15 replies to this topic

[girl11]

I think maybe it'd be helpful to have a thread where you can post when you're tempted to pick. Like if you feel it coming on, you can stop here and post about it and maybe it can help keep you from doing it. Is that a stupid idea? Last night I had a blackhead in the middle of my forehead that was probably not noticeable to anyone but me, and today I have a red mark with a scab. I am not happy. But I cannot let this happen again, so I thought next time the urge comes over me, I can stop for a second and come here to remind myself on why it's better to just leave it alone. Instead of being able to enjoy today, I am just obsessing over if I can cover up this scab with concealer and when it'll be gone, and if they'll be a mark when it's gone. I don't want to go through this again! I want to put my energy and focus my mind on other things!

[cmpltlyprfct]

I am joining!.. I pledged to stop picking yesterday...and now its morning which is the hardest time for me to resist the urge!.. but I'm fighting it...I WILL NOT PICK!....its so hard in the morning because that's when you get ready for the day.. u do ur daily inspection when you look in the mirror and bruch ur teeth, etc. And that's when the havoc usually begins for me..I end up ripping my face to shreds and end up trapped in the house all day. I won't even go to the mailbox. I'm so miserable!..its pure torture. I don't know what do do I've tried everything...so this is it for me.. I've also started to wash only once or twice a week..my skin definitely needs some tlc and the opportunity to rebuild itself .. so I think the "do nothing" is the best thing I can do for myself and my skin...if I could only keep my hands off of it.. I jus started yesterday..and in the middle of the night I found my hands searching my forheads for things to pick..I did a little uncontrollable picking...but not in the mirror ..so it didn't last as long. .. so yes I will be posting my daily "stop picking" progress!..and be here when I'm tempted and try to talk it out.. I hope this works.

[girl11]

I hope this helps you too! It's interesting that morning is when you are most prone to picking because night time is when I'm most likely to pick. I wash my face and all of a sudden notice things and figure oh I'll squeeze it out now, and it'll look okay by morning. Which is not the case sometimes (like last night). I hate that feeling of regret, and then I can't sleep and I get major anxiety over what I've done to my face. I guess it's good to know the time of day we're most prone because maybe we can set a time limit or something in the bathroom or vow to not look at our skin so much during that time knowing that that's when we usually give in.

I want to enjoy myself today, not be thinking of my skin and thinking I need to wait until Monday or Tuesday to see what the skin will look like when the scab comes off. It's a small raised scab, but being in the center of my forehead, it's all I can see. What was I thinking squeezing a blackhead in such an obvious spot?

[cmpltlyprfct]

Happens to the best of us!...honestly I'm prone to pick ANYTIME...
But I do find mornings are a bit more rough for me.

I am not washing or picking anymore... I am going on a cold turkey, detox skin diet. I am so tired of products,prescriptions,pills,expensive lasers,scrubs,expensive facials, and NOTHING HELPS. I have to stop...its ruining my life and making me so sad. I can't continue my life this way...so my goal is to successfully get through 30 days of this regiman...and then continue of course..but my short term is to take it day by day till I at least hit 30 days.. if improvement is seen by then I don't think it will be hard to continue with....

The challenge is getting that far, especially with the constant urge to run to the sink, scrub my face, then sit on the counter and pick pick pick..and squeeze.. and cause distaster!... I refuse to continue this destructive cycle!

And don't feel bad...my forehead is the one place I rarely breakout...and right now it is horrible... countless red enflamed bumps..and three huge cystic mountains that will likely never come to heads, butrather sit there, unsightly and pinful, for months on end, far all to see, and cause me hell. I'm sure of it.

[girl11]

So it'll be a 1000 page thread! I thought it'd be good to have somewhere where I can re-read how regretful I felt. Anything to get me away from the mirror. I feel sooo much regret for pickiing this blackhead, but there's nothing I can do now. Maybe next time though I can do something about it.

Compltlyperfect, my forehead looks bad now too. I mean, it would be clear except for the nasty scab in the center of my forehead. Literally, it's in the center. It's not like a flat scab you can easily cover with makeup, it's like a raised thick scab. Ugh. But I have to leave it alone. If you pull off a scab too early, it'll most likely scar then. Have to not touch it! I hope when it comes off either tomorrow or Tue or Wed, it is just a flat pink spot and nothing horrible. I hate when you squeeze something and it doesn't look too bad, but then the next morning it's formed a gross scab. It really stinks.

[amy91]

I picked my little whitehead yesterday. It's red and irritated and angry now. I have not picked since last Feb, but i was just nervous when I saw that annoying whitehead as I took a shower. Tomorrow I have an appointment with my derm,hopefully he will remove them all.

[Crystal841]

I am almost clear from tane, but I had an active, popped it, and it's ok. But now it's making me want to dig out my remaining clogged pores. I'm scared if I leave them they will turn to zits, if squeeze them and don't get all shit out, they'll turn to zits.. They've pushed up enough that they have tiny blackheads, I may be able to do it w/ out much damage, or I'll make some damn wounds and my skin is actually looking pretty good atm...
I am just going back and forth w/ this.....
God I want to gut them

Edited by Crystal841, 17 August 2011 - 01:05 PM.

[girl11]

I am almost clear from tane, but I had an active, popped it, and it's ok. But now it's making me want to dig out my remaining clogged pores. I'm scared if I leave them they will turn to zits, if squeeze them and don't get all shit out, they'll turn to zits.. They've pushed up enough that they have tiny blackheads, I may be able to do it w/ out much damage, or I'll make some damn wounds and my skin is actually looking pretty good atm...
I am just going back and forth w/ this.....
God I want to gut them

Try not to. I know we pick because sometimes we're successful which makes us feel validated in picking but that doesn't mean it always is. I had an unnoticeable to anyone else blackhead that left me with a horrible mark this week and a little indent because I pushed it in deeper and it got infected. I hadn't even messed with it a lot either, but the squeezing messed with the pore and made it get all red around it, and even though a scab formed, it was just building up pus underneath. I'd sure take the blackhead over having to hide inside right now with polysporin on, worrying about if I'm left with a permanent mark. If your skin is looking good right now, enjoy it! Rather than saying "I wish I had left my skin alone..."

[Crystal841]

I am almost clear from tane, but I had an active, popped it, and it's ok. But now it's making me want to dig out my remaining clogged pores. I'm scared if I leave them they will turn to zits, if squeeze them and don't get all shit out, they'll turn to zits.. They've pushed up enough that they have tiny blackheads, I may be able to do it w/ out much damage, or I'll make some damn wounds and my skin is actually looking pretty good atm...
I am just going back and forth w/ this.....
God I want to gut them

Try not to. I know we pick because sometimes we're successful which makes us feel validated in picking but that doesn't mean it always is. I had an unnoticeable to anyone else blackhead that left me with a horrible mark this week and a little indent because I pushed it in deeper and it got infected. I hadn't even messed with it a lot either, but the squeezing messed with the pore and made it get all red around it, and even though a scab formed, it was just building up pus underneath. I'd sure take the blackhead over having to hide inside right now with polysporin on, worrying about if I'm left with a permanent mark. If your skin is looking good right now, enjoy it! Rather than saying "I wish I had left my skin alone..."

Thank you for that.
That really gave me a better perspective.
I get so caught up when my face is an inch from the damn mirror. But u r 100% right.
Thank you, again.

[PaulH85]

I get so caught up when my face is an inch from the damn mirror.

Take a couple of steps back and they don't seem like such a big deal. What you see from a few steps back is roughly what other people see when they look at us.
After all, nobody looks at us with such focus in the same way we might if we end up with our faces practically pressed to the mirror. Every time I get that close, things look so much worse. When I think they look bad, I then start to think I can make them look better by popping whatever pimples I have at the time. In all the years I've thought like that, I've always been wrong. I might learn one day...

[wicky]

I feel the same as all of you. I am a skin picker but I dont gauge at pimples, I use my tweezer to grab dead skin and minor clogs off my skin on a daily basis. If I dont do this, the buildup I will get is gross and will lead to pimples. I am 44 yrs old and have been doing this for long as I can remember. I rarely make a so called mess anymore but I have learned to pick and choose what Im going to attack. For example, right now I have 9 clogged pores that all have whiteheads in them. The are a mear spec of white in the corners of my mouth. The cant even be seen close up but only when I flex my chin in a weird way. The problems is they will never go away until they are out so I basically am just waiting for the right time to after them. I do it one by one so I dont have an entire messed up area. Even though it looks so close to the surface, there are times I still cant get them. Right now I have an appointment with my derm tomorrw to do a dermasweep treatment and hopefully many of them will oome out. I doubt it because they are deep and I dont think anything besides good ole fashion extraction will get them out.

wish me luck

[Nilan]

Good luck wicky! I hope you can find a solution
This thread is a great idea! I'm most likely to pick in the morning AND at night, mainly because that's when I clean my teeth and so I am in front of a mirror for a long time. So as long as i go on this thread the minute i wake up and at the end of the day, I should be ok!

[girl11]

I haven't been on in months, but I just needed to come back here because I have a few blackheads on my forehead (the only acne I really have going on now) that I've been so tempted to squeeze because I know it's possible that I might just squeeze them out, and they'll be gone. But I need to come back here to remind myself that there's also a possibilty that it won't come out easily and I could get a red nasty scab left over like that the last time that took forever to heal and was unsightly for a week. Coming back to this thread has done the trick! At least I know blackheads are temporary, if I'm ever desperate to get rid of them, I'll go get a facial. If I pick at it, I might cause a permanent mark which is worse.

Edited by girl11, 09 December 2011 - 09:34 PM.

[Kara =)]

I haven't picked all day today, so proud of myself! but yeah I'm getting tempted right now, so I'm posting here. This thread is a good idea, I like it

[Lola Burns]

This reminds me of AA.

I have 2 of those little fuckers on opposite sides of my chin. I just want to kill them. KILL THEM! They're just sitting there. Taunting me. Like they're saying "just do it then! I dare you, do it."

I wish I could remove all the mirrors in my house.