What does having dermatillomania entail?
I pick mainly on my face, usually small imperfections, bumps and scabs. I scrape it with my nails and then eat what’s left behind those nails. I also pick my arms and chest
Do you have other related conditions?
I have mixed anxiety-depressive disorder, and borderline personality disorder, plus I have had eating disorders, adjustement disorder and addictions
Do you know what may have caused it?
My impulsivity and compulsivity. I also didn’t have a very peaceful childhood, there were a lot of arguments, chaos and emotional abuse, which I am trying to deal with rn.
When did you first start picking?
Idk when it first started, but I was dealing with body-focused-repetitive behavior since I was very little. I was biting my nails, eating snots, shivering in my armpits, etc. I definitely did skin picking when I was little, but it only got worse when I was a teenager. It always gets worse when I’m in a depressed phase
When were you diagnosed with dermatillomania?
I was not. I was diagnosed with all the other mentioned mental disorders, I have been going to a mental health specialist since I was 12 years old, but I never discussed skin picking with them, because I don’t see how they could help me with it and I already have too many disorders. I have also been on various meds for many years and have had several years of psychotherapy so I don’t think they can do much more than write it down on the computer. But I’m sure I have skin picking disorder because people around me keep telling me not to do it and my face is scarred. But I can’t control myself.
How did you feel knowing that there was a word for what you had? How did your diagnosis help?
I only recently found out that there is a name for it. At least I started to feel less alone. But now it feels more unfair when my family criticizes me for it, or when my mom slaps me over the arm for it (yes, she still does even now that I’m an adult, obviously it never helped). She also does it in public, or in front of my boyfriend, and I find it a little humiliating.
What symptoms do you experience? What areas do you usually pick?
Mostly my face, sometimes the scalp and when I am trying to let my face heal, I pick more on my chest or my arms.
How often do you pick?
Almost constantly, at least every hour. I do it at home, on the subway, at school, at work, everywhere. But in public I try to be more discreet if I realize it. Not even the fear of germs will stop me.
What are your triggers?
Stress, boredom, chaos, rush, nervousness, impatience, procrastination, insecurity, depression, when I feel that I am not free, scattered lifestyle (when my internal clock is shifted)
How would you describe how you feel when you pick at your skin?
Relief. And I keep trying to scrape away the imperfections, but it’s never enough, something always remains. So I can’t stop.
But the biggest relief in the process is when I can eat what I picked by my fingernails. I pull out what’s behind my nails with my teeth and if I don’t, I get a weird feeling behind my nails and I have a huge urge. I found it’s maybe called autocannibalism.
Have you ever been caught picking?
Yes, I usually don’t hide it much anymore, but when I need to look normal, I try to do it more discreetly.
How does dermatillomania affect your day-to-day life?
I have scars and pigment spots on my face. I try to cover it up with cosmetics, but it’s still visible. I spend a lot of money on drugstore face creams to help it heal, but I end up ruining it myself anyway. I used to be very ashamed of it, but now I’m in a depressed phase and mostly I don’t even care.
Are there any potentially dangerous aspects to having dermatillomania? Have you experienced any?
The fact that I eat it puts me at a higher risk of infection. I’ve had certain intestinal parasites a few times before, but I don’t know if it’s caused by that. I think I must have developed a relatively good immunity because I’ve been doing it since I was little, otherwise I think I’d have a lot more illnesses. Sometimes I get an infection on my lips and something unpleasant happens there.
Sometimes I get an unpleasant feeling of tension from scratching my face, dryness all over my face, sometimes the scab gets a little inflamed and it’s painful. Sometimes I develop something like eczema (I had it on my face as a child)
Do you tell people you have dermatillomania or is that something that you hope would remain more of a secret?
Once when my mom criticized me for it, as always, I told her that it was a disorder in itself. But otherwise, I have so many disorders that this is one of my less serious problems, so I don’t discuss it much with anyone
Have you developed mechanisms to manage it?
Not exactly. But when I need to have a less disgusting face, I pick at my scalp and chest instead of face
Have you had any treatment to help? How effective are they?
I apply zinc ointment from the pharmacy to the affected areas. This helped me a lot to speed up healing for a while, but it seems to me that it works less now.
Otherwise, I have been taking antidepressants and anxiolytics since I was 13, I tried many of them, but that was due to other disorders. I also briefly took antipsychotics and stabilizers, also for other disorders. Not sure if anything helped the dermatillomania… Maybe the anxiolytics, but then again the NDRI antidepressant Elontril may have made it worse. But I don’t know, it’s hard to judge, there can be a lot of correlations
Have you experienced any sort of stigma for having dermatillomania? Did that take a toll on you? How did/do you deal with it?
Probably only from family, mainly mom and grandma. They don’t get it, they keep telling me not to do it, they criticize me for it, but they don’t understand how hard it is for me to control it. They think that if I try, I will stop it and my face will heal. Other people probably just think that I have a little bit of inflamed acne, although in reality I hardly have any pimples. I just scratch every little bump so much that it looks like that, or by constantly touching my face I get some germs on that face
Have you lost opportunities due to having dermatillomania?
I don’t think so.
Does dermatillomania have an affect on what you wear or things you do? Is there anything that having dermatillomania has prevented you from doing that you really wish you could do?
I would like to experiment more with makeup, but when I have such ugly skin on my face, it’s useless. I also wear my hair down most of the time to make the scabs, scars, and pigmentation marks on the sides of my cheeks less visible.
How did/does dermatillomania affect your education?
I practiced truancy at one time, but it was mainly due to body dysmorphia (I felt fat, ugly, incapable) and the ugly skin on my face due to dermatomania only added to it
How does dermatillomania affect your career?
No
How does dermatillomania affect your love life?
Sometimes, when my face is really scratched up, I’ll text my boyfriend before our date that I have ugly skin on my face, because it makes me feel better if he expects it in advance and won’t be surprised
Tell your story, opinions, experiences.
I was a hypersensitive child who got angry very easily, needed to be calmed down, but his parents almost always added to his anger or mocked him for his strong emotions. No one took my emotions seriously. My parents dragged me into their very frequent heated arguments, asking me to judge them or to choose one of them. I was very attentive to my surroundings, I absorbed everything like a sponge, I didn’t miss anything and I sensed the emotions around me. I was interested in everything, I was perceptive, extroverted and a leader. I was above average in many ways and sought recognition and attention, but I rarely got it from my dad. I was very competitive, but I never felt good enough. My father also has mental problems, which he does not treat, even he has body focused repetitive behavior like me, but a different kind. Mom hated Dad’s BFRB and criticized mine from a young age, but to no avail. Sometimes she slapped my hand for it, sometimes she even kicked me out of the living room and from the TV for it, when she warned me several times before but I still didn’t stop. She said she couldn’t look at me, it annoyed her. My dad manipulated us, gaslighted us, blamed us, blackmailed us, scared us and threatened us (mainly with money, which is very important to him in life). But he directed it very often mainly at me. Or my parents fought over me. My younger brother was overlooked, a ghost child, and started to hate me, probably because more attention was on me. When I became anorexic at 12, we started going to family therapy because of me, where my mom decided to divorce my dad. Dad took it very badly and after the divorce started saying it was my fault (even though he cheated on mom and often caused terror). The court ordered him to pay quite high alimony and put us in the care of my mother. He said horrible things about mom in front of us. The court said that we will go to dad once every 14 days for the weekend. As he often took out his anger on me, which he had towards my mother, we often argued. At that time, my anorexia turned into bulimia, self-hatred, anxiety and depression. Despite antidepressants, I attempted suicide at the age of 14. Everything in the future felt like suffering, I felt trapped. I had a lot of stress from school, I was a truant, I was ashamed of my body, I couldn’t imagine going to my dad’s toxic environment on the weekends anymore. I was in ICU and then hospitalized in child psychiatry. I was so happy that I didn’t have to go to my dad’s or school, which caused me stress and anxiety. But then I had to take a pass, I had to stay with my dad for the weekend and it was terror, this time from his girlfriend, with whom they had a lot of arguments. Then it went on I had anxiety and took prescribed benzodiazepines, to which I developed an addiction and then had to undergo a child detox. I stopped taking benzos, but soon after that I switched to kratom, which I still take today, although I would like to stop. I want to be alone a lot, but I’m not functional without other people. I can’t maintain a normal routine, I go to bed really late (like 4 a.m.), I have to force myself to eat because I’m lazy to eat, I don’t wash for days, I live in a mess, I don’t have the motivation to see people and I procrastinate for days . I look at my phone, take kratom, a lot of coffee, scratch the imperfections on my face, and in the evening I’m unhappy that I’ve wasted the day again. When I have plans, I feel trapped in them and I often can’t handle it mentally.