106: Most Effective Practice to Heal Skin Picking & Hair Pulling

You've tried gloves, covering mirrors, fidget toys, and maybe even CBT or habit reversal, but none of them really seem to get you the results you're looking for.

The problem is that they don't address the root cause.

Emotion is the driving force behind this behaviour, and when we don't address it, it continues to rule our lives.

This looks like urges you can't resist and frustrating patterns of procrastination, self-sabotage, and impulsivity that perpetually get in the way of you living.

Why? Because you have been trying to control your behaviour rather than work with the emotion that's fueling it.

In this episode, I will walk you through a practice that allows you to address what's under the surface.

It will not only empower you to take tangible steps forward in your healing but will transform how you show up in your relationships and with yourself.

This is healing.

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My name is Raffaela Marie. I'm a holistic BFRB coach who has healed from 15 years of chronic skin picking myself and dedicated my life to helping driven women do the same. Through my podcast, free resources, and programs, I teach strategies to overcome urges, build emotional safety, and expand into authenticity. My approach goes beyond quick fixes, focusing on root causes and long-term recovery.

Transcript

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What do I do when I feel the urge to pick or pull or bite at my body? How can I better handle it? Beyond wearing gloves or covering mirrors or having someone sit in the bathroom with me. Because the thing is, just trying to resist or come up with new strategies or ways to manage the behavior helps us to an extent. But it's not sustainable. And it doesn't really get us the results that we're looking for. It doesn't make us feel better inside ourselves. There is a better way. There is a practice that I want to show you that I show all of my clients. And it's one that I do on a daily basis that helps me to better manage my impulsive side. Not just with skin peaking, but other areas of my life where I notice that I can be impulsive, where I had that internal battle with myself of I know I should be doing this, but instead I'm doing this. This practice that I'm going to walk you through allows you to start addressing the root cause. And through addressing the root cause, you'll stop battling with yourself so much. And you'll find it easier to let go and relax and to enjoy just being you. You are listening to episode 200. Why do I say 200? You are listening to episode 106 of Beyond Skin Picking and Hair Pulling, the place to be if you want to learn how to address the root cause of why you pick, pull, or bite at your body. In this podcast, we address the root cause so that you can actually start to find long-term sustainable healing. My name is Rafaela Marie. I'm your host. That is how I healed from 15 years of chronic skin picking. I've dedicated the past five years of my life to understanding the ins and outs, the nuances, the brain and behavioral science behind what it takes for us to heal. And I share everything that I know with you on this podcast. If you appreciate what I do, hit like and subscribe, leave a five-star review, and let me know what you thought about this episode in the comments or in a written review. And if you want more support and healing, you're more than welcome to join my free WhatsApp support group. It is a really incredible place where I post in there every single week messages of motivation and inspiration and important reminders that we all need on this healing journey. We also have some pretty incredible conversation in there too. You're welcome to lurk or post to your heart's content. To join, just go to the show notes, click send me a message, send me a message about why you'd like to join, and I'll send you the link. To understand this practice that I'm about to share with you, you need to understand this truth about emotion. And that is that all emotions want are to be seen, heard, and understood. For example, think of someone who's close to you, someone who you would confide personal vulnerable information to, someone you would go to when you're struggling. When you go to that person and you're sharing something vulnerable, you're not actually looking for solutions, you're not looking for anything to be fixed. You're looking to be seen, heard, and understood. Here's what I mean by this. And it's so important that we understand it because it's exactly this is the process, the practice that I'm going to be sharing with you. What it means to be seen is that someone holds space for you. They don't rush you, they are present. This looks like having their full attention. Their body language is facing you, they're making eye contact, they're nodding, they're showing you through their facial expressions that they're here with you. Presence is what makes someone feel seen. When you feel heard, it's because someone validated what you're feeling as real, as important. And this sounds like someone saying, oh man, that sucks. That really hurts. That would have been so hard. Not, oh my God, why would you even do that? What do you mean everyone loves you? There's no need to feel that way. While these things can be well-intentioned, they don't make someone feel heard. To make someone else feel like we actually hear them, we simply want to acknowledge that what they're feeling is real and that we hear the discomfort or the pain or the emotion that they're experiencing without trying to explain it away, without trying to make excuses, without trying to minimize it. It's just acknowledging that that emotion is there and it's real, and that you really do hear what they're trying to communicate. Being understood sounds like it makes sense that you feel that way. I get it. That's what being understood sounds like. You get where someone is coming from without blaming them or trying to change what they're feeling. Being seen is being present with that person. You don't need words. In fact, being seen is really much about your body language. Being heard is that sounds like it hurt. That really sucks. That's so disappointing. It's validating the emotional experience they're having by just naming it, honestly. And understanding is that makes sense. I get it. This is what we are looking for when we are sharing something emotional or vulnerable with a loved one. And this is what someone else is looking for when they're sharing something emotional or vulnerable with you. Because I'm sure you've had the experience where you come to someone with something that you're struggling with, and their immediate reaction is not to be present or to hear or to really listen or to understand where you're coming from. It's to try and fix how you're feeling or fix the problem that you're struggling with. And it's just really frustrating. It doesn't make us feel better. In fact, it makes us feel worse. And this process of helping someone feel seen, heard, and understood is the same process we want to do for ourselves when emotions come up. When you feel anxiety instead of rushing to think of how can I make this go away, it's giving yourself the space to be present with that feeling. And I am going to walk you through the process of how to apply this to the urge to pick or pull a bite. Right now, we're just building the foundation of the understanding of what you're doing when you do this. Now, a mistake a lot of people make when I first share this process with them, this practice, is they skip the being seen aspect and try and get straight to the validation and understanding part so that we can try and control and fix what we're feeling so we can move on and be okay. And this is what I see it happens a lot with those who are very much in their heads, very intellectual and intellectualize their feelings. When I share this process, they get it. They get it logically. And so they feel what they're feeling, they feel the urge to pick, or they feel the anxiety or the frustration. And rather than allowing themselves to be present with that feeling, they get straight to, okay, well, where is this coming from? What do I need? What can I do about this? It doesn't work that way. Because we cannot truly hear and understand ourselves or someone else if we are not first present. You cannot skip the step of being seen, of being present. Because imagine you're sharing something vulnerable with a loved one, but they're on their phone or they're checking their laptop or they're walking around doing something, or they're facing away from you, or they're fidgeting around, looking out the window, or maybe they're staring at you, but just purely with a blank face. And then imagine they try to give you words of validation and understanding. It's going to come across as insincere or ingenuine because they haven't been truly present with you. So how can they possibly have really heard what you're saying? How could they have possibly really understood? How could they actually mean what they're trying to say when they haven't been with you in that moment, been present when you were speaking? And this happens on a subconscious level. There's a feeling behind it of it sounds like they've ticked all the boxes, but there's something missing. I don't feel seen. This is also what happens when we intellectualize our emotions and we don't allow ourselves to actually sit with them and be present with them before trying to figure them out and understand them. Now, why does this work so well for helping us to heal and grow beyond the urge to pick and pull and bite out our body? Because what fuels the urge to engage in those behaviors, there's an emotion underneath. There might be boredom or frustration or anxiety or self-doubt or indecision. There are so many different parts of us that can trigger the urge. It's not just one little thing. There's lots of, there's many little parts of us. In fact, I was talking about this in a group coaching session inside Strength, which is my program for holistically healing from these behaviors. And something that a person shared is that indecision was a trigger for skin picking. And they'd actually gotten pretty good at redirecting that part of themselves because they built awareness around it of, oh, I'm feeling indecisive. This is why I'm picking. And simply just having that understanding can make a big difference. But what do we do when redirection or distraction doesn't work? Let me walk you through that process, which includes how to truly make yourself seen, heard, and understood, because that is how we soothe emotion. When someone really truly sees you and hears you and understands you, you feel soothed. It is such a wonderful feeling. That's what we want to start doing with the different things that fuel the urge to pick or pull a bite. The first thing that we want to do is to start to become aware. Aware of where the urge is showing up inside your body because emotion shows up in the body. We feel emotion in the body. And so when you get an urge, just get curious of, okay, I wonder where that's showing up inside my body. For many people, it shows up as a tension inside the chest or a knot in the stomach, or maybe there's some tension in the shoulders. We want to find the location of that urge. This is building bodily awareness. This is building connection to your body. And the more connected we are to our body, the better we get an emotional regulation. Because you cannot regulate your emotions if you're disconnected from your body. It doesn't work. And then the next step, this is a step where so many people get stuck or they conveniently forget about it or conveniently brush over it. The next step is when you notice where the urge is, wherever that's showing up for you, it's just to sit with it. That is the second and most important step. That is the step of allowing yourself to be seen, of truly seeing the discomfort that is showing up for you. This is what you're doing when a friend comes to you and they're sharing something really hard that they're going through. You're not immediately trying to jump in and give advice, or you're not trying to jump in and say, oh my God, I so understand what you're feeling. You're not trying to cut them off from speaking. You sit there and just give them space to be human, to share their pain with you. And you don't say anything. It's really just being present. That is the power of being seen. You don't need words to start with. It's just to be there and be a witness and hold space for those emotions. That is the second step of this practice for healing the parts of you that are fueling the urge to pick or pull a bite. It's to locate where they are in your body, which you'll be able to locate when you feel the urge and start to become aware of it. And once you locate where it is, it's just to sit with it and use breath to help you to sit with it. You can breathe deeply into the space where you're feeling it. This is you, this is you actively being present with yourself and processing whatever is coming out for you. And only then, when you let yourself sit with and breathe in, breathe into it, breathe into the intensity of what you're feeling because the urge can be intense sometimes, especially if you're trying to stop yourself from engaging in it. Breathe into the intensity, the waves of emotion that are coming up. Do for yourself what you do for a friend. Only then do we move into really hearing and validating what we're feeling. Because it's only through being present that we can actually start to truly hear what's going on and truly start to understand. A lot of the time we just make so many assumptions about what we're feeling and why, without actually getting curious and being present. Like you're sitting with your friend and they're sharing what they're hearing. And instead of just being present with them and listening, you're in your head thinking about, well, it's probably because of this and this and this. I'm gonna tell them about it. I'm gonna tell them why I think they're feeling the way they're feeling and what they need to do about it. Like it's just not nice. It's not nice to do that to a friend, it's not nice to do that to yourself. Now, to explain what it looks like to hear and validate these parts of us that are fueling the urge to pick or pull a bite. I first wanna say sometimes it's not that deep. Sometimes it can be rooted in trauma and really painful experiences, but sometimes it's not that serious or deep. Let's talk about the part of us that actually just really enjoys picking or pulling or biting. There's a part of us that just loves it, enjoys it, enjoys the experience, gets satisfaction or soothing. It's just, it feels good. There's a part of us that doesn't have a problem with the fact that we pick or pull or bite. Now, if you think about this part as a little child, let's say about three years old, two, three years old, think of how it is when a two-year-old child is doing something that they're really engaged in and they're really enjoying. You're at the park and they're having loads of fun playing in the sand. You go to them and say, Hey, it's time to go now. Do you think that kid is going to be like, all right, cool? Yeah, I'm really enjoying what I'm doing right now, but yeah, let's do something that is not as enjoyable as this. That kid is probably going to throw a tantrum. High chance. Especially if that child hasn't learned how to process and handle transitions in a better way, especially if they're not supported in handling transitions in a better way. They're gonna flip their shit. If a two-year-old wants to pick up a dog poo and you tell them no, they might flip their shit because they really wanted to pick up that dog poo. They don't care that it's maybe gross. They don't know that. They just know that they have the desire to pick it up. If you try and stop a two-year-old from putting something weird and random into their mouth, an unidentified object, they might scream and cry that you tried to stop them. They don't care that you have their best interest in mind. Or God forbid, it's time to turn off Bluey and go to bed. I don't have children myself, but I do know enough people with children, and I've heard enough stories to know that that can be a chaotic moment. The thing is, we have these parts of us inside of us, these childish parts of us. You have the irrational two-year-old inside of you that just likes what she or he likes and doesn't give a shit about the consequences, doesn't give a shit what people think about it. You just like it. And if you try to stop yourself, it's like you're having an internal tantrum. Internally, that part of you, it's losing its shit that you're trying to stop it from doing something that it likes. And maybe that's because your parents didn't help you to process and handle transitions in a healthier way. They either gave up and gave in to your screaming and kicking, or they used coercion to try and convince you that it's all good, or they just use force because they were done, they were fed up. And so you never learned how to handle that feeling of, but I don't want to stop. Now, in reality, what a grounded adult would do in that situation is allow the child space to just feel what they're feeling, not try and fix it, not try and control it, not think there's something wrong with them for reacting the way that they are, but help them to process that moment and help them to learn the skills to transition more easily, to stop doing things like that more easily, to handle the frustration and disappointment that comes with not doing something that you really want to do. Let me tell you, I think a lot of us have not had that experience. This is what we're doing when we start to reparent ourselves. We become the parent of these parts of us that struggle. There is a part of you that struggles with the idea of not engaging in skimpicking or hair pulling or nail biting and doesn't like it when you try to stop it. And you can try and force yourself as much as you want, but it gets exhausting and you're just gonna give in sometimes because it's hard to keep up that battle. But if you just take a step back and practice being present, really seeing that part and allowing yourself to just feel that tantrum, that internal tantrum, you'll start to learn how to process those emotions instead of escaping them or avoiding them or giving in to them. And that is when when we understand, because maybe you're resonating with this and you're thinking, oh, there definitely is a part of me that is like that. That two-year-old part that just really wants to do what she wants to do. And this is where we can start to really hear and to validate what that part is feeling. And this sounds like I can see that you really want to pick right now or pull a bite. And it's super frustrating and disappointing that you don't get to do that. It's so okay to feel that way. Man, I know how hard this must be. It makes sense that you feel that way because I know how much you enjoy it and how much you like it and how soothing it can be. That is the appropriate time to actually validate and understand, to give that energy. But it has to come after being present and sitting with and allowing your nervous system to flip its shit, allowing that part of you to throw its little tantrum if it needs to. That is the practice. When you feel the urge come up before you actually engage in it and you notice it, or you catch yourself picking or pulling or biting and you try and stop yourself. Those are the two points where you get to practice seeing yourself, seeing that part, being present with it and allowing yourself to sit with and breathe into whatever's there. Only then can you truly hear and understand what's going on and stop making assumptions about why you do the things to do and why you feel the way you feel. Because almost always when we make those assumptions, we assume something really bad. And that just makes us feel like we're not good enough or we're stuck or we feel more lost within ourselves. We think, man, I have so many problems. When in fact it's often not as complex and not as bad or dark as you might think. And that's even including the really hard parts of us that we struggle with that maybe come from some really hard experiences that we've had in our life. The truth of that part that you're struggling with is so much more well-intentioned and kind and gentle and soft than we assume. And that is the problem that we face is that we make assumptions automatically and we act off of those assumptions and we never actually truly see ourselves. And so we never actually get the chance to truly process what is there. And so we perpetuate the cycle of picking, pulling, and biting because those emotions are still going unseen, unheard, and misunderstood. When you give an emotion those three things, it soothes it and helps us to stay regulated and in control. It helps us to remain the adult in the situation. Now please hear me when I say this is a practice, not a solution or a quick fix. This is you shifting how you relate to yourself, the relationship that you have with yourself. And that takes time and patience and dedication that you so deserve. You can't fix your way into freedom. You feel your way into that freedom. And I think I've said this in the past three or four episodes in a row. But if you haven't had someone support you in doing that, make sure you get support. Because these are things that we cannot truly grasp on our own if we've never been walked through it before. And this isn't something to do with your partner or your friend or a family member. This is something to do with a neutral individual, whether it's a therapist or a psychologist or a coach or a counselor. And if you would like support from me, I am a coach. And this is the exact kind of work that I help my clients with every single week. So if you want to discuss us working together, just go ahead to the show notes, click on send me a message, and send me a message about why you feel like you need support right now. So we can see if I am the person that can support you with that. The struggle that so many of us have and that I see so often in others is that we blame ourselves for what we're feeling because we've made so many assumptions about who we are because of a certain feeling. And so often those assumptions are entirely wrong. And all it takes is to be seen, heard, and understood to start to heal that and release it and move on. This is how we address the root cause. This is the practice that will help you to actually gain more understanding, more compassion. It will allow you to soften and be kinder to yourself and to actually start to take steps forward instead of ending up in the same exhausting cycle. You are so deserving of this effort and the incredible things that come from giving yourself what you've always needed. If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to hit like and subscribe, leave a five star review, and do let me know in the comments what stood out to you in this episode, or leave it in a written review. Thank you so, so much for hanging out with me, and I'll see you next week for the next episode of Beyond Skin Kicking and Hair Pulling.