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sitting on hands , 10 May 2015

Whole extended family does this: its gotta be genetic

I'm new to the forum, but not to skin picking. Every member of my moms family, right back to my grandmother does this in some form or another, its a big family too, so there's a lot of us.

I remember starting when I was about 10 in school, when I was feeling bored and restless, having to sit and listen the the teacher drone on about stuff I already understood. I would pick at my arms, finding little irregularities in the texture, trying to make them smooth. I progressed on to my ears and would pick at the skin creating quite large sores, until I was taken to the doctor with a suspected skin infection.

These days I mostly pick at my scalp, its been bad for the last 7 years, it suddenly got worse when I was put on a stimulant kind of medication for weight loss, I was also on an antidepressant at the same time. It improved a little when I came off the weight loss drug, but got uncontrollable when I started on stimulant medication for ADHD, it would get worse as the medication wore off.

I'm not on any medication now, but it remains quite bad. Triggers for me tend to be reading, internet surfing and some conversations. If I'm having to listen to someone talk, but its not very interesting, the stress of trying to stay focused causes it. If my hands are not otherwise occupied and a certain kind of receptive brain activity is required, it seems to trigger the urge to pick. I can see a connection between skin picking and ADHD, it seems to be a subtle way of trying to focus attention for me, at times anyway. Its like as if my brain needs more stimulation than what its getting. I'm glad I found this fourm and hope to find some help and answers here.

1 Answer
May 27, 2015

I'm here if you ever need to talk. And I was once told that picking can be from the part of ADHD that induces hyper-focusing

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