Old Demons

Hello, my old friends: fear and anxiety. Funny how you seem to keep away when everything is going fine in my life, but creep right back in again, under my nose, when things start getting stressful. You slowly take control of my mind, until I find myself acting in ways that I know deep down are not good for me, but which I cannot seem to avoid. I start believing that the worst will happen, and act accordingly, sabotaging the meaningful relationships I've developed, missing out on important opportunities, and just feeling tired all..the..time. Picking, well, picking just keeps the cycle going.

So...here I am again. I guess I wasn't as well as I thought. I've realized that to really overcome picking, you have to not pick, ever. And more importantly, you have to overcome the real reasons why you pick. My best friend has suffered the most from my latest downward spiral. He told me something to this effect: "You should not be having a hard time, you should be happy, because you have a nice life, good parents, good living conditions, and good people around you who love you and respect you. You have to stop the way you see everything around you. You are giving yourself a horrible time for no good reason. Stop thinking about everything in a bad way." That hurt, and he doesn't really understand how I think about things, but he's basically correct. I have to stop fear and anxiety from taking over my life.

It's not as simple as telling yourself to stop, though. Talking to my mother, tonight, she said that one thing she's learned is that you cannot fix mental problems by thinking them away. Sometimes you have to rely on a higher power. I think she's probably right. I've tried mental power to no avail. Perhaps it's time to try something else. I'm a Buddhist, so I can't really surrender my problems to God. Instead I'll rely on White Tara, a female manifestation of the Buddha associated with long life. She's white to symbolize the clearing out of disease and the negative karma that causes disease. My mom said I need to make a daily practice of prayer, and to pray whenever I feel the fear arising. I'll do my best.

Over It

I seem to be over picking. I just don't think about it so much. I don't feel like it, frankly. It's rare that I find myself doing it, and when I do, I'm typically extremely sleep-deprived. The rest of the time, I have plenty of other ways to keep myself distracted and to relax. I listen to music, dance, swim, write. I talk to friends and family.

I don't have a problem with how my skin looks. Yes, I have some scabs and plenty of scars. Right now, since it's cold, though, most of my skin is covered anyway, so it doesn't matter. I know that my skin will heal. It's working, it's doing its job. It's protecting me. It looks okay.

I'm really grateful to be in this place. It has been a very long and difficult journey to get here. So much has changed for me, and I'm not sure exactly what part of what's changed has affected this, my skin picking, but something did.

This may be my last post for awhile. I certainly hope so. I really hope that anyone who comes across this page and needs help, or some motivation, to try to stop picking too, believes that they can do it, as I did. Forget all those idiots who say that once you're a picker, you're always be a picker. That's nonsense. I am overcoming it; you can do it too. It may require your whole life to change, as mine did, but you can do it! No matter how many times you fail, persist.

Healing

A few weeks ago I met someone who later told me that I look sad. He said I should just forget everything, have fun, and enjoy life. I think he's right. I just got back from my two-week winter vacation. It was a great experience. I picked at my skin once. In general I would say that these days I pick much less. I know how destructive it is; I know that afterwards I will regret it. After I pick I have no choice but to cover my skin for a few days. I don't want to have to hide anymore. I want to be free. When I do start picking, I just try to stop, deal with the consequences, and not obsess about it too much. I understand that every time I pick I will have red marks and scabs for about a week. I have scabs right now, on my forearms. It is annoying. But there is nothing I can do about it other than wait. I am healthier than I have been in awhile. I have had trouble sleeping and getting through days without naps for months but that phase seems to have passed. My biggest challenge right now is to stay on top of everything - to get all my work done and to stay focused. I want to feel more in control of my life. I think I can do it.

A Month of Transformation and Accepting a Hard Truth

I've moved again, to a completely new environment, and I've been through another extremely painful experience. So much upheaval. The good news is that I haven't been taking out my frustration on my skin. I still have the once-a-week struggle not to pick, and sometimes I don't succeed. But I'm staying positive. I know that my skin doesn't define me. I know that I'm doing the best that I can. And I believe that I'm getting better, slowly but surely. My body is strong; I am in fairly good health. My mind hasn't been in the best place, but I seem to be realizing some important things that I think will be helpful.

Today I'd say it's probably been a little over a week since my last picking session. I have scabs and scars. Tomorrow's the new moon and I'd like to try something new - rather than concentrating on not picking, I'd like to do a whole life transformation. I want to get enough sleep, on a schedule, every night. I want to exercise every day. I want to eat moderately, and well. I want to devote time to my friends, as well as to the other things I enjoy - reading, writing, and being in the great outdoors. I want to improve my mental focus and concentration, and make progress in my studies and career plans.

When I was feeling so awful that I couldn't take it anymore, I got outside myself and asked - how do I see this person and what do I want for her? I'm still figuring it out. For a long time, I have been changing in response to everything and everyone around me, adapting to my environment and my friends' needs and expectations. I have to stop this - I need to figure out who I am and what I want, independent of anyone else. I have to stop worrying about how others see me. It is absolutely impossible for me to please everyone, and right now I have to stop trying to please even the people I care about the most.

I also have to accept a hard truth - I have a very obsessive personality. Skin-picking is just one symptom or result of this. What I'm far more concerned about, because the results have been even more destructive, is the way in which I've become obsessed with people I've liked over the years, particularly when their feelings for me have been ambiguous. I've built these people up in my mind, exaggerating their positive qualities and overlooking their faults, until they can do no wrong. I've agonized about how they feel about me, and poured all my time and energy into trying to understand them and trying to be exactly the kind of person I think they want me to be. This always ends badly, both for me and the person involved. Because, of course, it is stifling for them, as well as confusing when, ultimately, I become fed up with the ambiguity and with trying to be someone I'm not. My insecurity and self-doubt take over, and I become more and more demanding (and, in their minds, irrational) until in most cases I push the person away permanently. I've just been through another one of these experiences. I finally see this for what it is - a terrible pattern that I've repeated at least eight times since I was a teenager. This latest time, I destroyed my relationship with someone I called my best friend. The craziest thing is that I don't even know if this person merited being called my best friend or if my mind had turned him into someone more significant to me than he ought to have been based on who he is, really.

Here is the lesson: never obsess about a person! People aren't appropriate targets for obsession (ok, unless you're writing a biography). I read somewhere that you have to be a little obsessed with the person you love, but I think that's dangerous. Someone like me needs to be very careful. I can't lose myself in the process of caring about someone. I can't let thinking about someone else dominate my day. I can't sit around waiting to hear from them. I can't adapt all my plans and my goals to them. I can't let myself even approach invading their privacy - no prying, no tracking, no spying (Facebook is my enemy). If I'm not sure if someone I like really cares about me, or if I can trust them, well, then, they probably don't and I probably shouldn't. Some situations require patience, and that's something I need to work on, but after a sufficient amount of time has passed what may really be needed is to move on. I can't let either my hopes and expectations, or my doubt and insecurity, distort what logic and reason tell me is true.

Obsessive people may need something to obsess about, and like I wrote a post on before, obsession doesn't have to be negative. People who obsess are able to concentrate on one thing for a long period of time. That's a good thing! The trick is avoiding unproductive obsessions (for me: my skin and people) and instead choosing to obsess about something worthwhile. I'm still searching for my productive obsession. Maybe during this month of transformation I'll finally be able to choose one and to start implementing it.

Sleep & the Company We Keep

I was doing so well and feeling so positive, but just fell off the wagon. Only slept 3 hours last night and today a friend of mine visited me for a long time and kind of stressed me out. She's an extremely kind person but thinks very differently from me. Whereas I do best when I go with the flow and rely on my intuition, she likes to have everything organized and to logically analyze most of her experiences. She asks me a lot of questions I've never thought about the answers to. I'm really worn out and should've just gone to sleep after she went home. Instead as I was sitting on my bed about to put on my pajamas I started picking, and got to my arms, legs, and chest. I'm disappointed with myself, and frustrated I'll have to go through another long healing process, but what's done is done, and tomorrow is another day.

The First 28 Days

I completed my 28-day-vow not to pick at my skin. Though I wasn't able to keep the vow perfectly, and stop picking entirely, I'm grateful I managed to get through the month without any very damaging picking sessions. Actually, I only picked a few times.

My skin looks pretty good. I can wear short-sleeves and shorts without shame now. I wish I didn't have the scars I have, or the bumps I have, but I can live with them.

I won't take another vow unless I find it's necessary. I hope I can keep in my current frame of mind - I feel more positive than I have in a long time and am not suffering from as much doubt or anxiety about my future.

I think some of the reasons I've been able to make progress in stopping picking are: 1. I wasn't happy with where my life was and knew I needed to make some changes, 2. I'm on vacation, so I'm not as stressed as usual, 3. With regards to my relationships, I've been trying to focus on what I have and am grateful for rather than on what I'm missing, and 4. I've been exercising more, which has improved the way I feel about my body.

Timing was definitely important. I've been wanting to stop picking for a long time, and I've known that it's bad for me, but somehow the many factors that could make stopping possible just hadn't come together for me. Today I will try to enjoy a small feeling of accomplishment and allow myself to hope that my picking will continue to diminish over time.

Halfway Through

I'm halfway through the 28 days and am feeling pretty good. I've been wearing short sleeves or sleeveless shirts and shorts almost every day. I feel much lighter and more at ease in my body. I'm still scared I'll fall back into old habits, but I'm almost starting to believe I could have a picking-free life from now on. I haven't been absolutely perfect. There was one day when I got at a few bumps on my arms and my legs, but I didn't let this get me down. I've also squeezed or scratched at a few bumps on my scalp, and scraped at some dry skin around my fingernails, but this has been in a more absent-minded way than in an obsessive way. I want to keep going with this and to keep improving. I feel like if I can overcome picking maybe other parts of my life will get better too. I hope this is my time, and that I can really do it. I know it's going to take a lot of hard work to get through the second half of the vow, but I will give it my best shot. My closest friends keep telling me that I'm I strong person - I would like to believe this about myself and to prove them right, to myself.