Biting your nails

Excellent. That's a good sign that you are serious. Nobody said it is going to be easy. I'm on week two and have absolutely no desire to bite them after doing so all my life.

I really can't understand it, but I'm actually feeling quite smug and pleased with myself.

Its so difficult to stop. It’s worse than crack cocaine.

Same! I mainly bite my nails through work related stress. I’ll find myself biting in high pressure situations or when working on a difficult problem. I also prefer the feeling of my fingertips on my keyboard, rather than nails against keys.

Strangely though, if I go on holiday or have some time off work, I never bite my nails! Simply, my cure for biting my nails is retirement. Just another 35 years to go; hopefully less!

Not exactly like that, as I can touch type, but yeah ... I type with my fingers bent, whereby the tips are near vertical. I can type fast too; I work in IT! If I’ve come back from a holiday, I can feel my nails catching on the keys ...

As a lifelong biter, I’ve managed to half give up, they currently look like this, if they get longer I bite them down to shorter length but nowhere near as short as I used to.



Not sure why I seem to have really long fingers there :-/

Anyway, the big issue I have is I want them to look better than they do now. Obviously they grow longer but they don’t seem to grow like other people’s anymore, they’re always detached from the finger underneath and they don’t go as far back towards the knuckle as others either.

When I lift them up, you can see how much nail is under the skin...



How do I fix that? I’m very self conscious about them and just want them to look normal now I’ve got on top of the habit.

Just out of interest, how many of you nail biters are very rarely ill? I don’t seem to get sick and I’m convinced it’s to do with biting my nails for as long as I can remember, anyone else?

I’ve always bitten mine except on holiday. It’s worst when I’m watching a film or tv alone. I too am going to try and give up now, it’s just such a daft habit.

I find it's totally sub-conscious. I just don't notice I'm biting them until somebody either mentions it or it hurts as I've bitten too much.

Keen to stop now though as my daughter is at that age where she's beginning to copy everything we do.

Any more updates with progress?

Well done .

I am tempted to get into the routine of taking a photo every day, not because i think there will be progress but just because it is a routine and i will feel i am then working towards something that will be ruined if i start chewing!

Took a shot. I cut my nails very close to the limit, as anything longer annoys me, I always flick the nail on stuff and break them. The image shows my crappy cuticles.