Nail biting
Are you struggling with a nail biting?
CBT Therapy aims to help you be able to identify patterns in your behaviour. It can also help you cope with feelings that are difficult to manage, which could be the cause of your chronic nail biting habit.
What is chronic nail biting?
Chronic nail biting is classified as a habit disorder. Habit disorders can range from hair pulling (trichotillomania) and lip biting, to gambling and pathological stealing (kleptomania). Nail-biting may occur without conscious notice or may be a focused behavior. It usually begins in early childhood and intensifies during adolescence.
When to seek treatment for Nail biting
You should consider treatment for your nail biting habit disorders when:
You have feelings of unease or tension prior to biting
You have feelings of relief or even pleasure after biting
Your habit is disruptive to your work, social life or appearance
You feel shame, embarrassment, anxiety, or guilt, often related to the appearance of physical damage to skin and nails caused by biting
You tissue damage to fingers, nails, and cuticles
Your habit has strained or complicated family and social relationships
"I know that years of bad habits is not going to change in 7 sessions, but I am able to practice to help myself in the future."
"It was helpful to talk to someone who is impartial. I felt listened to and the therapist helped me to learn to question my habits in distressing situations."
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Recovery rate
87% successful recovery rate
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What you need to know
In a clinical setting, Habit Reversal Training is a gold standard of treatment for trichotillomania (compulsive hair-pulling), dermatillomania (excessive skin picking), onychophagia (chronic nail-biting), and other body-focused repetitive behaviours (BFRBs). Habit Reversal Training is scientifically proven to help you reduce and take control of your unwanted repetitive behaviours.
For people with hair pulling, skin picking, and nail-biting, these behaviours have become automatic - and repeated - responses to triggers. These behaviours do serve a purpose, as coping/soothing mechanisms, but they don't serve us well! When we engage in these behaviours our brain does feel a momentary sense of relief, like a reward, which makes the brain want to do it again. And so we enter The Habit Loop
Habit Reversal Training (HRT) is a way of breaking "The Habit Loop" and undoing these habits, or behaviours.
Habit Reversal Training (HRT) is a way of breaking "The Habit Loop" and undoing these habits, or behaviours.
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We offer online, phone or face to face therapy. Contact us to get matched to the right therapist for you.