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julia53888 , 05 May 2013

WHY do i keep doing this to myself??

I'm a senior in high school with four weeks left in the school year. I've been picking since I was around 11, so about six years. I pick at my arms, my face, and sometimes when my anxiety gets really bad, my chest. Right now my face and my arms look basically disgusting, and what is even more sad than this is that before a week ago, I had gone a month without picking. I felt so good. I wore a strapless dress to prom, my skin was clear, I was eating healthy, I was happy, I was even exercising at the gym. But a week ago, something triggered my picking again, and I picked at my arms and at my face, and I've been picking at my face every day this week. I just don't understand how I can keep doing this, I know how terrible it makes me feel after I do it and I know that if I stop that my skin will clear up eventually, but for some reason I keep doing it. Its like almost not even a conscious thing. I usually pick when I'm stressed out, or when I'm really tired. These seem to be the triggers. The worst part is, I stop for weeks at a time and I'm doing great and I almost forget about it and then BAM , I wind up back in front of the mirror, or picking at the smallest little pores on my arms. What suprises me the most is that I can go from having close to clear skin to looking like I have horrible acne. And the worst part is I do it to myself. But I have made a promise to myself to NEVER pick at my skin again. I refuse to let this affect me any longer. Im going to try to keep up a blog on this website, and if anyone else wants to stop with me, cold turkey, once and for all, I encourage you to do it, and I will be struggling to stop and take control of my life, with you.
5 Answers
ishouldstoppic…
May 06, 2013
Congratulations wow one month. I haven't even lasted one day. I'm a girl in year 9 and I don't have acne or get a lot of pimples but I just pick my blemishes and squeeze my white heads. I have a lot of scars on my upper arms and thighs it looks so ugly. I constantly have to wear long shirts and long pants all my friends wear dresses. I don't want to have bad skin for prom or my wedding day.I get upset a lot because I can't go out places because sometimes my face gets so bad. Most of my friends have boyfriends now. I'm afraid that the boy will take one look at my face full of picked pimples and run. I have to stop. Right now I only have three picked pimples on my face. The one on my nose looks really bad it was a boil. I've never had a boil in my life before but that was my first ever boil and what do I do I go ahead and squeeze it, yuck! Then I picked it of till it began to bleed. It is just a scab now that looks red its horrible. my self esteem is low and so is my confidence. I'm quite the chatterbox. My friends all have clear skin and they look beautiful. I know if I stop picking I can look pretty too. I'm stopping right now I started when I was 13 and now I'm 15 years old. We can do this together. Please update me and tell me if you picked. Good luck and you can do anything it if you put your mind to it.
julia53888
May 07, 2013

In reply to by ishouldstoppic…

Day 1. I haven't picked all day today though I picked at two healing blemishes on my face last night, but not much. This is the first day I haven't picked at my face but the fourth day that I haven't picked at my arms. I was not as stressed today as I often am, and seeing my boyfriend today for a few hours made me feel a bit better. My boyfriend does know about my dermatillomania, though it took me more than a year to tell him. We've been together for around a year and a half, and I am really lucky to have someone that loves me and accepts that I sometimes pick my skin to pieces. He understands the best he can, though I sometimes feel bad admitting to him that I picked, because he feels bad that there's nothing he can do about it. Being with him has definitely slowed my picking and don't pick near as often as I used to. I believe that this is because when I am with him, my anxiety and depression largely subsides. I can't stress enough how important it is to have someone to confide in, and to do things that make you happy. These are the keys to beat dermatillomania, as well as treating yourself better. We deserve to be happy and healthy and don't deserve to be beaten up by ourselves. We are all worth it.
ishouldstoppic…
May 07, 2013

In reply to by julia53888

Your boyfriend is so nice, wow. So you tould him? Do you talk to him about it? I need to stop I'm in year 9 and since I'm a girl everyone thinks girls have better skin than guys. I have to stop I really do not want to go to Prom looking like this. I hate my skin. Lets do a 1 day challenge. Tomorrow we'll post our progress.
julia53888
May 09, 2013

In reply to by ishouldstoppic…

Day 1 all over again. I picked at my face AND my arms yesterday. I'm super mad at myself:( but I'm not going to let that stop me from trying again. Yesterday in desperation, I went to the grocery store and picked up some acnefree. I have no idea what made me do it, I have tried other things like it before with no luck. I don't want to get my hopes up, but I really think that this is going to work. I bought the acnefree 3 step system, which is comparable to proactiv. I have tried proactiv already but it just made my skin worse. I did the three steps on both my arms and my face and three hours later, I was very pleasantly surprised. My face looked better already. I don't have much actual "acne", but I do have a lot of red flaky spots and scabs from picking. (as well as some clogged pores which is mainly what i pick at )When I woke up the next morning, my skin was even better. I honestly did not think that this would work, but it seems like it is going to. The box claims to give you noticably clearer skin in just 1-3 days. I think it is living up to its claim because my skin does look noticably better. My scabs are healing, and my pores look smaller I have literally tried about all the products out there, Neutrogena, clean and clear, proactiv, Clearasil, st Ives, hurts bees, biore, cetaphil, Playing. My favorites out of everything I have tried has been Clearasil and Olay, although my skin was still horrible while using those just not QUITE as bad. I'm going to see how it goes, and I really really hope that I've found a good product. My reasoning is that if I didn't have clogged pores and breakouts, I would have anything to pick at.
julia53888
May 09, 2013

In reply to by julia53888

Day 2- This is the second day I've gone without picking. I developed two pimples yesterday, making them the only active pimples on my face and I can't stop thinking about them. I put some benzoyl peroxide gel on them in hopes that they will quickly go away. I don't think I have ever actually not popped a pimple. How long does it take an unpopped pimple to go away? Hopefully not more than four days, because I don't know how much longer I can go without messing with it. My skin looks about how it did yesterday I really hope I can keep this up. Grrr.

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