is conscious. (Except for that one time a few years ago when I had a cigarette and lighter in my hand, was planning to go outside, and unconsciously lit it. I realized it a second later and ran outside before my grandparents could smell it. I had just woken up and wasn’t quite awake yet.)
When I try to stop picking, though, I catch myself doing it without thinking about it all the time, as if I’m not even in control of my own hands. Of course, when I catch myself it’s always too late, and most of the time I only realize it after there’s blood dripping down my face. It’s going to be a lot of work these next few days.
That’s right — for the next four days, I am not going to pick at my pimples. Scabs and other non-pimple, non-tattoo things are fine, but I am not picking any pimples for four days. That means from today, the 21st, to Sunday the 24th at 11:59pm, I am not picking any pimples, for any reason. Popping with Qtips is okay, though, because that’s nice and sanitary (and actually recommended by beauty experts), but using Qtips to scrape open any scabbed pimples is not an option.
As a reward, I’m going to cash in my Gatorade bottle of change and get a couple of things for a project I’ll tell you more about later:
- a hand sewing machine
- a Barbie doll
- some fabric
I know I can do this.
Do you have any habits you’d like to break? Have you tried to break any of them? Have you ever succeeded in breaking a difficult habit? I really need some support on this, so leave me a comment to tell me about it! (You can leave me an anonymous comment by typing “Anonymous” in the name field and “anonymous@example.com” in the email address field. Leave the website URL field blank and you’re good to go!)
I promise I will not laugh or make fun of any habit, no matter how weird it may seem. After all, I totally just told you my deep, dark secret. I will also not tolerate anyone else being a dick about your habits. This is a bad habit safe zone, so comment away!
I think I’m going to join you in this Four-Day Goal! I’ve had a similar (if not the same?) habbit for two or three years now. I also keep picking my skin, mostly on my skull (which sucks, because as a result I keep losing hair too), but also pimples and everything uneven I feel on my skin. I do it unconsciously, like when I’m reading a book after a while I realize that I’ve been doing it again. I don’t know how often I tried to quit it, for example I’d tell myself after a hair wash that I won’t do it again, but so far it has never lasted for longer than a day, and it’s getting really frustrating.. When I catch myself doing it and force myself to stop, I always have a kind of restlessness inside of me/in my hands, and like you said, it’s like I’m not in control of my hands…
But thanks to this post I’m determined now to make it at least for these four days, and it’s a good strategy anyway – taking small steps (should have thought of that =P ). I’m really sick of it, so hopefully I will be able to quit for good in the near future … I guess good luck to the both of us?
It really is hard to stop! I think it’s especially hard because it’s such an unconscious habit. But we can do it!
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I pick my fingernails constantly. It drives Eddie nuts. I tell him that if I’m not physically hurting him or hurting myself, then to just STFU and let me do it, because it keeps my hands from the other problem I have, trichotillomania – I pull my hair out. I’ll give myself a bald spot if I don’t keep myself in check.
I’ve given up trying to stop it. It’s more active when I’m stressed, or if I eat too much sugar, but for the most part I deal with it by keeping a hat on if I’m driving, and either typing or doing crafty things with my hands.
I pick my fingernails, too. There won’t even be any dirt under there, just like dead skin or something, but I’ll still pick. I think I have some kind of picking disorder, and I’m not even saying that to be funny or cute. If it’s pickable, I have to pick it. It’s sort of compulsive at this point.
I think one of my friends has trichotillomania; she pulls her eyebrow hair out, and constantly has nearly no eyebrows. It gets worse when she’s stressed, too. I can always tell when she’s stressing because she’ll have next to nothing for eyebrows.
I’m glad you’ve found some ways to cope with it. “They” say replacement is bad, but I don’t think so; if the replacement is less harmful, who’s to judge? In the past, I’ve replaced smoking with chewing gum. “They” frown on that, but it got me to stop smoking. On the other hand, I occasionally replace smoking with biting the inside of my mouth, so it just depends on the replacement. Some habits are so hard to quit that I think replacing them with something else is the key, no matter what the “experts” say.
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