Anyone managed to stop scalp picking or hair pulling habits?

I do this too and have recently bought myself a Picky Pad fidget - working for me so far!

Faith in Nature does some lovely natural shampoos which don't aggravate the scalp & cause itching. Worth a look.

This is really interesting - do you know what type of magnesium it was?

I either bite my nails to the quick (in which case I can’t pick at my scalp/other skin because I have nothing to pick with) or manage to grow my nails but then use them to pick… also have spells of pulling out hair, so a whole load of terrible habits. My son also has some of these repetitive habits (pulling out eyelashes and eyebrow hairs) and I wish I could help us both.

Play games like candy crush or homescapes. Occupies your hands so you can't keep picking it.

Keeping nails short and double washing hair every day helps whenever I go through a bout of scalp picking. I find when my scalp and hair are really clean and not at all oily it is much less satisfying to pick so I just don’t do it and then it has time to heal.

I have only recently ( last 3 yrs) started scalp picking. I can get to the point where it’s almost healed then I aggravate it again. It’s definitely stress related since the last three years have been a roller coaster.
I do have an allergy to SLS and benzyl benzoate, present in the majority of shampoos and conditioners. So after much research I’ve found a range of hair products that are very “free from” chemicals. It has improved the underlying itchy scalp that seems to trigger the picking.

It may also be a side effect of a drug I take. It started around the time my scalp dried out. Hopefully I will be able to stop the drug later this year.

It probably hasn’t helped that I retired a couple of years ago from a career where my hands were gloved all the time and infection control meant I couldn’t scratch my head at work.

Yes. It wasn’t too much of an issue because I bit my nails too so they were always short and couldn’t do too much damage (other than the damage I did biting my nails). I’ve stopped trying to bite my nails and realised the skin/scalp picking is worse and now I can hurt myself a lot more. I’ve bought fidgets to try and move the urge into. I’ve also found having gels on my nails means that whilst they are longer, they aren’t as sharp so I can try picking but I can’t get the same traction I can with a finger nail. It’s also means when I’m digging a finger nail it’s also not causing as much pain and I can’t bite my nails the same. Although sometimes I do know pick the nails off.

So not stopped it but trying to divert it onto things that don’t hurt me.

https://amzn.eu/d/05ttfX8J wonder if you might find this book helpful op? This is an amazon link but sure you could buy elsewhere. Sorry edited as title didn't come up - it's called Overcoming Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors: A Comprehensive Behavioral Treatment for Hair Pulling and Skin Picking

I know that it's not exactly the same, but I used to bite my nails (had done so from childhood) and was really surprised after I started to take magnesium supplements regularly that I just stopped - the urge just went away. This wasn't something that I'd thought about or heard anything about beforehand. So if you don't take magnesium already, it could be worth a shot?

I realised I was doing this when bored and/or anxious, now I try to just massage the area with my fingertips rather than picking and it definitely works for the boredom, and if I notice I'm doing it in time, for the anxiety too. Keeping my nails short also helps with this.

I used to do it, and I am sure it was because I used to dye my own hair and there always seemed to be little itchy patches on scalp that I would pick at. I used to make a concentrated effort not to do it a week before I went to the hairdressers because it was embarrassing.

I don't dye anymore; my hair is natural, and thank God, the urge to pick has mostly gone too.

I do this too, also have ADHD. It's difficult not to. Most of the time I'm not aware I'm doing it.

I had a scabby patch on my head for a few years, I finally got rid of it by telling my DH and DD to tell me off when I tried to scratch it.

My habit was doing it in the evening so one or both of them was around to spot me if I tried to do it, helps that we have a small house with open plan living downstairs.
I got them to photograph it every month aswell.

I also started regularly exercising after dinner and going for an evening walk so less time to scratch.

During the day at work there is no heating so I wore a hat indoors and that stopped me touching the patch. This was over 2 winters ago that it finally went. Hopefully I've broken the habit now.

I'm a terrible picker (but avoid my face).

About a year ago i had a picky area on my scalp which i kept at until it was sore. In the end i decided to spend some money on a really nice scalp healing/dry skin soothing shampoo and made a determined effort to let it heal. It worked for me.

I think because by buying something to treat it it made it a real issue which needed dealing with, if that makes sense? Rather than an almost dream like state thing.

No, I have diagnosed ADHD and ASD and I do the same thing, I haven’t worked out how to stop. I have other stims and can’t stop those either.