Calling All Nail Biters -- 12 Ways to Stop Biting Your Nails

Your hands are always in a fist to hide the unsightly stubs where nails used to be. Your fingers are in your mouth every opportunity you have to rip off a little piece of skin, a hang nail or to attack any signs of new growth. Pain suddenly feels gratifying as your finger bleeds and throbs from that last nail or skin you bit off from your fingers. You use bandages to cover up unsightly gross finger tips like putting a hat on your head. It's normal to you to do this. Nail biting is a common behavior albeit a destructive compulsive bad habit. Nail biters experience consuming thrill when biting nails. Almost a victory as we work on those hard to get pieces of skin or new layer s of growing nail.

This impulse control disorder is an obsessive behavior called Onychophagia. There is a term especially for skin biters too called Dermatophagia. There is a link to being an inherited habit, but not all nail biters inherited their behavior. As many as One out of 50 people have an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, which translates to over 4 million people in the US alone. Why do people have these disorders?

1) It feels good. It brings a sense of comfort and calming effect. It actually can be calming to your nervous system when you bite your nails or pick at them.

2) Boredom. It's a stimulator when you are bored or tired because it gives you something to do.

3) Over grooming. A perfectionist in how you want to look. You may tend to over groom yourself and going overboard on doing it to the point where you cause damage to your nails.

Nail biting can be a self perpetuating cycle. The more you do it the worse it gets resulting in unsightly nails or pain and disfigurement from doing it. What you are left with is shame, anxiety, self hate, defeat which then turns into a behavior that makes you continue the process.

Psychiatrists consider nail biting as of the repetitive self militating compulsions. Although it is not a life threatening disease it can get extreme. There are treatments but there is no real cure for this disorder.

These are the treatments that are used today to modify this behavior to try and control the urge to bite:

1) A psychiatrist can prescribe antidepressants that may be at high as 80% controllable on some people.

2) A vitamin that goes after the brain transmitters that reduces the desire to pick, bite and pull your nails and surrounding skin. Vitamin B ositol in high doses is a treatment that doesn't need a prescription and won't cause harm to your body in high doses because it's water soluble.

3) Psychotherapy treatments help you reverse bad habits and become aware of your behavior that triggers what causes you to bite your nails.

Treatments that can be done by you that could help:

4) Chew sugarless gum. Suck on lollipops. The trick is to occupy your mouth, keep your busy and substitute's the oral fixation (a Freudian analysis that describes needing sexual pleasure that is associated to your mouth) you might need.

5) Keep a little notebook in your purse or pocket and jot down when you feel like biting or picking and what you are doing and feeling at that time and what time of day it is. Look for a pattern and see if you can use gum or a lollipop to redirect your urge to bite at those times.

6) Man or woman, you can a professional manicure. Women can get a pretty nail polish on or clear for both men and women. You will feel special and pampered for that time you are getting the manicure. Your nails will look so good that you won't want to bite them and if you do you will remind yourself that you paid good money to get this manicure.

7) Artificial nails. There are so many beauty supply stores that sell artificial nails kits that with a little time and patience you can put nail tips on or gel for that last one to two weeks if not longer in between applications and maintenance. Otherwise, you could have them done professionally for $60-100 for first time and maintenance of approx. $50 monthly. What the artificial nails do is cover up your nails so you won't bite them. They also give you perfect nails so your hands can look great.

8) Keep strong smelling hand lotion with you at all times. The Body Shop and other specialty stores have strong grapefruit, vanilla, citrus and other great smelling hand lotion. Keep re applying on your hands to keep cuticles soft and nails smooth. Also the smell reminds you that the taste is no doubt bitter if you put your hands in your mouth so it's helpful to modify your triggers to bite your nails.

9) Take up doodling, drawing, writing, knitting, crocheting for example if you are fidgety and need something to do. If you bite your nails because you are bored, you can occupy your hands by using your "bored" time doing something good. You might find that you have talent in some things.

10) Get a photo album. Take a picture of your bitten nails and or cuticles. Keep a log of these. Write next to your pictures, find magazine cut outs of the nails you want to have. Keep this album of reality and fantasy updated daily, weekly. You will one day want to be the fantasy and remove the reality pictures and make them perfect like the magazine pictures. It's a goal that you keep for yourself and work on. You know you have the power to change what your reality is and replace it with what was once a fantasy.

11) Carry a nail file at all times. When you feel a hang nail or a sharp cuticle, don't pull it, just file it smooth. Remember to always keep a coat of clean nail polish on nails to minimize sharp or hang nails.

12) Keep your hands and wrists adorned with beautiful jewelry, watches and jewels. Visualize beautiful hands. By showcasing your hands and wrists you will want to keep your nails and cuticles at bay and not touch them. Visualizing what you can have may allow you to want it all the time and not feed into biting and picking your nails.

OCD or Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is a repetitive behavior with a compulsion to doing it. Nail biters tend to experience anxiety and depression. You want and have to bite your nails but then after you do you may feel a sense of guilt. Although no one really knows what causes nail biting, it is believed that it is a chemical imbalance in the brain where serotonin is produced. You might just be born with a disposition for OCD and it then can manifest into various types of OCD if a traumatic or stressful event occurs.

Sources: The Obsessive Compulsive foundation, the Nat'l institute of mental health, American Psychiatric Assoc.