stop eating my fingers

The only times I DON’T bite or pick are when I am happy, eating, talking to people, or occupying both my fingers and my mouth (knitting and chewing gum). I’ve torn my fingers apart because finals are just stressing me out :( I remember a week where it made a dead stop. It was the middle of summer two years ago, I was at a fair with my best friend, and I had absolutely no worries.

I haven’t made my scalp or my fingers bleed in TWO MONTHS!!! :D

I think I just met another wolf biter IN PERSON!
He shook hands with me and his fingers were definitely ragged, and he didn’t grip firmly at all. I also noticed him chewing his fingers… wow! In person, face to face. Of course, I had just met him. Not exactly the right time to say, “Hey! Do you eat the skin off of your fingers?”.
Wow. Maybe I can pursue a friendship with him and get a better look at his fingers, it felt pretty bad when I shook his hand.

Any skin, dead or living, will be picked at, chewed, and eaten by me. Also scabs, but nothing else. Does everyone else only have a few teeth they nibble at bits with? I only use my left front tooth against any bottom teeth, or my right incisor against my bottom teeth. I’m so weird…
I find that chewing on rubber bits relives me. Especially, for girls, the tiny rubber backs of earrings that go over the metal backing, when you first get them. They take forever to chew up and are nice and rubbery. It’s as close to the texture of skin that I can get, and it helps tremendously. I often carry a few in my pocket or keep them in my mouth.
This is beyond strange, but I’m on the internet, and nobody can give me weird looks or anything, so I will simply post my thoughts, no sugar coating. I promise I’m completely normal besides this sick habit. God I hate it. I’m typing with 6 fingers because I’ve had a stressful week and managed to strip my pinky, thumbs, and ring finger of several layers of skin. Owww :(

GOOD, I’m so glad I’m not alone in picking at my head too. I hate it. Biting my fingers can be mistaken for biting my nails, which is normal.
My head is all scabbed. I spend 20 minutes sometimes combing through my hair looking for scabs and skin. I promise I’m completely normal besides this!!!
I keep thinking… this is like OCD. You can’t really get rid of it. It’s… chronic. You can find ways to avoid it for a while, but it will just find you again.
Unless somebody puts my entire head in a thick glass bubble so I can’t get my fingers to my mouth or scratch my head, I won’t be able to stop doing this.
Oh… and I told my sister. She got uncomfortable and admitted that yes, she bites the skin too sometimes. But it’s nowhere near as severe as I do it. And I’ve seen my mom biting her skin, but again – her fingers don’t even turn red at all.
It’s never going to stop…

I remember the first time I bit the skin on my fingers. I was 7, and I had just gotten out of the shower. I had dry skin and multiple hang nails at the time, I bit my nails for years previous. I accidentally bit the skin. I liked it. I was softer than nail and… nice.
Now I’m 13. My fingers are red, raw, have creases, and are occasionally bloody. I have been able to refrain myself from making myself bleed, by telling myself that there will be no skin for me to chew if I bite to make myself bleed.
I have dandruff, and I pick at my head. Scabs have since formed. I can’t stop picking at the scabs and eating them. I rip them off before they heal, and then again and again and again…
I’m so glad I have found this site. Now, when classmates ask what’s wrong with my fingers, I can tell them I have dermitophagia, instead of mumbling a lame excuse. They won’t know what it is, or even how to spell it, and they’ll be satisfied with that. If they do look it up, let them know, at least I won’t have to tell them that I eat the skin off of my fingers. I hate this. It’s disgusting and sick. I’ve never told this to anybody before. Nothing works. I had to quit guitar because I bit the calluses off and it hurt too much to press the chords. I had to tell my mom that I simply didn’t want to play. I loved that guitar. I loved the music. My own habits have ripped me from that beauty, do you have any idea how hard that is??
This is tearing me apart! A simple handshake hurts! A high-five is unfathomable. Opening a bottle of water, turning on the faucet. My friends are confused when they see me feverishly chewing my fingers and picking at my head, and wincing when they reach towards my hands.

Does anybody else eat their dandruff and scabs? DISGUSTING, I KNOW. But I can’t say it any other way.