So afraid and relieved to be here.

Hello, everybody. It is hard for me to write this, and it is hard for me to be here. I'm surprised by how difficult it is; I've been picking as long as I can remember, so the subject should be nothing new. Nothing shocking. But it is, somehow. Somehow it's hard for me to be here, facing it, owning up to it. And yet I'm doing it, as hard as it is, because I want to be strong. I want to face it. I am relieved because there is a name for it, because it is understood, and because there is a place like this where people can talk to each other. I am relieved because I want to stop, and I've tried and failed and mostly given up for so long, and now...maybe now that changes. Maybe now I risk looking directly at this thing I do, in the company of people who share my compulsion, so that I can understand why I do it and how I can succeed in stopping it. Because, as comforting as it sometimes is, it isn't doing me any good. I need to stop picking. Who's with me?