Skin picking or dermatillomania can cause a person to compulsively pick their skin. It can be automatic and sometimes people may not ever realize they are doing it, others may be aware but cannot stop themselves from engaging in skin picking. This may further effect an individual’s mental health as people may feel shame of visible scars or injuries, further causing anxiety, depression or social isolation.

Skin picking or dermatillomania can cause a person to compulsively pick their skin. It can be automatic and sometimes people may not ever realize they are doing it, others may be aware but cannot stop themselves from engaging in skin picking. This may further effect an individual’s mental health as people may feel shame of visible scars or injuries, further causing anxiety, depression or social isolation.

Symptoms of Dermatillomania:

This included compulsively aka the impulse or desire is impossible or incredibly difficult to resist picking at your skin. Triggers of this condition can include stress and anxiety. People who struggle with dermatillomania may also struggle with other mental health symptoms such as OCD or other OCD-related disorders, depression, or anxiety disorders.

What is the difference between Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Dermatillomania?

While dermatillomania fits under the category of obsessive-compulsive disorder, it has some differences from the specific condition of OCD

Obsessions: in order to meet the criteria of OCD, there must be obsessions present, which are thoughts or urges that a person cannot control and causes distress. Those sorts of obsessions do not occur with dermatillomania.

Feeling of reward: People who struggle with dermatillomania may often feel relief or positive emotions upon picking their skin, that relief or reward is not present with OCD.

Strategies to Help Navigate Skin Picking:

1. Know your triggers: People may pick for a variety of reasons including stress, anxiety, boredom or other negative emotions.
2. Make it Harder to Pick: To reduce picking, it can be important to control our stimulus, or changing our environment to make it harder to pick. For instance, keeping our nails short, wearing gloves when we are triggered or more likely to pick, or try distracting our hands utilizing a fidget spinner or silly putty.
3. Hyperfocus: When we understand our triggers and gain awareness into the behavior, we can utilize a “counting system” to help us “fight the urge” to continue picking. For instance, this could be reminding ourselves of a mantra that may be helpful in reducing the urge. Other behaviors could be setting a timer and then changing our environment to help reduce the urge.