Every 7 years your skin is completely renewed.

I think there should be support groups meeting around the US and the world for this disorder because it is incredibly private and feeds on it itself in the dark. I am 24 and experienced the high peak of my picking from 18-21... going to college and such.. as well as obsessive tendencies in other areas of my life, probably stemming from social anxiety--though ironically I would go out every night during this time (but at night! where the places and clubs were so dark, my scars could not be seen) yet when I would return or look at my face in the morning, I would take to it with dirty hands and form patterns of pain upon my face. I assumed I was making myself ugly because I felt I didn't deserve to be beautiful..as sad as that was... after getting a boyfriend and sabotaging my relationship with all kinds of emotional anxiety and obsessiveness--I quit picking cold turkey. I realized I was so crippled with self loathing I could not accept blind love.. I could not love wholly back, I was scared he was drifting, I was jealous of everybody from other girls to his friends --but the real root of the problem lied in a deep inexpressible fear of opening myself wide and accepting myself..to the public, which includes anybody--even one person. It manifests in incredibly private behavior, bouts of intense solitude, and hiding parts of yourself which you quietly antagonize over in the dark. When I stopped picking, I traveled to a retreat in the mountains of France by myself where there were no mirrors. I did not look at myself. Sometimes, I would be tempted to see what my face really looked like. I remember one early morning, I walked to the top of the mountain at sunrise and took a photo of myself on my phone and saw to my horror in the white light of day--the tense blotches of redness afflicting in a line down the center of my face--my forehead, nose, inner cheeks, and chin...and my lips too. I looked away, terrified. For months I kept up--I did not pick. When I came back to NY and moved into an apartment with a friend, I kept the lighting dim. I moved on. I still pick my lips--sometimes i get into bouts where I feel very compulsive..it has indeed come and gone and come back again. The root problem still remains..it is hidden in a place where words cannot even draw it out, indescribable and unreflective. The only thing I think that can truly cure this is to talk about it--to make it known, to cast it out of the dark. Anyone want to chat more with me that would be nice... 10 years of this and today I put a name to it! I hope to stop for good, for good, for good. But on the upside, every 7 years your skin regenerates. You will heal--your skin is incredible at it--if you only allow it to do its work. And it is true of all parts of your bodies--from the breasts to the face to..everything. Another thing--anybody notices this is primarily effecting women? Poor ladies tearing themselves apart in secret. We must take hold of our anxiety and accept ourselves. I would like to more than anything... I have a son now and for him, I would like to be sane, clean, hopeful, assured. I would not like to hide from him... and so I must try and recover completely.