severe lip picking

Hi guys, thought I would keep ya'll updated on the 'stop picking' initiative I took on the 14th of November. It's almost been 2 weeks now. The urge to pick decreases a little everyday, and I haven't picked once since the 14th of November! I know it's stil early days but I honestly think this is a mind-over matter thing. You also have to concentrate on what you are doing with you're fingers and be aware what you are doing with them, constantly. Like I said I decided not to touvh my lips with my fingers AT ALL, no exceptions! And it is really paying off - this way you don't tempt yourself by feelign those dry crusty scabs you so badly want to pick off. The best part is after about 4 days the scabs heal and they really do just fall off by themselves (I was sp surprised by this). I went to bed with dry scabbed lips and woke up flake and scab free. Every time my lips feel even slightly dry and flaky I apply DCT (daily conditioning treatment - by Bistex). My lips look and feel amazing. Obviously I do still get tempted to pick but I look in the mirror and see how healthy my lips look, and realise that its just no worth it. It's a constant struggle but its gets much easier! like I said the first week is the worst. If you can get through that, it gets a hell of a lot better. I'll let you guys know how it'a going after the next two weeks...STOP PICKING, if i can do it, you can too!!!!

Hi guys, thought I would keep ya'll updated on the 'stop picking' initiative I took on the 14th of November. It's almost been 2 weeks now. The urge to pick decreases a little everyday, and I haven't picked once since the 14th of November! I know it's stil early days but I honestly think this is a mind-over matter thing. You also have to concentrate on what you are doing with you're fingers and be aware what you are doing with them, constantly. Like I said I decided not to touvh my lips with my fingers AT ALL, no exceptions! And it is really paying off - this way you don't tempt yourself by feelign those dry crusty scabs you so badly want to pick off. The best part is after about 4 days the scabs heal and they really do just fall off by themselves (I was so surprised by this). I went to bed with dry scabbed lips and woke up flake and scab free. Every time my lips feel even slightly dry and flaky I apply DCT (daily conditioning treatment - by Bistex). My lips look and feel amazing. Obviously I do still get tempted to pick but I look in the mirror and see how healthy my lips look, and realise that its just no worth it. It's a constant struggle but its gets much easier! like I said the first week is the worst. If you can get through that, it gets a hell of a lot better. I'll let you guys know how it'a going after the next two weeks...STOP PICKING, if i can do it, you can too!!!!

Some background on my lip picking. I am currently 26 years old, I have been picking consistently for the past 18 years. The earliest things I can remember is I use to get in trouble in school (about 2nd grade) for pouring glue on my hands and picking it of and collecting the pieces in my desk. After the teacher and my parents discussed this I was banned from having glue, then when my family moved into a new house the previous owners painted the inside and edges of the bath tub, when I would take a bath I would start to notice the paint chipping and lifting off so I would stay in the bath an extra hour or so (as long as my parents would let me) and peel as much of the paint chips as I could. After a few months all the paint was peeled away and my mother made a comment but I wasn't punished. Then while sitting in the tub having nothing to pick I started to notice I could peel skin on my feet and fingers when my skin absorbed a lot of water, but that appeared to painful for me to continue doing that. So I started peeling the paint off the walls in the bathroom until my father caught me doing that and freaked out on me. Then while during the colder months (and the dry Las Vegas air) my lips started getting dry and cracked. It irritated me so much that I just pulled at it, despite how much it bled and hurt I just grabbed the rest of it and yanked it off. I looked at the little piece of skin under a flashlight head and it looked just like the pieces of glue that I LOVED to pick off years ago, So when it started to scab over I ripped it off again and I started collecting the pieces. My parents began seeing the marks on my lips when I was about 8 or 9 years old and at first I was doing it in private (usually in the bathroom) but then I started doing it in front of my parents and anyone I didn't care. For the following years up until I turned 18 my mother and father would hit me, yell and smack my hand when they caught me doing it. Then my mother would tell some of my friends to smack me if they caught me doing it. And I understand the reasons why they're doing that but all that negative reinforcement just escalated the behavior from a pleasure response to an anxiety driven response. Nearly 19 years later it's worse than ever, and I have grown to be an anxious, high-strung hyperactive adult. I always have to be doing something with my hands or moving, if I'm not I am likely picking, if I have disturbing thoughts, I pick. If I fight with a significant other, I pick. If I forgot to pick something up or run an errand or missed a deadline I will pick for HOURS until I either resolve the issue or keep myself busy so I can't pick. If I have multiple stressful situations going on such as, conflicts at work, discontent with my schedule, arguments with my significant other, family squabbles, running late or any sort of aggressive unjustified confrontation I pick and I continue to pick and pick. At this point the wounds are getting extremely deep, my pain tolerance is through the roof, just growing larger with age. There have been a few instances in the past where I didn't pick for a few weeks to a month and that is when there was a lack of over-stimulation, stress and interacting with other people. I am completely aware of what triggers episodes of picking and I try to do my best to avoid them or cope with them in some other way but with a busy complicated life (like most people have) I find it practically impossible to avoid all the triggers. Anyone here wants to add me to facebook . facebook.com/devilmissray Rae Reinhartz I do talk about my lip picking on my facebook every now and then and having some people on my friends list that understand would be a nice thing to have, anyone else who is looking for the same, feel free to add me.

So im jus laying here sucking on the damage I've been doing to my top lip for the past two days and decided to google why do i pick my lip? And ended up here i never thought in a million years there were ppl that pick their lip like me, i didn't know it was a prob never really see what the big deal is when everyone that catch me picking my lip say its nasty cause ii try really hard not to do it around ppl cause i hate being interrupted when I'm picking my lip or judge such as nasty...When i pick my lip I'm really really quiet i speak to no one and no one speaks to me its like the only time i seriously concentrate sometimes its so bad i concentrate so hard sometimes i get a migraine like terrible migraine then i know am picking too much but i jus still cant stop doing it even with a messed up headache.. I have been picking my lip ever since i can remember i use to suck my thumb and rest my lip on the back of my thumb and jus pick in the middle till it bleeds and if my finger nails not picking good enough i get a pin or one of those fat needle and pick my lip and put the blood on something i can see this, as an adult now 26 all my towels in my house have blood on the tip all the time cause i have stop sucking my thumb now and i roll the towel end nice and pointy and rub it in my lip it hurts cause my lip in tender but its like it feels gud when it hurts i feel better ik it sounds bad, but reading u guys stories made me start shaking cause ik i have some kind of issues cause i cant get upset witout getting a panic attack and that hasn't been working out too well for me ik i need therapy and idk how to get help and express myself to someone that is actually looking back at me maybe judging me idk how to express what am truly thinking idk why, except when i get mad of course and when i get really mad my heart starts doing that thing like am about to die when i wanna hit this person in the face i get cold cant breathe then ik i need to stfu and try to chill and im telling u to get myself to chill after i get that mad i always end up at my physicians office with some oxygen mask. But anyways I'm a horrible lip picker and i bite my nails ppl say its like i have two diff hands i have my healthy left hAnd with nicely shaped nails then u have my right hand nails so sml when i put on false nails there is never enough nail to hold the fake nails idk why i do these things when friends catch me picking my lip or biting my nails they get mad cause i don't hear what they r saying to me when I'm picking my lip or biting my nails i jus completely zone out like am gone lol ik it sounds horrifying, i will get help one day and to make it worst i haven't gotten a good night sleep two days now cause i have been going thru some serious picking stage i wanna go to sleep but i keep feeling stuff to pick off and Xanax stop working cause I'm taking two a night and i haven't slept properly two days now this morning the last time i look at the clock it was something after 7. When my friends ask me why do i do this i use to say am jus weird i didn't know it was like a serious issue like ocd .... Reading some other comments that was left i obsess over my weight all the time but thats that norm for me but i get guilty when i eat too much or if i dint eat right i dont really like taking pictures cause i look fat in all of them honestly lol since doing a surgery i lost 32lbs and i cant c what everyone is talking about when they say not to take off anymore weight im not skinny but i have a few lbs that needs to be shed...

I do this too! I have picked my lips as long as I can remember and I never thought it was anything abnormal really... just an urge I had. I saw it as the same thing as someone who bites their nails. Family and friends are always yelling at me and slapping my hand away and all that does is make me want to do it more as well. I first realized it was a disorder when a girl in ont of my college classes did a presentation on trichotillomania and I kept thinking 'that sounds familiar!' I have certainly never met anyone who picks their lips like me, but it never crossed my mind that it was a disorder. It is so good to hear from others that they struggle with the same thing!

I just found this site and have been reading the posts on this thread. I cannot BELIEVE there are other people like me who have this problem. I have been picking my lips for as long as I can remember. Seriously. There are photos of me at age 3 where you can see the mark from the lip picking. I'm 24 now, and I think maybe I've got one or two days without doing it. I've tried countless times to stop. Acrylic nails worked for me at first, but I found a way to maneuver my fingers so I can keep picking. I'm so embarrassed by it. I'm also an all-around picker, but I'd say the worst picking problem I have is with my lips. I don't draw blood everyday, but almost. Seeing a movie in a theater is the worst, I've found. I've started to carry my chapstick with me all over my house, I seem to want to do it less and it's less satisfying if my lips have something on them. I'm really excited to go through these posts and maybe start trying some of these solutions suggested. Thank you to everyone who's posted here- it's so strange but so nice to know I'm not alone In this!

I used to bite my nails for many years and then when i stopped bitting them i somehow switched to biting my lips and pulling the skin out. Years ago i used to pull so much skin that i ended up with my mouth full of blood but nowadays its not as severe. I do not think i am like most people on this thread because i havent been doing it my whole life but i reckon it has something to do with anxiety since i replaced nail biting (something very common amongst people with "nerve" problems) for lip biting. I do it all the time, anywhere, either with my teeth or with my fingers.

Nice knowing that there are lots of others with this problem. My question is, does anyone like the feel of it ? Like when I pick at my lips I get them dry and cracked so I can spread them and they will crack Ofcourse I'll bleed but I'll keep picking and picking but I like the feel of it just like if I get those uncomfortable sores on my tongue I'll pick and pick at it but I like the way it feels. I don't pick my lips in a self-mutilative way, I just want to know if anyone also likes the feel of it, I also pick at any little bumps or scabs I have on my head, I bite my nails also. But I've been doing the lip thing for years now.

I am 46 and have been picking my lower lip as far back as I can remember. I do not pick at anything else at all on my body. I remember that I bit my fingernails as a kid but I finally got that under control with mind over matter as a young person. For some reason, I associate picking at my lips with relaxing. I have no idea why because it hurts after awhile yet I keep on doing it because....habit? I don't know. It's definitely a compulsion, but I've noticed that it's situational to when I'm sitting and not doing much - such as driving, watching TV, etc. If I have any stress - my hand will be at my lip without me even thinking or realizing it. Right now, I have picked them smooth and I'm going to really try to just keep them covered with lipstick or balm at all times and force myself to keep my hands busy and away from my lips. At this point in my life, it HAS to be habit because there's is no good reason - I'm a normal mostly stress-free person. What a strange thing this is.

Oh my goodness i never thought this many people would have the exact same compulsion as me to pick my lips. It started I think when I was 4 or 5 because I grew up in Ohio where it was most of the time cold and dry. But when ever I would feel stressed, resorting to lip picking comforted me or gave me something to work on. I'm 16 and I still do this either stress induced, or out of habit. I just can't stand there being flakey skin on my lips. I have to pick it all off until it feels relatively smooth, even if it means bleeding. Very strange and I want to stop because I feel like people notice I do it and think it's weird. Also I don't know if my saliva is doing any damage to my nails... Anyone have some good tactics besides Chapstick that helped them stop?

I guess I am in the same boat as everyone here. I picked my lip my entire life thinking i was just removing some dead skin, and I knew I was a touch over zealous with it. I assumed my lip picking was to me was the way nail biting was to everyone else. I noticed I did it more when my stress levels were through the roof, and when I really tried, I could force myself to stop. But there have been times when I fell totally apart, my lip would turn to total you know what. Never saw another person who looked like me. Right now as I started to go to town on myself for no apparent reason I decided to google search because I decided there is no way in this universe I was alone. It's not a weather condition. I absolutely pick pick pick pick the hell out of my lip. I really find a way to make the skin come off. I've bought every product on earth. Aquafor is a great product. I've even picked it off my top lip, which has mended itself nicely. It's mostly my bottom lip that takes the beating. I just turned 33, and I don't know how long I've been doing it. As for people who talk about people around you who tell you to stop to help - yep. I've had that, and I've ended up telling them to shove it in return. I've been through therapy for depression and anxiety, and I've never been diagnosed for OCD. So I find it next to impossible I actually have OCD. I know if I don't pick my lip nothing bad with happen. So the actual idea that it's OCD is totally bogus. It's pure anxiety and purely compulsive. It's clearly a bad habit. It is nice though to see and know...I'm not some sort of total freak.

I've had this problem sence I was 3 it sucks and is verry embarrassing but one day my friend wanted me to get acrylic nails and after I got them I noticed it made it harder for me to get any skin or pick off skin so much lip doesn't look red anymore I can still pick it if my nails start to thin but it realy helps! And I've had my on for a year now I'm so thankful for the help I get from them ! This terrible habit sucks ass! And it's a plus to have beautiful nails all the time and ur bf has to let you get them ! Lol :)) anyway just thought I would let you guys know about it lots of love too you all beautiful people good luck and god bless you

I could cry: at the age of 51, disgusted that once again, without realizing it, I've been picking at my lips - something I've done on and off for as long as I can remember - I googled and, lo and behold, came upon this site. I so, SO want to stop. I have lip balms stored all over the damn place, and every day I start out intending not to do it - I make it through the day, then sit down on the couch for the evening and that's when I stop paying attention long enough to start doing it. Definitely have depression and anxiety issues, so I wouldn't be at all surprised to find there's a link. But I'm so grateful to find out I'm not alone. I've never in my life been brave enough to tell anyone about it - they may have noticed, but I've never discussed it. This is the first time I've expressed anything about it at all. What a relief.

I never really expected so many people to be having this habit. Like many others I have been doing this since 4yrs. I am from India so it is not because of cold weather to cause any kind of dryness. But I really like to pick my lips when it is dry until i peel it off and let it smooth. I never felt embarrassed because of this unlike many people here. Its just a habit and it keeps me relaxed. Sometimes it helps to sleep peacefully in the night. So i dont think it is such a big issue here to feel very bad about.