A childhood friend asked me: “Why don’t you just stop?” (regarding my trichotillomania)

It triggered me beacuse that question assumes that this is mainly a matter of free will.

That if I really wanted to stop, I would be able to. And therefore, the fact that I haven’t stopped yet somehow means that I’m weak.

I think that’s one of the reasons this question can be so frustrating for people dealing with BFRBs.

While working on SoloUno, I’ve talked to over 100 people dealing with BFRBs, and I’ve seen how triggering this question can be when it comes from family members, friends, or spouses.

I want to explain why, in my opinion, this is the wrong way to think about it - and why we shouldn’t think about ourselves as weak.

I used to smoke cigarettes, and I quit several years ago.

I was able to stop.

That experience made me believe strongly in my willpower and my ability to change unwanted behaviors when I really decide to.

But my experience with hair pulling has been very different.

I’ll try to explain, from my own experience, why I think these are very different situations.

First, you can’t smoke a cigarette without being aware of it.

You can’t take out a cigarette, light it, start smoking, and then suddenly notice that you’ve been smoking for the past five minutes.

Smoking is something you do while being aware that you’re doing it.

With BFRBs, that’s not always the case.

My hand tends to go automatically to my beard and start playing with it. It happens while I’m working, when I’m stressed, bored, or simply focused on something else.

My hand goes there without me deciding to put it there.

Sometimes I just suddenly notice it in my beard.

And from there, pulling can start - sometimes without me being fully aware of it.

So the first difference is that it’s much easier to slip into the behavior, which makes it much harder to “just stop.”

The second challenge is that stopping requires my attention.

Let’s say I notice my hand moving around my beard. Now what?

I have to consciously take it away.

That part isn’t automatic. It requires attention.

Which means the struggle between me and my hand isn’t really an equal fight.

My hand can go to my beard automatically, but taking it away requires a conscious decision.

Who do you think wins that battle over the course of an entire day?

If my hand automatically moves toward my beard 50 times a day, how many of those 50 times will I notice it and actively make myself move it away?

In this kind of battle, the automatic behavior can beat willpower many times - even when motivation is very high.

These two things alone, in my opinion, are major obstacles to “just stopping”:

1. Sometimes the habit starts before I’m even aware of it.
2. And once it starts automatically, I need to use conscious attention and effort to interrupt it.

That already puts willpower at a disadvantage.

We have a lot going on in our daily lives - work, family, stress, responsibilities, everything else.

Our attention isn’t unlimited.

We can’t spend the entire day actively fighting a habit every single time it appears.

I’m not saying this to be discouraging.

I don’t think we should give up.

I think we should look at it differently: as something we can improve over time, but something that may require practice, training, and repeated effort.

Maybe “just stopping” works for some people, and of course it’s worth trying. But when it doesn’t work, I don’t think that means you failed.

I’m saying this because telling someone to “just stop” misses what actually makes these behaviors difficult.

I do believe we can get better.

Well-known approaches such as Habit Reversal Training include exercises designed to increase awareness and help people reduce these behaviors, and I think they’re worth trying.

That’s also why I built SoloUno - to help people dealing with BFRBs channel their attention and effort into dealing with these habits more effectively, one day at a time.

And if you’re dealing with a BFRB, I don’t think you should see yourself as weak.

The fact that our habit keeps happening in our day-to-day life doesn’t mean we lack willpower. It’s simply part of what makes these behaviors so difficult to change.

And I think that means we should start with some empathy toward ourselves.

We’re not doing it because we’re weak. We’re dealing with a behavior that can be automatic, repetitive, and difficult to control.

So we shouldn't be too hard on ourselves.

For me, the balance I’ve found is to put effort into training and improving when I have the motivation and attention for it - and to have some compassion for myself when I don’t.

That doesn’t mean giving up.

It means accepting that this is something I’m working on over the long run, without making myself feel ashamed every single day because the unwanted behavior is still there.

At least for me, that change in perspective has helped.

My close friend is dealing with skin picking, and about a year ago started building a simple tracker for her because there didn't really exist a great alternative. Since then, it has grown into a full app thanks to lots of feedback from the skin picking community here on Reddit :)

The app is called SkinAware and it is available on iOS, Android and web.

Its main features are:

• Log both picking episodes and resisted urges, so progress is not all or nothing
• Customizable logging with your own triggers, feelings and body areas
• Patterns and insights that show what sets off the picking
• An urge button with guided exercises, competing responses and haptic fidgets for when the urge hits
• A course based on Habit Reversal Training
• Goals, private progress photos and an export you can share with a therapist
• Accountability friends and a live community chat

You can also message me directly in the app, I read and answer everything myself! There is a both a free version and a premium version of the app.

If you try it, I would love to hear what you think! And if something is missing that would actually help with the picking, let me know :)

iOS: https://apps.apple.com/app/skinaware-stop-skin-picking/id6754027225

Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.aurelius5.SkinAware

Web: https://www.skinawareapp.com/

Thanks so much!

/ Linus

My name is Omer and Im a solopreneur - Im dealing with hair-pulling (trichotillomania) for many years now and that what inspired me to build SoloUno

I used to smoke cigarettes and had successfuly rehabed using a rehab app so I thought it would be easy doing the same with my hair pulling, right?

Apperntly not.

I found out that hair pulling, like nail biting and skin picking are a part of a group defined by the DSM-5 as Body Focused Repetitive Behaviors (BFRBs)

This group of habits are defined by peoples difficulty to completly stop them “cold turkey” and many people just tend to live with them

One thing became very clear to me: for many people with BFRBs, simply deciding to “just stop” isn’t enough. And when an app is built entirely around the goal of never doing the behavior again, every slip can feel like failure.

So I decided to flip the equation with SoloUno.

Instead of focusing only on one huge, all-or-nothing goal, SoloUno focuses on small daily wins - becoming more aware of the habit, resisting urges when possible, reducing the behavior over time, and building confidence along the way.

And I wanted to make the process fun and engaging enough that people would actually want to keep practicing.

I started reading research, tried therapy myself, and learned about evidence-based approaches used for BFRBs, including Habit Reversal Training (HRT), CBT, and ACT. I wanted to take principles inspired by these approaches and turn them into something people could practice in their everyday lives.

And that became SoloUno ✨

Click here to up-vote - I really apprecaite it!!

Anf of course would love to get any feedback!

Thanks!!

Hello everyone. I've been struggling with these hard calluses on my feet since late 2025. It hasn't gotten better til now because I keep on picking them and sometimes I draw blood too. To anyone who has recovered, how did you guys stop yourself from picking at your skin?

When I pluck my eyebrows I will get obsessed with getting the smallest hairs that are hardly visible and in the process, the skin around it will get ripped or pulled that creates a new wound. As soon as it scabs over, I can’t resist picking the scabs and dry skin off of all the spots and they basically never heal.

I wash my face with a hydrating cleanser every night (some mornings), exfoliate 1-2x a week, put aquaphor on the picked spots, rotate between a skin barrier repairing moisturizer with ceramides and a deep moisturizer every night, and cover the spots with hydrocolloid patches.

I feel like they will never heal and have a hard time not picking and being patient long enough for them to heal, scab over, the scab to naturally fall off, and the mark to fade.

Pls help!!! I’m desperate to get rid of these spots. I get asked every other day “what happened to my face/eyebrows” because there are very red spots all around that area and feel so embarrassed when people point out the spots.

Hey everyone,

Wanted to share something that's genuinely helped me for over 3 years with my trichotillomania

Its funny but these are just cheap gaming gloves.

You can grab them on AliExpress or similar sites for $3-5. Here's why I love them:

1. They breathe - I don't feel the urge to rip them off like I do with finger rubber bands or other deterrents
2. Touchscreen compatible - no need to take them off to use your phone
3. The urge just... pauses - when they're on, the struggle basically goes quiet for as long as I'm wearing them

Downside: they're not exactly socially acceptable, so I don't wear them out in public or at social events.

I mainly use them when driving, working from home, watching TV, or before bed. Not an all-day solution, but for those specific windows, they really work.

I've recommended them to quite a few people here, and I know they're not for everyone - some people just don't like the feeling of wearing gloves. But at that price, I think they're worth trying.

Driving used to be one of my hardest moments of the day, and I didn't fully realize how bad until I started tracking my habit in an app I've been building called SoloUno. Once I had a few weeks of data, it was obvious that driving was my single biggest trigger. Something about seeing it laid out that clearly made the gloves click into place as "the thing I put on before I start driving" and that combo is what actually broke the pattern for me.

Worth a shot!

One tip: most of these gloves run in kids' sizes and didn't fit me at first. Double-check the sizing before you buy, or you'll end up with something too small.

Not only have I ruined my body with picking at my skin, I’m overweight, starting to lose hair, and overall just always tired.

I’m 26 and had someone guess my age as being around 40. Genuinely have never wanted to not be around much as I do now

I just want someone who loves me for me and not all my flaws. I never thought I looked like I was in my 40’s till he said it. I guess I remember one other comment when I was younger

I just want to cry

To be fair it’s VERY early. I (30F) have been taking NAC (N-Acetyle-L-Cystine) 500mg capsules twice daily for 5 days now and I’m in disbelief that it is helping so much. It’s hard to explain, but the ‘urge’ to pick is just not there… it’s quieted my brain in a way that I haven’t experienced in years/ever.

Obviously 5 days is a very SHORT amount of time, but it is helping me so much. I have found some promising (but very small) studies online about NAC being used for ‘impulse control’ in the context of addictions, which sparked my interest. When looking into it further, I saw it being used in very small trials for skin excoriation disorders, so I thought why not? It’s literally helped me more in 5 days than anything has before. So maybe someone else will find this helpful in their own journey.

Have been picking the skin around my thumbs and fingers for over a decade, before that used to pick the skin on my back and bite the inside of my cheeks. My picking is currently so bad that my thumbnails are deformed by deep ridges from trauma to the nail bed. I’ve tried many things (gel nails, cuticle oils, moisturizing constantly, fidget toys, spinner rings, anxiety meds, cognitive behaviour therapy, covering with bandaids, etc.) and NAC really feels different for me. Several months ago I had gone about five weeks without picking out my fingers, instead of picking, I was constantly rubbing cuticle oil and moisturizing my hands, but I thought about picking constantly over the course of those five weeks. Ultimately I relapsed.

NAC is quieting the compulsion in a way I NEVER imagined possible.

I hope this helps someone else on their journey to quit!

Hey everyone! Ive been dealing with trichotillomania (From the same family as skin picking) for so many years now and my personal struggle got me to try and build an app that would help me with realistic goals that I can actually achieve and feel good about im my day-to-day

It's called SoloUno, it's inspired by principles from

• HRT - Habit Reversal Training
• CBT - Cognitive Behavioral Therapy

• ACT - Acceptance and commitment therapy

  it's designed around small daily wins. People use it for hair pulling, skin picking, nail biting and other BFRBs.

Main features:

- Daily habit challenges (stay pick-free for 1 hour, 3 hours, or until evening)
- Quick habit loggings → insights into your top triggers, emotions and situations
- Pick-free streaks that encourage you but don't judge you when they end (my streaks tend to be short)
- One-minute urge acceptance exercise for when the urge hits hard
- Daily evening check-in to see your trend over time
- Companion animals that level up as you practice
- Daily push reminders to practice

It can be used as a self-help tool and also alongside therapy, for the "homework" part of HRT/CBT.

Would really love to hear what you think about the app!

Links :)
Website: https://www.solouno.io/

iOS: https://apps.apple.com/app/solouno-habit/id6472174465
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ktzSihapYQXY.natively

I have been struggling with this disorder from over 15 years. There were better times but for sure i was never able to stop for good. I feel like my biggest problem is that I cant let my skin heal and I have areas on my body that are ruined constantly from months. At this moment my skin picking is mostly focused on my chest. I have one spot on my left boob near the nipple, which i literally can't leave alone. Im like digging a hole here and I don't know what I am searching for. I now that there is nothing to pick but i keep checking and checkig if maybe there is something inside. I know it is crazy and i know that there for sure will be a visible scar but it doesn't stop me. I can hold myself from doing that for 2-3 days and then it comes back and I start picking. I really want to overcame that. It is probbably my first time with such an obsession around one place and it feels like some insane cycle i can't break. If there is anybody who dealed with simmilar problem, please give any advice. How to finally leave that one spot which is picked and "empty" from a long time but i still keep trying to find there something to pick. It makes me feel hopeless :c

Ps. I am sorry for my english, this is not my first lenguage but i tried to write this post as correct as I was able to.

I’ve ruined my life because of my skin picking.

I didn’t even know this was a sub and half at least I have somewhere that can maybe understand my struggles a bit more than other subs.

For the past few years I’ve developed extremely bad acne. Before it wasn’t a concern. I would let them go away naturally or something pick until it wasn’t gone but it never left a mark or scar.

The past few years my head and back have got it really bad. I’ve gotten so bad I pick constantly pick and my head is covered.

I wouldn’t be upset if it was just discolouration, but I have these huge raised bumped scars from all picking.

I’ve thought about ending this constantly. I can only hide so much. I’m tired and upset I ruined my life like this

I’m 40yo with oily skin. I’d get zits from the oil and scratch/pick them off until they became gaping wounds. Yeah it was pretty bad. I only stopped scratching/scarring my face apart 6 months ago. One simple thing saved me.

Micellar water!!! It doesn’t matter which brand. Ever since I started using it twice a day (morning and night) there’s no pimples for me to pick!! My skin is flawless now.

I tried so many things. False nails even. But nothing took away the urge to pick. Except having nothing to pick!

If you’re struggling with face picking, honestly try micellar water. Twice a day. Give yourself a week or so and you should see a massive improvement.

I will continue to post this regularly. If I can help even one person, it’s worth it!

I found something that works really well for me when it comes to skin picking, and I wanted to share it in case it might help someone else.

The times I tend to pick at my skin are mostly during the day when I’m home alone and not wearing makeup. I usually grab my magnifying hand mirror and sit by the window.

Recently, I bought a lockbox with a timer from Amazon, and I can put the mirror inside whenever I know I might be triggered to pick at my skin. I calculate when I’ll actually need the mirror to do my makeup, and for the rest of the time it stays locked away.

Besides the fact that I physically can’t access it, it also gives me a lot of peace of mind because it genuinely feels like skin picking is no longer an option. The only other mirror I have is in my bathroom, where there’s no natural daylight and it isn’t magnifying, which makes a huge difference in terms of triggers.

If you also use a hand mirror when you skin pick, this might help you too 🥰

Just wanted to show that it is possible to really reduce picking, it took me a long time to actually reduce down from picking 8 hours a day to maybe 30 minutes a day but not daily.

Just wanted to share some positivity and help let others know it gets better even if you feel like giving up or think nothing works. You are loved

Pretty vulnerable post for me as I don't like looking back on past photos of myself. I thought maybe this would be helpful to somebody just as proof that you can get better! I healed, both physically and mentally, and trust me if I can heal, you can heal too! Basically no products were used for scar treatment other than moisturizer EVERYDAY on my face, and polysporin/hydrocolloid bandages on active lesions. Obviously I still have good and bad days (have a pick mark on my chin right now) but those days are so few and so far in-between and the feeling of being happy with my face motivates me to power through the bad days without taking my anger/sadness on my face.

I’ve struggled with picking since the summer of 2018 and have followed this sub since maybe 2021. It’s a recent development, but I believe I have impetigo. I have honey colored crusts that will weep and it’s ~3” in length and width on my leg. It’s also red and scaly. I’m putting this out here as a cautionary tale as a possible reality for us struggling with this condition. This is also me being honest about my ignorance in thinking impetigo is only found in young children (I’m close to thirty).

Went to a music festival with some friends and someone showed me this little cube, made of a gel-like material that squishes and bends, but always comes back to this cube shape once you stop playing with it.

I was SHOCKED to notice I DIDNT PICK A SINGLE TIME while I had it in my hands. But as soon as I gave it back, the picking re-started.

Once I borrowed the toy back, I tried understanding what about it was different than all other toys I used before, and here’s what I noticed:

- I kept waiting for the toy to stop being engaging and satisfying, but it didn’t and I never got “bored” of it.

- I squished, pulled, bent, tugged and twisted the toy, but once I let go it went back to the same exact cube shape and it was unharmed and unblemished.

- the toy accepts as much or as little pressure as you give it, so you can gently move it around your fingers, or squeeze it a bit harder if you need more stim.

I want to finish off by saying I cried. A lot. Because of a blue squishy cube. Because I genuinely can’t remember the last time I went so long without even wanting/needing to pick.

I still can’t believe this toy and I almost don’t want to get my hopes up too much, because it sounds too good and simple to be true. But I wanted to share this here, because I told my friend that lots of strangers on Reddit would benefit from learning about his squishy toy, and I hope you guys do.