Dermatillomania

why you can't stop picking your cuticles

In my twenties, I used to think snazzy medical words for normal things were fun but now I think they are pretentious and annoying. But, still, I was amused to find out that my life-long inclination to pick at the skin on cuticles and lips has a word.

It was terrible in my teens and twenties, my fingers constantly bitten-down and bleedy-looking. My lips were less bad but, still, sometimes I resembled one of those dudes who gets lost following a disastrous SAS mission and crawls out of the desert after four days of drinking their own urine.

These days, I am much better. I keep my fingernails short and I am just generally more distracted and less chronically anxious, (though I am still capable of being acutely anxious), so don’t attack myself so often.

I am usually very careful with my cuticles so I’m not sure what happened in the last week or so, because my hands are a mess. I have got five active sites on my fingers where at some point I pulled at a piece of skin and it is now red and sore. The third finger of my left hand is a real problem - ragged cuticles and dotted with red pinpricks. A sad and sorry sight.

Perhaps it is the weather. It is very unexpectedly cold at the moment - maybe you’ve noticed? - but I have merrily put away all my gloves and I’m acting like it’s late July and 32C. I don’t like summer much, so often want to rush into it in order to get it over with - but I have gone Too Soon and I’m back to being picked and bleedy.

Anyway, the whole thing reminded me of my foolproof 4-point plan for regenerating hassled cuticles, for anyone who is suffering from the same thing.

1 Trim your nails nice and neat and short, if only as a memo to self that we are starting afresh.

2 The key to eliminating ragged cuticles is moisturise, moisturise, moisturise. One tube of hand cream isn’t enough. I have three: one by my bed, one by the kitchen sink and one to put in a handbag or pocket when I go out. Only Vaseline Intensive Care Hand & Nail will do. I slap it on as often as I can.

3 Get a pair of cuticle clippers and know where they are at all times, so that you can neatly clip off hangnails, which will prevent you from pulling or picking at them. I think one of the reasons my fingers are a horror show is that my pair has disappeared from my desk drawer.

4 Lansinoh. The miracle worker. Is there anything Lansinoh can’t fix? Every night, smear a conservative amount around all fingernails, massage in and leave to work overnight. It really is the most incredible stuff.

How about you? Do you have a favourite elaborate medical term? Or where are you on your compulsive skin-picking journey? Please leave a comment in the handy box below.