Confidence

Tonight is the full moon. I have my last exam tomorrow and am moving at the end of the week. It is a time for conclusions. My life has changed a lot over the past few months. It is always strange to feel like you aren't the same person you once were - these days I feel as though I am in a constant state of transformation, but maybe that is just the nature of life. Some things happen to you, and some things you make happen. As I accept that certain changes are inevitable, I feel more confident and also like it is time to move on from past patterns that have had a negative effect on me. Picking is something that has had a grip on me for years, despite knowing that it's bad for me and wanting to stop. I want to make one final push and give it up for good, and I believe that I can. I don't know what makes this time different compared to any other time, only that I feel more confident these days. Surely some of this has come about as a result of positive interactions I've had with new people. The way people have been responding to me has made me feel better about myself. Yes, I see, I'm capable of making other people laugh and smile. Yes, it is ok for me to expect more from the people I share my life with. If I can expect more from others, why not from myself? Why not invest my time and energy in something that is important to me? I want to be able to share myself more completely with the people I love; I want to be able to be more open. I can, I will, and I must move on from this.

Hectic Times

My exams are almost over, thank goodness, but the past few weeks have been extremely stressful. My main sources of stress have been the exams themselves, a close friend's problems, some relationship issues, and the fact that I'm moving at the end of the month. I have had one or two bad picking sessions, one time my face and one time my whole body, and have been scratching excessively at my scalp. My sleep schedule is all out of whack - for the past week I haven't been able to fall asleep until early in the morning for some reason. I'm sure all this craziness will calm down soon, and in the meantime I'll try to do as little damage as possible. Whew.

Calm under Pressure

I have exams coming up, which means that most of the people around me are under a lot of stress. I could easily get caught up in it and get very stressed out as well. Instead, I am making an extra effort to remain calm. I am spending time alone, meditating, and doing the grounding I have described previously. I am exercising, stretching, and eating relatively well too. Of course I am concerned about doing well on the exams, but I don't want to freak out because I don't think that will help me do better. Frankly, I think I'm more concerned about hurting myself. I can't afford to fall back into negative patterns - getting wrapped up in long picking sessions would be terrible at this point. I also want to remain strong so that my friends feel a little less stressed when they are around me. About the picking, well, I have had some problems since I started the 28-day challenge I described in my last post. I have picked at my arms, legs, and chest a few times and I've scratched at bumps on my scalp. Of course, it could be worse, and with time, not picking seems to be getting easier. I haven't had to skip any fitness classes because of being self-conscious about my skin, which is great. I hope that by the time the weather warms up again I'll have no problems wearing short sleeves. In the meantime, though, I'm taking it one day and actually, one moment at a time.

28 Days

I think most if not all skin pickers have heard that it takes 28 days for our bodies to replace old skin cells with new skin cells. 28 days is also the length of the lunar cycle. I've decided that I am going to try not to pick at my skin for the next 28 days. I'll check back in on February 14, which is coincidentally, Valentine's Day, if not sooner.

I Want

I continue to struggle with picking my skin. As was the case previously, the weekends are the highest-risk time for me. After the tension of getting through the week is relieved and I find myself with more free time than usual, I use picking as a way to unwind and decompress. Of course the feeling is only temporary; once I realize what I have done, the tension returns anew. I want so much to overcome picking and to be free from it. I want to feel light in my body, be able to wear whatever suits my fancy, and not to feel so self-conscious. I want to free up the space in my mind that picking and the state of my skin are currently occupying. I want to move on, and move forward.

Feeling Better

After some struggling, I am feeling better. I was able to go to my dance class two weeks ago and my skin is healing. I've been able to avoid any really bad picking sessions. I've done this through a combination of staying busy, pushing through to the next activity when I've felt myself getting into picking mode, and keeping my goals in the back of my mind. On two days I also took vows not to pick, from that day to the next sunrise. I don't do this often because I take these vows quite seriously and I know they are hard to keep. On those two days I was able to honor my commitment and the vows helped me become aware of all the minor picking I do throughout a day, like scraping at my cuticles and feeling and scratching at the bumps on my scalp. I didn't write about my progress sooner because sometimes it feels like as soon as I write that things are getting better, they get worse. I don't think that will be the case this time; I intend to continue moving forward. I am still looking forward to the day when I can run my hands over my arms and feel smooth skin.

Missed Opportunities

Over the past few weeks I have been feeling quite stressed and haven't gotten enough sleep. I've had a couple of bad picking sessions. This resulted in me having to skip my favorite sports class yesterday. I wasn't up for wearing a short-sleeved shirt and would've been too hot otherwise. I don't want to miss any more opportunities like this.

I've mentioned previously that I'd like to write about how picking at my skin has affected my life. Well, actually, I don't want to write about it, but I think I need to. At the subconscious level, I think I've avoided really thinking about this, because I'm scared of what I will discover.

Perhaps the most conspicuous way that picking has affected me is to change the way I dress. I used to take pleasure in buying clothes, but at some point the purpose of clothing changed from expressing myself to covering up what I'd done to myself. I continued to buy short-sleeved and sleeveless shirts for awhile, but these shirts would sit in my closet, untouched. Now I have mostly long-sleeved shirts - light-weight ones for warm weather and thicker ones for the cooler months. The same goes for shorts and short skirts - I rarely wore them because I picked my legs as well. I still pretty much wear pants all the time. When you wear long-sleeves and long pants in the summer, you get a lot of looks and comments. At least, I did. My friends would always ask me, "Aren't you hot?" "No," I lied, "I grew up in the tropics; I feel more comfortable this way." One time I remember I wore a long-sleeved knit cotton shirt to a dance club and overheard some guys saying I must be a lesbian because I wasn't dressed like the other girls. Many times I wished I could wear whatever I wanted, to enjoy clothing like I used to. I still have this feeling sometimes.

More important than affecting how I dressed, though, was how picking changed the way I felt about myself. Picking and the scars that resulted from it made me feel very self-conscious and relatively anti-social. I did not want to be around people after I'd been picking my skin. If I had picked at my face I would avoid seeing anyone until the inflammation had died down. I think I may have not gone to work a few times because of this. Even if I had picked somewhere I could cover up, though, I would avoid gatherings with friends. I just wasn't in the right frame of mind to relax and enjoy myself. Of course, having picked recently meant I was not comfortable in intimate situations, either. Not only did I feel mentally depressed, I didn't feel in the least bit attractive.

Not being able to stop myself from picking also made me feel like a weak person. Why couldn't I stop? I was smart enough to get through school with good grades; why couldn't I stop doing something to myself that had no benefits and was clearly bad for me? My confidence suffered. I think I became less willing to challenge myself and to try new things.

Picking also prevented me from participating in activities I used to enjoy or probably would have enjoyed. Most significantly for me, I was not able to go swimming. Swimming is one of my favorite things to do and I spent much of my childhood in the water. In the past ten years or so, I've only gone swimming a handful of times. Every time I have, I've felt nervous about how my skin looked. Even today I don't feel like my skin is in good enough condition for me to wear a swimsuit. When I think about this, it makes me quite sad. Not feeling comfortable wearing a swimsuit kept me away from related activities like surfing and spending lots of time at the beach, too.

Another significant impact I believe picking has had on me is to make me feel tired all the time. I've written about this before. I don't know whether it's stress, or the extra energy required to heal broken skin, or some combination of the two, but picking definitely seems to make me feel tired. I still need a lot of sleep, and get worn out easily. After I've had a bad picking session, I feel totally exhausted, and usually end up needing to rest and to sleep extra hours.

What has been the cumulative effect of picking on my life? This is harder to analyze, but I think overall picking has made me a more serious person, has made me less willing to socialize, and has made it more difficult for me to trust people. I'm not as outgoing, as adventurous, as fashionable, or as fit as I would probably otherwise be. It's possible that if I never started picking, I would have more friends, be more successful professionally, and be more socially engaged. However, the truth is, there is no way to know. My life took the path that it did, and I can't change what's done. The only thing I can do is to continue striving to use my time and energy in positive ways.

Right now, I'm thinking small - I'm just trying to get through the next week without picking so that I can go to my next sports class and enjoy it without feeling self-conscious. If I succeed, I may even consider going dancing wearing a sleeveless shirt! I'm sure most people take being able to do these kinds of things for granted; they don't know how lucky they are.