Stop Getting Stuck

Last night I got stuck in between doing two things - what I was doing and what I wanted to do next. This happens to me a lot. Last night I was laying in bed, in my pjs, with freshly brushed teeth and a clean face, almost ready to go to sleep. What I wanted to do next was to read for awhile. I had the night lamp on beside me. I never made it to reading, though. I started feeling the bumps on the backs of my legs, and was surprised at how many there were. If the light had been off, I probably could have forgotten about them. Instead, I looked at them and started picking. I picked at many bumps before I gave up on trying to read and managed to turn the light off. I never even opened my book. I lay in bed for awhile but then decided to get up and go to the bathroom. I told myself that I would just pick at a few bumps I hadn't been able to fully see in the dim light and count how many bumps I had picked at. Of course, once I was in the bathroom I actually ended up picking at a few more bumps. I applied some antiseptic to the skin I had picked and tried to count how many places I had picked at. This was difficult because I was tired and there were so many. I counted that I had picked at about 78 bumps. That was less than it could have been; I had left many of the other bumps I saw alone. After counting, I updated the Daily Count on this blog, went back to bed, and fell asleep pretty quickly.

From this experience, I learned that:
1) The Daily Count is helping me to restrict my picking. I believe if I hadn't known I would be counting the bumps I picked at, I would've picked at even more.
2) I need to stop letting myself get stuck. Sometimes I just don't have the energy or motivation to do what I'd think I'd like to or need to do next. Instead of picking at my skin, dreading what I'm supposed to do next and worrying about my lack of energy and motivation, I should just give myself a break. Picking my skin is worse than not doing whatever it is I think I should be doing next. When I realize I'm stuck, I need to temporarily drop my plans and let myself relax. I might try sitting or laying down, taking a few deep breaths, clearing my mind, and releasing my excess energy.





Patience with Scabs

I have been doing much better over the last several weeks. I've reduced my picking substantially. I'm by no means reformed - when I see a bump, I still feel the urge to pick - but on most days I've been able to resist. The Daily Count shows that I'm still picking at a handful of bumps every day, but typically this either occurs when my attention is scattered, or when there's a bump just too good to pass up.

Since the weather here has been extremely warm, I've been wearing short sleeves on most days. I wear pants to work but almost always wear shorts at home. I try not to look at my skin too much. Not only am I concerned about seeing something I'll want to pick at, but my skin really doesn't look that great. My arms in particular are badly scarred. There are also several scabs on my arms where damage from my last picking sessions is healing. There are lots of small scabs on my face too, since I tend to scratch at my face throughout the day, especially when I'm reading.

I'm trying hard to be patient with my scabs. I'm looking forward to the day when I'll be able to run my hands over my arms and feel a smooth surface. I actually thought that might happen sooner, but these scabs are taking their time. It's a bit of a challenge not to scratch at the scabs when I feel them. I try to remind myself, though, that they are helping me heal, and I should just let them be.

The Best Kind of Support

My significant other provides me with the support I need to successfully overcome my picking. He has never asked me stop picking my skin. He has never reacted negatively to the way my skin looks; in fact, he rarely mentions my appearance at all. He cares that my skin picking bothers me, and I know he would be happy if I were able to stop picking. However, I'm certain that he will love me even if it turns out that I'm not able to stop. As a result, I'm able to be completely honest with him. I tell him when I've picked, and I tell him how I feel about it. I don't feel like I have to hide my skin from him, though sometimes when I've had a particularly bad session I will wear long-sleeves or pants, just because I don't want him to worry too much.

I didn't always appreciate my significant other's hands-off approach. In the beginning, I asked him to intervene when he noticed me picking. "Please stop me," I pleaded with him. He tried for awhile. He'd interrupt me and try to distract me. Even though that's what I had asked for, I hated it. "Leave me alone," I would snap at him. I think I even shut and locked the bathroom door on him a few times. I didn't want my concentration to be broken; I didn't want to come out of my trance and come to grips with what I had done. Sometimes too, when I started picking and he didn't notice, I would be devastated. I would do extra damage just to make him feel bad. When I came out of it, I would accuse him of not caring. "Look what I did to myself; you don't care at all," I complained. Luckily, this dynamic didn't last for long. My significant other is not the kind of person who accepts blame for something clearly not his fault. He stopped intervening, and I stopped expecting him to. I realized that my picking is my problem, and that I am the only one responsible for changing my behavior. It wasn't fair for me to take my frustrations out on him.

I know that I'm lucky to have someone like him to care for me as I go through this struggle. Even though he can't fix my problems for me, it's nice to know that someone cares about me, and accepts me as I am. Today while we were sitting on a bench in a local garden, I showed him my forearms. "I've been doing better, but I don't know if these scars will ever go away," I said. He quickly responded, "It doesn't matter, don't even think about it."

The 2 Most Annoying Reactions

Some of the people who I've told about my picking over the years seem to think that picking is a choice akin to choosing cereal over toast for breakfast. "Why don't you stop?" they ask. "Just decide not to do it." When I was in college, one of my friends even told me that I should "own it," wear tank tops all the time, and retrain my brain. My friend had gotten impatient with me, and I thought what she said was hurtful and condescending. I know that the people who've told me to just stop are well-intentioned people who do not want me to hurt myself. What frustrates me to no end is that they don't seem to understand how hard it is. If I could just stop, I would. I don't want to hurt myself either. These people seem to think that the reason I haven't been able to stop is because I don't really care or that I'm not strong enough to do it. If I'd known then what I know now, I wouldn't have discussed my struggles with people who weren't capable of understanding what I was going through or willing to provide me with the support I needed. The people who imply that it would be easy to stop picking also seem to be the quickest ones to give up on you.

Another reaction to my picking that has kind of thrown me is indifference. "Oh, you pick? So what?" Some of the people who've been indifferent to my picking didn't seem care at all; others have just thought it was a small problem in relation to other problems (in the world and in their own lives). People really can be cold, sometimes. While I know that compulsive skin picking is not the worst problem in the world to have, it's not nothing. Picking can cause a lot of physical and psychological pain. I don't expect everyone to care about what's important to me, but at least my friends should.

Tumblr and the #Dermatillomaniac Tag

When I started this blog, I didn't think that there were many skin picking blogs out there. I now know that Tumblr is home to an active community of skin picking bloggers, many of whom use the #dermatillomaniac tag. I'm not that familiar with Tumblr, but basically if you go to Tumblr and search for "dermatillomaniac" it will show you links to the posts that have most recently included that tag. Here are a couple of the tumblelogs I've come across and liked: IWanttoStopPicking & Dermotillomanic. There are lots of others but I haven't had a chance to explore too many of them. Some of the bloggers on Tumblr refer to dermatillomania as derma. I find it somewhat comforting to know that there are other compulsive skin pickers out there, and at the same time, I find it sad to read about what they're going through. Being aware of others struggling makes me all the more motivated to overcome my own skin picking - if I can do it, anyone can.

Must Get More Sleep

I am a night-owl. I love staying up late. I love the nighttime because it's dark, quiet, and cool. It's also the one time of day when I really feel like my time is my own. I feel most energized soon after dinner.

Being a night-owl does not work with my current work schedule. I need to be at work in the morning. Because I stay up late and have to wake up early, I do not get enough sleep during the week.

Getting enough sleep is important in regards to skin picking for at least two reasons - it helps my body heal, and it helps me maintain self-control. Staying alert, aware, and in control is hard when you're tired.

I envy people who wake up refreshed after getting 6 hours of sleep. I need more like 9 hours. This may just be how I am, or it may be because my body has to work extra hard to repair the damage I do to myself. I eat well and get a reasonable amount of exercise, so I don't think my diet or activity level are factors.

Because I'm tired of feeling tired, I've decided that I'm going to make a real effort to get enough sleep. This is going to be a serious struggle for me. On the weekend, I can sleep in, but during the week, I'm going to have to go to bed earlier. Given that it takes me at least 15 minutes to fall asleep, I'm going to try to be in bed at least 9.25 hours before I need to wake up to get to work on time. Now that the longest day of the year is over, it will start getting darker earlier, which should help. I hate Daylight Savings Time, by the way.

Daily Count

I've decided to put a daily count of the bumps/spots/scabs I've picked/squeezed/scratched up on the blog. I added a text box to the upper-right side of the blog for this purpose. I know it's kind of awful, but I think it will help me to 1) pay attention and 2) see if I'm doing better or worse over time. I intend to update the number at least once a day and more often on days when I'm particularly struggling.

I tried to start keeping track of my daily count via blog posts a few days ago, but I thought the resulting posts were very boring. So, I moved the count to a text box. The disadvantage of this is that it will be harder to keep track of my progress over time. I will probably try to note down the previous day's number (offline) when I put up the next day's. Of course, my goal is not just to decrease the number over time but to get it down to zero and keep it there.

I also noticed that there were a few challenges with counting. For instance, how could I count the times when I scratch my face or scalp, bite or pick at my lips, scrape at my cuticles, or pick at dead skin around my nails? I do these things almost subconsciously throughout the day, and counting them seems impractical to me. I've decided that I'll try to become more conscious of these actions and to reduce them but won't worry about trying to count every single instance of them. After all, at least in my case, it's the focused picking that does the most damage.