Fighting urge to bite my nails.

[Changebagsandgladrags]

I stopped biting my nails on Thursday. I've bitten them for 30+ years. I stopped in the run up to my wedding, but started again as the nails drove me mad.

I like to bite any white parts of the nail off and currently I have whites showing on 6 nails.

My fingers look really ugly because I also bite the skin around the nails. I've continued to this since Thursday as I've been trying to even things up.

So here's the question. On two of my nails, I don't have the cuticle joiny part. The part that joins the skin to the nail, not that part that grows up the nail that you have to push down. That's due to constantly trying to even it out and not have raggedy bits.

Also, one finger is quite swollen as that's the main bitten one.

Will any of this reverse in any way? If my fingers are always going to be ugly I may as well keep biting them.

At the moment, I put my newly grown nails against my teeth but don't bite them off. The urge to is quite strong though.

Not sure if this is any help, but my nails are exactly as you describe, have bitten all my life (30+ years) and the ONLY thing that helped me grow and not bite my nails is:

Get acrylic extensions and keep on for as long as poss until nails are a decent length

Once acrylics are removed, I need to make sure my nails are always nicely painted. I won't bite painted nails.

When they start to chip, I redo them as soon as I can because the chips are tempting to pick at etc.

Taking up cross stitch and getting a fidget cube helped me too

The condition will improve if you keep three nicely painted, filed and use strengthening stuff.

Yes they will improve, he was a terrible nail biter as a child and only stopped with the promise of nail varnish from my mum! I still bite if they aren't painted (including skin around fingers). Invest in some nice nail polishes, or get a gel polish which lasts longer. Good luck!