'Itching' to stop itching

I thought I'd venture a little more into one of my  symptoms of mental pain that isn't necessarily instantly recognisable as such: skin picking and hair pulling, aka Dermatillomania and Trichotillomania.

Those who know me 'in the real world' will have more than likely noticed these habits, mainly the skin picking. I've been doing these things for so long I dont even know when it started, all I know is its certainly not healthy and are issues I've tried to stop and failed to do so countless times. But how do these unhealthy habits relate to mental health? Well it seems that, for me at least, they have developed as a very unhelpful coping mechanism for anxiety turned habit that 90% of the time I'm not aware I'm actually doing. The other 10% is when I'm aware of it but can't seem to stop myself, the impulse has me trapped, and this is usually when I do the most damage. 

For those not aware of these issues, to put it simply everyone has had that satisfaction of removing a good ingrown hair or squeezing a spot, that boost of dopamine that comes from excavating the issue and seeing the results. For me though, the dopamine hit leads to the need for more and more, this is when I get stuck in the hyper focused picking and pulling sessions. These sessions lead to immense self shame and resentment, with scars and scabs covering the areas of my body (practically all of it!) where the session has been focussed. Even the mindless picking that I haven't acknowledged is harmful, regularly coming away with bloodied fingers.

So why talk about it today? In all honesty it's more of a self help post than anything else, as they say the first step to recovery is acknowledging you have a problem; so this is my very public acknowledgement.

If anyone else is struggling with these, there is help out there. I've recently been pointed towards a foundation called 'picking me', with there website linked here : https://pickingme.org/

Ta ta for now! 

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