You may have noticed that I find it quite difficult to keep up to posting at this blog, and answering the many questions that people leave me. With that in mind, I’ve decided I’m going to make a few changes around here.

For a start, I’m going to organize the content so that it’s easier to find out information about trichotillomania. Although I may not regularly post blog posts, I will try to tweak what’s already here and add more informational articles so that it becomes a resource both for those who have trich and those who are trying to understand trich (especially parents of trichter children, as I know many of you visit this site).

Please bear with me while I tweak the design and the way the content here is organized. I hope it’ll make it easier for you to find out what you need to know.

If you know of any useful books or websites related to this condition, please let me know in the comments as I’d like to include these to help point people in the right direction to helpful content.

~Penny

Here’s Lady Gaga’s new song:

As you can hear, she says “I am my hair”. As trich sufferers, this is definitely something we need to get over thinking. Now obviously Lady Gaga means something different with these lyrics, and she isn’t attacking people who might me bald or pull out their hair, but at the same time I want to post an opposing view from India Arie:

The lyrics (which I think I may have posted before, but they are worth posting again):

[Talking:]
Is that India.Arie? What happened to her hair? Ha ha ha ha ha
Dat dad a dat da [4x] Dad a ooh

[Verse 1]
Little girl with the press and curl
Age eight I got a Jheri curl
Thirteen I got a relaxer
I was a source of so much laughter
At fifteen when it all broke off
Eighteen and went all natural
February two thousand and two
I went and did
What I had to do
Because it was time to change my life
To become the women that I am inside
Ninety-seven dreadlock all gone
I looked in the mirror
For the first time and saw that HEY….

[Chorus]
I am not my hair
I am not this skin
I am not your expectations no no
I am not my hair
I ma not this skin
I am a soul that lives within

[Talking:]
What’d she do to her hair? I don’t know it look crazy
I like it. I might do that.
Umm I wouldn’t go that far. I know .. ha ha ha ha

[Verse 2]
Good hair means curls and waves
Bad hair means you look like a slave
At the turn of the century
Its time for us to redefine who we be
You can shave it off
Like a South African beauty
Or get in on lock
Like Bob Marley
You can rock it straight
Like Oprah Winfrey
If its not what’s on your head
Its what’s underneath and say HEY….

[Chorus]

[Bridge]
(Whoa, whoa, whoa)
Does the way I wear my hair make me a better person?
(Whoa, whoa, whoa)
Does the way I wear my hair make me a better friend? Oooh
(Whoa, whoa, whoa)
Does the way I wear my hair determine my integrity?
(Whoa, whoa, whoa)
I am expressing my creativity..
(Whoa, whoa, whoa)

[Verse 3]
Breast Cancer and Chemotherapy
Took away her crown and glory
She promised God if she was to survive
She would enjoy everyday of her life ooh
On national television
Her diamond eyes are sparkling
Bald headed like a full moon shining
Singing out to the whole wide world like HEY…

[Chorus 2x]

[Ad lib]
If I wanna shave it close
Or if I wanna rock locks
That don’t take a bit away
From the soul that I got
Dat da da dat da [4x]
If I wanna wear it braided
All down my back
I don’t see what wrong with that
Dat da da dat da [4x]

[Talking:]
Is that India.Arie?
Ooh look she cut her hair!
I like that, its kinda PHAT
I don’t know if I could do it.
But it looks sharp, it looks nice on her
She got a nice shaped head
She got an apple head
I know right?
It’s perfect.

What do you think of both of these songs about hair?

That said, last year I did go to the doctor to get help for something which I keep just as secretive as my hair pulling: social anxiety. In the process I also told someone about my hair pulling. I actually told someone about it!

How I Felt Before I Sought Help

I can’t describe how nervous I felt before going to talk to the doctor about it. Even making the phone call filled me with dread and it took me ages just to make the appointment. Then I felt terrible days before it. Of course, the nature of social anxiety means that I do fear situations like this, but I’m sure anyone with trich can understand how difficult it is to talk about your problems.

How Did The Appointment Meet My Expectations?

It didn’t meet my expectations at all! And that’s a good thing, because my expectations were that the doctor would tell me I was stupid and would offer no help, setting me back even further. That couldn’t be further from the truth.

I was shaking very badly. I am not normally a shaker but wow I was shaking a lot. I told her about the anxiety and she firstly said “lots of people have the same problem” and “it’s normal”. She said the same when I told her about the hair pulling! I was surprised, because I know a lot of doctors may not have heard of trichotillomania.

How I Felt After My Appointment

She referred me to get further help and she prescribed me some beta blockers to slow my heart rate/ anxious feelings when I needed to. But it wasn’t this that helped. It was opening up to someone that made me feel happy.

I felt so proud!

If you’re scared of talking to someone about problems you’ve been hiding for years, no matter what the outcome, you should feel so proud in yourself for taking action to do something about it!

Now, the subsequent treatment I have received hasn’t exactly left me feeling much better about things, but I at least know I can muster up the courage to go and get help! I will blog more about what I went through in the future.

Remember, talk to a doctor. The worst that can happen is that they won’t help, but they probably will. And, even if they don’t, you should feel so proud that you spoke to someone!

Firstly, I became overwhelmed with this website. You know I suffer from trich myself, I am not a doctor and unfortunately have not stopped pulling 100%, though I get a lot of emails and try to help everyone. The emails are so important to me but I got overwhelmed by the amount and have not replied to any for months. I have also moved home (AGAIN!) and been through some stressful times which didn’t help things.

The same goes for the comments, I’m so sorry I haven’t replied but your comments are so important. It’s really important that we have a place to share thoughts, emotions and even ways of improving our pulling! So please don’t think I am ignoring you. Like I said, I was overwhelmed and as a result stopped checking the site

How Comments Work

The way comments have been working is that, if you’ve never commented here before, your comment wouldn’t show up until I manually “approved it”. I didn’t realize, but I had 100+ comments to approve from the last few months! I am so sorry your comments weren’t showing, and many people who were waiting for replies didn’t get them.

To prevent this from happening again in the future I am changing the settings so your comment will show immediately. If you include a link in your comment, though, I will still have to approve it and it won’t show up straight away. I’m sorry about this, but I also had thousands of spam comments to delete from the last few months which is why I have to keep this policy.

So now you should be able to instantly see your comment show up unless you include a link, and you should get those emails telling you when people have replied a lot more timely than you were.

Once again I’m so sorry! But after talking to my partner about this site and feeling overwhelmed, he’s encouraging me to set aside time for it in the evenings to get it going again. I really want to do this because this website is so important to me, so expect to see more regular posts here again

Hi,
I pull around the back of the neck and eyebrows and have been doing so for about 15 years. It was worse when i was 15-20 (i’m 30 now), and had bald patches on my neck although I wasn’t pulling my eyebrows out then.

I went through periods of not doing it so much or sometimes not at all and the bald patches went but about 3 years ago I started pulling my eyebrows out and I cant stop myself! Its painful sometimes as I don’t just directly pull them but use my finger nail as well, to run across or backwards and forwards – strange but till the hair “feels right” – over the hairs.

This makes them worse and sometimes I get a cut from it if I have been doing it for a long time. And also afterwards the hairs are going in all directions! And I find myself washing my face with hot water to straighten/flatten them again, sometimes if feel like its becoming like a ritual.

Its mainly the outside of the eyebrows that I do it and a lot of the time I don’t know I’m doing it! Sometimes I like to do it, or it feels good, I really can’t explain but I guess a lot of people reading this will understand.

I have been doing it quite a lot recently because I am under a bit of stress with my job so I think stress does affect it. I get angry at myself afterwards for doing it but 5 minutes later ill be doing it again!

My neck hair has grown back now but is thinner because I do still play with it and pull a little but my eyebrows are a mess and I am going to make more of an effort with them. I might try Vaseline!

I watched a video on YT yesterday of a girl in the UK with Trich and it was so upsetting to see her tell her story and how hard it was for her to talk about it, but also made me feel good to hear someone else speak about it as I have never spoken to anyone about my Trich so this blog is definitely a good thing!!

I recently moved house, so things have been even quieter around here than usual. The last couple of months have been very stressful, and very busy. Weirdly, I sometimes think the busyness stops me pulling, but then sometimes it makes me pull more again.

I hope to catch up with comments and emails this week.

Penny x

I was just checking in on the blog, and I noticed it got over 5,000 visitors in July. Wow, that’s so many people! I know a lot of people are looking for answers about trichotillomania and, though I don’t have all the answers, I am glad I can at least offer some reassurance.

I am also so thankful for those of you who come here and share your own stories and experiences, I feel we all help each other, and in that way it’s quite a unique kind of community!

I only wish I had more time to run this site. It’s one of my dreams that I’ll eventually have more time to do that, and to be a bit quicker at responding to comments!

Anyway, if you find people who are lost and need to find more about trichotillomania, point them here or to other trich blogs. It can only help spread the world and help us feel more comfortable just the way we are!

~Penny x

On the subject of keeping busy, I’ve found business can have two completely opposite effects on my hair pulling. Sometimes it’s a ‘good’ kind of busy and it stops me pulling almost completely. It’s the kind of busy that I just don’t have time to stop, no time to pull.

But if being busy means I’m stressed, then I’m going to pull more. Sometimes I will pull and it will completely distract me from the things I need to get done, making it worse because I feel guilty that I’m not getting things done.

In a weird way, both kinds of busy aren’t healthy. The first would basically mean I had to never stop to avoid pulling. That obviously wouldn’t be good for me. And the second is obviously no good.

So the question is, how do I not pull when I’m completely relaxed? So far the only times that seems to happen to me is when I go away on holiday.

I have a similar problem where I pick at my skin. I had a teacher tell me that your mind learns from repetition and telling yourself that you can do something can make it happen. I kept a journal or a log I didn’t write in it everyday but I wrote when I felt like picking, or after I had picked. It’s not just telling yourself that you can do it but you also have to believe it. Something that worked for me was looking at myself in the mirror (where I usually pick at my face.) and said I CAN STOP PICKING MY FACE over and over and over. I did this every time I was feeling stressed out at home. I also would write down I CAN STOP PICKING MY FACE on a piece of paper or sometimes several pieces of paper, but you have to believe it. I would write my self notes all over the place saying I CAN STOP PICKING MY FACE. I surrounded my self with these messages to myself. I had to identify when, where, and why I picked. I kept a journal or a log I didn’t write in it everyday but I wrote when I felt like picking, or after I had picked or if I didn’t pick. I wrote notes and put them in everyday places like the inside of my door, on the dashboard of my car, in the shower (I laminated them), on my computer, on the refrigerator door, on the inside of my refrigerator door, I wrote it down in my daily planner on every single page. I put these notes around and it was a reminder that I could do this and I would remember not to pick. I would pick anywhere and everywhere, at school for example. I would go in to the bathroom stall and pull out my compact mirror but I had written a note on the inside saying that I CAN STOP PICKING MY FACE. These three things among other methods helped me stop picking. I would start with not picking for days at a time then weeks at a time and now I have not picked my face in a year! I am just letting you know that this doesn’t just happen over night you truly have to surround yourself in your goal/message. I have been picking my face among other things for as long as I can remember (like pulling my hair, biting my nails, picking scabs, etc.) But picking my face was the worst. It was easy for me to admit that I had these particular problems and I would say that I wanted to stop but the words didn’t mean anything to me it was me just going through the motions. One day I decided that it really was time for me to stop. Because I didn’t want to do this for the rest of my life. but when I told my self that I could stop picking my face I started to believe it. I got compliments and that was even more encouragement for me. I would recommend that you try this with any form of treatment you think will help or is already helping you.

All the best to you