My Picking Diary

Scrolling through Reddit last night and happened to see this YouTube channel recommended for how to take care of nails: I’m feeling hopeful!

Tore my nails off down to the quick last night. I was watching a movie before bed, which I don’t normally do. They’ll grow back in two weeks if I leave them alone.

I’ve been watching and rewatching some of her videos this morning: The Salon Life - YouTube. What I thought was the cuticle is actually the proximal nail fold. Very educational for me. I’m going to try and commit to putting kerasal on my nails every night this week and continue oiling my nails after washing my hands when I can.

I have a dentist appointment on Tuesday, so I’m going to commit to not picking my lips starting now. Otherwise they will split open and bleed during the check up. Very embarrassing.

So I’m about 24 hours out from tearing my nails off down to the quick. It takes a couple weeks for them to heal from that. They’re still pretty sore. I’m recommitting to my nail care though:
1) oiling after washing hands
2) using a small amount of kerasal nightly
3)gently nudging back the living skin once daily/every other day

I’m now a week out from tearing my nails off down to the quick and they are healing nicely. I do have one infected area on my right thumb, but it’s not so painful I have to take Advil any more. I’m continuing the care outlined by the salon life on YouTube; in another week they should be fine.

2 weeks out from ripping my nails off down to the quick—they are now 100% healed. Found some cuticle oil at work, so I’ve been able to keep them moisturized after washing my hands. Also keeping up with nudging the living skin back every night and applying a dab of Kerasal. We have a family get together on the 21st, so I’m using that as motivation to stop picking the skin around my nails.

I’m struggling with picking the skin around my nails. Instead of oiling the nails after washing and using Kerasal nightly, Anna recommends using Vaseline as much as possible when the skin around the nails is still healing.

Are you still around? This is a bit like my problem which originally brought me bacj the the forum again. I "pick" at my cuticles and the skin around the nails. Sometimes lips, but only whe they are especially cracked/dry and not as much. But yeah, this is whag leads to sometjmes accidentally harming myself, because the dry skin is so irritating, i want to cut it all off, but sometimes i nick a not dry part. Oh i hhate it but the irritation is unbearable! Chapstick helps my lips and lotion on hands BUT winter makes it extra dry and hard to keep hands moist because i use them so much and wash them a lot, washing off the lotion.

I'm irritated as i type this. Some slight hangnails. Grr!

Yep. I use Vaseline on my hands (a little goes a long way), file rough spots instead of cutting, and use neutrogena Norwegian formula hand cream on my lips (I don’t know if you’re supposed to, but that’s what I do).

I still struggle with this behavior, but I accept it.

It's good not to feel alone though, right? Well, at least now i have found someone much closer to what i experience than before.

It hd been warm for a few days so no issues, but now it is drying again. I was irritated a little bit, but just tried to be really careful not to hurt myself and stay as hydrated as possible. Maybe it helps that i got a cut on my finger (or two fingers really. Work and i have a sensitivty coondition thtat makes me scratch and bruise more easily) because i am like trying not to touch that, so I'm like already just holding my hands open not to touch and feel the dryness. Lol *shrugs Not that those are fun, but might be helping distract me.