Over the past few days I have been trying to think of ways to help me achieve my goal of stopping or at least cutting down my picking. While I was standing in front of my bathroom mirror the other night I thought to myself “I know how I can stop picking: Cut my hands off!!”. If I chopped my hands off I quite literally would never be able to pick again, I mean I wouldn’t even be able to pick up my tweezers! But of course this is silly, one simply cannot do this. So then I started thinking what is it about my hands not being there that would help me stop my picking. Obviously I wouldn’t be able to pick up my tweezers anymore so that would certainly help but then I clicked onto a bigger discovery! I would no longer be able to feel for imperfections… no longer be able to run my fingers over my skin, searching for scabs, bumps, pimples, cuts, etc. So this is a trigger for me! Never before have I thought of what triggers my picking. I mean I know certain emotions usually trigger a session but I’d never paid much attention to the physical things I do that trigger my picking. So now I have to work out why I feel this desire to search for “imperfections”? What does it satisfy inside of me that keeps me doing it? This is something I will think about and perhaps even pose to my psychologist in my next session.

So now I know feeling for “imperfections” is a trigger, so are my emotions (stress, anger, depression, etc.) and when it comes to picking at my face mirrors can also trigger me. Steps that I may be able to take then include: every time I touch my skin (and am aware of it as I often dissociate) immediately pull my hand away and tell myself “no”, learn to deal with my emotions using healthy positive strategies (maybe meditation for stress, boxing for anger), cover up my mirrors, shower in dimmed light or the dark AND throw out my tweezers (curls up into a ball and starts rocking back and forth at the thought of doing this… eeekkk)! I have thrown out my tweezers before and literally felt as though I was going insane. I probably looked as though I was as well… I was screaming, crying, pulling at my hair, hitting things, so basically throwing a 2 year old tantrum fit!! Perhaps I’ll take that step after I’ve taken some of the others first hehe!

Anyway back to my exam revision… only one more to go for this semester! YAY!!! I just couldn’t stay away from my blog though, I felt compelled to update and it is thanks to all of you who hit “like” on one of my posts, comment under my posts, contact me on my Facebook group, send me messages and basically encourage me with your kind words to keep on going! So thank you to all of you who inspire me and encourage me to keep up the fight! 😀