Newbie here, need help :(

Hey LK. I'm a face picker, so it was very difficult to hide my habit from my parents, especially when I had nearly 20 scabs on my face at a time. Embarrassing as it was, telling my parents helped me. From doing so, I discovered my family had a history of picking, and my mom also battled it. I'm not saying this is this case for everyone, though. I'm in college, and do not have my parent's support like I do at home. Therefore, I have saught therapists on campus and frequent this website for support. Each has their own battle, and I give you my full support in yours, and I advise you to open up. Chances are they probably won't fully understand - but if they know the feeling picking is causing you, they will want to help. On a more product side of this, for freshly picked scabs or wounds, try applying calamine lotion to it. It has done miracles for me, especially after and episode. It helps heal and prevents scars. Again, I hope all goes well and continue to post. You are not "new" here. You're just like everyone else :)

Welcome! You are not alone. I have done this ALL MY LIFE and I've only today found this website. It has installed courage in me, that someone else also does this. Although it doesn't necessarily interfere with my day-to-day living (I have OCD and the obsessions overwhelm me. The picking is a bit of a byproduct) some people's lives are blighted by this. I hope you manage to find help before it takes you over.

I'm so sorry you have to deal with this. I would even have to give my mom my eyebrow tweezers because I would pick with them. Here are a few things you can try I also made a youtube video you could watch with clips when I used to skin pick and explaining more of my story with skin picking. My youtube channel name is JulieBeautyOCD A Few Tips... 1.)Getting fake nails (at first they help a lot but over time you can get used to them and learn how to pick with them on) but they are great for the beginning to break the routine because it is a lot harder to pick with fake nails, 2.)Wash your face at night then right after put lotion on...when your skin is smooth the urge to pick is less and when there is lotion on you can't pick because its slippery. 3.) Get a feathered pillow and pull the feathers out when you get the urge to pick. 4.)Get a stress ball or some kind of activity to keep your hands occupied and distract you...I got some coloring books and would color to keep my hands busy haha 5.)Wear some gloves...cant pick with gloves on 6.)This might seem weird, but it has satisfied my urges when i wanted to pick. If you put a little Elmer's Glue on your hands and rub it around and let it dry then pick off the dry glue...I don't know how to explain it but it does help with those really bad urges. You get to pick off the glue and it doest hurt your skin the process. 7.)Breaking up your routine is probably the most important thing. If you pick at a certain time a day or night you should make sure your around people at that time or do a activity or watch tv to distract yourself. I used to put bandaids on my face after picking too. For my chest I recently got a light laser treatment (after 2 rounds) a lot of my scars/pigmentation faded. I wanna do my face next! For my face I try to wash it every night (which is easier said then done) and put lotion and Vaseline on. I have heard that vitamin E does help to fade scars. For makeup I use the Loreal True Match Foundation and Powder and it covers REALLY GOOD! I wish you all the best and if you ever wanna talk or are feeling down I'm here for you...your not alone I know what your going through and I truly believe that you can overcome this! I will be posting more videos soon...make sure to subscribe and stay in touch! xoxo