Where do you pick?

My heels where the skin is thick. Also, the bottoms of my big toes, the ball of my foot and right below my pinky toes. I have been biting my fingernails since I was 7 (I'm 25 now) and biting/eating the skin around my nails since I was 10.

I pick at my scalp until it bleeds and scabs over. It sounds gross but I love the feeling of getting my nails under a scab and picking it off. I'm trying to stop but it's very hard. I usually have several scabs on my head that I pick continuously.

My first post so here goes... I pick my face, neck, chest, shoulders, arms, back, sides, legs, genital area... also chew/pick my fingernails/cuticles/skin around them and pick my toenails. Also i have psoriasis on my scalp and behind my ears which I pick just about daily on my way to work. Also, I pick around my lips, and I also chew the inside of my cheeks.. (scrunch my lips over to one side and bite the opposite side) and sometimes I even push in on my cheek while in this pose to get a better bite. I'm also a chronic nose picker regardless if it "feels" like something is in there. And I'm a habitual knuckle/joint cracker. (I'm talking full body cracking sessions including multiple joints on multiple appendages) But here's the saddest part of all, and here's where I really really want someone to respond... does anybody elses picking spill beyond them? I routinely pick my husband's pimples!!! I'll ask if he wants me to go over him - granted he does have a lot of body acne.. but regardless! I've even picked a pimple on my baby!! And I see people with a pimple, or a large or deep blackhead and I'm driven to distraction wanting to pick it!! Sometimes when I ask my husband and he says no I get really mad. I've even went on youtube and watched pimple picking vids for hours! I even remember the first EVER time I picked, was my first ever pimple, and I got off the bus and is was in the crease of my nose and it hurt really bad, so when I got home I went straight to a mirror to see what was hurting and I could see the swelling under the skin and so I squeezed and it popped and it instantly felt better.. but seeing the yuck come out was SOOOOO satisfying!!! I litterally JUST found this site and I'm freaked out because I knew it was wierd..... but OH MY GOD!!! I had no idea!! And I'm reading the info and seriously I have like EVERY SINGLE manifestation of this except trich. I do have depression that I *thought* was fairly under control.. except it's really really really hard for me to get up in the morning. I do not suffer from anxiety-I used to have panic attacks so I know the difference. I don't know what it is. It's not like I'm relieving any anxiety, I actually get PLEASURE out of picking! I've lost HOURS to it. I even have a "picking kit" which is a compact without the makeup and a straight pin that stays in it. I've even got rubbing alcohol and cotton balls in my bedside table for picking! Lately I've been going to the restroom at work and getting "lost" picking my chest/shoulders/arms/genitals! Sure afterward I feel awful...and my skin is terrible.. but I have freckles so it hides a lot of it.. I guess. I pick pimples that are there, some that may not be or may be the smallest blackhead you ever felt (because they're even too small to see) and then I pick and pick at the scabs and dry skin so they take forever to heal...I've even eaten scabs!! Is anyone out there this bad or worse???? Help?!

Hi... This is my first post. I've picked for what seems like forever.. I used to only pick at my arms (mostly upper) and any acne I might see.. I can relate greatly to the post above that deals with the insane urge to pick at acne, even if it isn't your own. I get annoyed to distration too! But in the past three or so years I began picking at my toes somehow. Now it's like a ritual. I have special tweezers and clippers I get out just for my toes and nothing else. I pick at them mindlessly with my fingers until that doesn't work well enough.. then I have to move the lamp closer, change postitions and use my "tools". I always draw blood from at least two of my toes.. it's embarassing.. they are all picked and dry and usually bloody. I can't paint my toenails well because I don't have much of any given toenail left. I feel absolutely nuts about this compulsion. But the scary thing is I can't stop.. It doesn't hurt when I'm picking.. It actually feels good. Later on my toes are very sore and if I stub one or my daughter steps on one I could cry for the pain it causes, lol.... The whole ordeal is so emabarrassing Anysay.. I also pick my shoulders, breasts and legs when I have "used up" my toes and arms for the time being.. I have scars everywhere from it :(

This is my first post. I pick at any Acne that shows up on my face or back. The ones on face, especially on my chin, I tend to pick them until they get huge. I don't usually go for blood... but I get some twisted rush when the scab gets hard and I rip it all of at once. Then I become incredibly ashamed and can't even cover them well with make-up. I hate it :( It makes me hate myself. Occasionally I will have some on my arms but my biggest other spot for picking is my legs or back because they are easier to cover up... except during the summer (i always wear jeans, sleeves and am miserable) I too pick at my toe nails and the skin around my toes... sometimes picking too far until they bleed. I try to keep my nails short but find if I can't pick the scab with my non-existent nails I get extreme anxiety and will use anything with a sharp point to get the scab off. I take an SSRI and Ativan for anxiety and depress and ambien to help me sleep. None of it has helped. :( I don't want my daughter to see me doing this and end up like me. And I don't want to continue hating the way I look everytime I look in the mirror. It doesn't help my sex life either... I feel ashamed so I don't like get undressed and letting my boyfriend see me. He tells me all the right things, that I look beautiful anyway... and he tries to help me find ways to stop but he really just doesn't understand. :( The only thing I have found that use to help me was having Acrylic nails made it so much harder for me to pick and a lot of things would heal. But the last time I got them I kept tweezers around and they didn't do as much good. I feel for everyone on this message board. It's good to know I'm not the only one.

I've picked moles all over my body! And I've got many! I also pick pimples, blackheads and clogged pores. The areas I pick the most are my face, breast, neck, arms and ears (on the in- and outside). I also pick my hands and legs. What I hate the most is that I pick my eyelids!!! And it hurts like hell!!! I almost always start crying because of the pain when I rip the skin off with my tweezer. There are these spots right abovemy eyelashes and I want them gone. The skin on the eyelids contains tiny tiny spots which is normal, but I want them to look similar and have like a pattern. If one spot feels bigger than the others (that are smooth) I pick it off. All this results in my eyes swelling up and making me look even more ugly. I don't think I have trichotillomania, but I pull out my eyebrows with a tweezer every day, so I don't have any eyebrows. And now I've also begun to pull out some of my eyelashes when I pick on the skin right above them. If a hair sort of sticks out I have to remove it. I pick all over my face, but besides from my eyelids other annoying areas I pick are my lips and the skin under my nose and the pores on the inside of my nose (they are often clogged). I really want to stop picking because of how it affects my life, but I live in Denmark and so far I haven't been able to find a doctor who knows enough about skinpicking to be able to help me. It's so fucking frustrating! But I'm glad I'm not alone anymore...

By the way does anyone besides me pick the skin on their eyelids?

I basically pick everywhere. my scalp, although it doesn't ever scab because it's really dry and I can just pick away painlessly, I pick moles, ingrown hairs, scabs (especially from shaving my legs) and most often.. acne on my chin. I have very clear skin on my face but I tend to break out only on my chin, and then it starts.. I pick one small pimple, and I eventually get more because I can't stop touching the are waiting for it to scab over. then it's basically just continuous from there until I feel so ashamed of the scabs on my chin that I bury them in concealer and foundation and have to consciously stop picking til they disappear. it's unbelievably frustrating and sometimes next to impossible. I defintely go through cycles and it's hard to resist the urge when it just hits you out of nowhere again! I had no idea how many other people actually did this too!

I really didn't know this was a disorder. I thought I was just some freak. I pick on my face and lower arms. I have so many scars on my arms. I hate to go out in public, I feel that people are looking at me and that really embarasses me. Is there any thing that can be done for the scaring. If I get nervous or upset I will actually dig holes in my face and arms. I have even woken up in the middle of the night with blood on my arms and face from picking in my sleep.

I pick my cuticles, sole of my right foot, and to a lesser extent the cuticles around my toes, esp. the last two toes on each foot. I also bite the skin off my lips but I don't think that's noticeable (unless of course I'm actually doing it). I'm very self-conscious about my cuticles - I think it makes me look crazy. I've been picking my heel for the last 2.5 hours, and it has bled. I also took tweezers to it - I like to have as smooth an area of picked skin as possible. There's even blood on my fingers as I type this. The more I pick my heel, the less I pick my cuticles. Also, I find having fake nails on almost eliminates my cuticle picking. I've had them on & off for the last few years. They're expensive & time-consuming to maintain, and I usually end of picking them off after a couple of weeks. When I first went to have them done I was SO embarrassed about the state of my cuticles.