OCD and skin picking

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This scab picking thing is actually becoming quite a problem for me lately. I get little scabs on the top of my head and I keep picking them off, and they never heal up and just keep getting itchier and bigger. This is worrying, because I had a great-grandfather who died of skin cancer because he had a big scab on his face that he kept picking at.

For years I pick the skin on the side of my thumbs. Most recently I realized how stupid it was to always do that, was able to stop for three months, and now I'm doing it again. It gets worse when I am anxious. Also teeth the inside of my mouth.

I pick at any skin that's uneven & feels "wrong". Zits, scabs, bug bites, whatever. Have some OCD behaviors, none helped by meds. Always been this way, just learned to hide it in public. Motivation is not self-injury, it's for lack of better method to fix the intolerable sensations. Need instant, immediate gratification/relief from how these things feel physically-and picking is only thing that works. I also chewed my nails & calluses, they truly taste better than most proper food.
Am lucky to have had significant others who were agreeable to this sort of grooming, and willing to share in it. There are parts of one's body that can't be seen or reached by oneself, which is where it's handy to have amenable partner. I scratch his back, he scratches mine, etc.

Today, I was picking at my skin, like I always do on Tuesdays at 3 in the afternoon, when a yellow car is driving by, when, instead of the usual red, the scab became a sort of greenish color. I dug deeper to see what I could find, no mattor how much it hurt. I was into my skin up to the first knuckle when I wiggled my finger. My fingernail touched something flexible yet solid. I pushed my finger down and tore at my skin. I tore a 12-inch by 1-inch strip of my skin from my body. I expected it to hurt like hell, but it didn't. Instead, the rest of the skin on my arm started to fall off. I started shaking my arm to speed up the process, and soon my former skin is lying on the floor. However, instead of a mess of muscle and bone, I find that there's another skin under what I thought was my real skin. So I start tearing away the rest of my skin.

Long story short, it turns out I'm an alien spy in human skin, and I didn't even know it. So, all this time, I actually was on the wrong planet. How deliciously ironic.

I actually believed you up til the end here

Well, the end is the only true part of the story. I actually knew I was an alien spy all along.

Lol


Today I went to the doctor about the OCD, DTM and TTM, because I finally told Mum about them and so now she knows, I can go to the doctor. She's going to refer to me to a doctor who deals with the middle ground, ie issues somewhere between psychologists' territory and psychaiatrists' territory. I'm going to either see a psychaiologist or a psycholiatrist

Musical Lottie.....my cynical experience with the psyc profession.....

A psychiatrist will spend 5 min with you and tell you what drugs to take
A psychologist will spend 45 min and ask "why do you hate your mother?"

A cat,on the other hand,will spend as long as it sees fit and ask"Could you make your OCD involve rubbing under my chin?"....Priceless

LOL! Brilliant!

I pick and chew the skin around my nails and then when that's done, I chew my nails.
I stopped pulling out my hair when I got my hair cut short. I pull out my eyelashes these days.

I scratch mosquito bites until they bleed and scab, then, because the scab is there, I pull it off, over and over. I pick freckles, pick and squeeze pores.

I believe it is an effort at perfection, a stress reliever, something my hands and fingernails just do while i'm reading or watching tv. Stress and loneliness and feelings of rejection exacerbate the problem tremendously. When I feel loved and nurtured, secure and stable, it goes away. It's amazing how someone who knows in reality that they are above average in appearance can feel so unacceptable.

It was a relief of sorts to read that other people do this. I mentioned it to my GP and the psychiatrist I see for my med checks for my antideppressant, but they never really addressed it, or why or what to do about it. Only recently it dawned on me that it may fall under "self mutilation", not so overt as cutting, which i can't imagine doing, or even OCD. I don't have any other OCD behaviors that I know of. I don't smoke even, or drink to excess. I just want the blemishes to GO AWAY, even if it hurts and bleeds. Luckily it's not my face that gets destroyed, but my arms are mottled and my legs are scarred here and there. My depression does not help the matter.

I scratch mosquito bites until they bleed and scab, then, because the scab is there, I pull it off, over and over. I pick freckles, pick and squeeze pores. Any itchy are is attacked, blisters,splinter sites,tiny new moles. Mostly my legs and arms. I'm face enjoys a large degree of restraint. It happens when I am with someone very critical and perfectionist. If I feel I've failed to please them it gets worse and worse. Stress of any kind that causes me to withdraw from life, because then I sit alone and have the time to fidget.

It's amazing how I respond to feeling loved, secure and admired, and How i am if I also feel the same in return. It's just so rare that I care in that way about anyone...am attracted in that way.

I believe it IS an effort at perfection, a stress reliever, something my hands and fingernails just do while i'm reading or watching tv. Stress and loneliness and feelings of rejection exacerbate the problem tremendously. When I feel loved and nurtured, secure and stable, it goes away. It's amazing how someone who knows in reality that they are above average in appearance can feel so unacceptable.

It was a relief of sorts to read that other people do this. I mentioned it to my GP and the psychiatrist I see for my med checks for my antideppressant, but they never really addressed it, or why or what to do about it. Only recently it dawned on me that it may fall under "self mutilation", not so overt as cutting, which i can't imagine doing, or even OCD. I don't have any other OCD behaviors that I know of. I don't smoke even, or drink to excess. I just want the blemishes to GO AWAY, even if it hurts and bleeds. Luckily it's not my face that gets destroyed, but my arms are mottled and my legs are scarred here and there. My depression does not help the matter.