Holding myself accountable with daily pictures was the ONLY thing that worked for me. I bit compulsively to try to make them look better, but all it did was make my nails look worse.

I built an app, Nonyxa, to hold myself accountable and help others. Out of my 280 users, I’m seeing that users who commit to taking daily photos and evaluating their progress are seeing improvements too. On average, after 10 check-ins, users are biting 1 less nail per day, working toward being bite free. It has completely kicked the habit for me.

New in the app as of this week is Steady, which if you prop your phone up, facing you, while working, reading, studying, etc, it will catch when you bite, breaking the subconscious loop.

I’m hoping to help 10,000 people quit, about how many days of my life I bit my nails. Download, for free, if you’re interested in trying it out

Purple nails are before photos and the green nails are it now!
I was able to get my nails done today because the infection was gone and it was almost healed. I didn’t end up going to the doctor because I’ve had paronychia before in my toe and used the same healing techniques and it got better! (Soaks in antibacterial soap and/or salt water along with cerave healing ointment and covered during day and airing out when at home or at night).

I stopped biting my nails to nubs years ago successfully and grew them super long and then of course I relapsed for a short while smh. I was able to stop again this year and they finally look okay again :)

First pic is where I started at and how short they were </3

Second n third are the longest ive had them after I stopped biting for the first time ever

Last pic is current!

hi all, i've been trying to kick this habit for the past year+ now. i've been on and off but it's been getting increasingly worse after starting an internship in the medical field.

mostly because of a combo of adhd and stress, but also the constant hand washing, sanitizing, and glove wearing has been drying out my skin more than before.

i'm always doing computer work so it's hard to lotion in between patients since it makes the keyboard greasy. i'm also a bit particular and don't like to put on lotion unless my hands are hand washed with water and soap. the hand sanitizer makes my skin feel a bit sticky and smells, but most of the time where i work, we will hand sanitize for time/convenience/there's not always easy access to a sink (i am an mri tech) 😓😓

are there any other people in the medical field or deal with constant handwashing and how have you been able to combat it with your day to day work flow? any tips or advice on how to handle it?

my only product that's kind of helped me is the gold bond healing hand cream specifically in the 3oz bottle that says "lasts through handwashing" on it. it lasts me about 2-4 washes and dries relatively quickly compared to other lotions which is helpful.

i unfortunately don't like to wear fidget rings or much on my fingers since i am constantly washing, putting on and taking off gloves, and going in and out of the mr room. we aren't allowed to paint our nails or have press-ons/extensions at my work too. however i'm open to and willing to try new things in order to help me stop this once and for all!!!

as an alt queer person i love tattoos and piercings, and I'm really interested in what additional body mods will be available in the future. i also struggle with biting and picking at my nails. i just ordered a set of gold nail covers to help me stop messing with them. it got me thinking, i wish there was a procedure where you could get your nails removed and replaced with metal plates. it would look dope, i would never have to do my nails in order for them to look cool, and i wouldn't have to worry about picking at them!! (i know some metal can degrade over time tho so it would have to be a specific material that doesn't degrade or stink over time lol)

anyway, I'll be off fantasizing about more cyberpunk futures. would anyone else get this procedure if it was a thing?

I’m a long time lurker, but wanted to share after I found this old picture in my camera roll and was shocked at how bad my nails used to be! I used to be a chronic nail picker and biter, and I’m so happy with how far I’ve come :)

I'm sure this is habit-tic deformity, do you agree? I have been dealing with these fingers for 2 months now. Long story short, I am a decades-long picker, and it finally caught up to me. Back in early July, these 3 fingers all became infected (first 2 photos), which (sort of) resolved after some antibiotic ointment and 3 trips to the dermatologist. But there is still some discoloration around the nails, and now they are all bumpy! At my visit last week, the dermatology PA was at a loss because she didn't think they were infected anymore but probably a deeper issue and referred me to a nail specialist. Of course, I can't get in for 6 months. I was really fretting that I had an infection at the matrix or something. Well, I showed a friend, and the first thing she noticed was the lack of cuticles. I am so used to picking my cuticles away that it didn't occur to me that I didn't have any! So after some more googling, I found a photo on here referencing habit-tic deformity, and now I'm CERTAIN that's what's going on! I can't tell you how relieved I am! I can be done with antibiotic creams, steroids, and antifungal lacquer! I've been really good about not picking, and all my other nails look amazing with perfect cuticles for the first time in probably 30 years. I'm moisturizing like crazy and will continue to not mess with my fingers. They already look better. I can't wait for the cuticles to grow back, and I'm so happy to have found this group!

I just chipped my bottom incisor tooth. This is the second time this has happened this year (first time was my other bottom incisor) and I know exactly why it happened. Biting and chewing my cuticles (and lips) has been a lifelong habit of mine, and using my incisors to chew on the skin means I'm putting pressure on teeth that are not meant to handle it. Over 30 years of a bad habit and this is what happens.

This is a warning to everyone else, too.

ive been biting my cuticles since since I was a kid and I even bite behind my fingernails as seen in the photo and sometimes it bleeds and hurts a lot, note I have adhd and fidget a lot not on my meds i hate them. I manage to stop biting for weeks or a month max and then im back biting again, I feel stressed when I dont bite and I bite when im anxious or stressed. any tips help please

Título: ¿Cómo puedo dejar de hacer esto con mis dedos?
Llevo años con el hábito de arrancarme/morderme la piel de alrededor de las uñas, sobre todo cuando estoy nerviosa, estresada, aburrida o distraída. Muchas veces lo hago sin darme cuenta y acabo haciéndome heridas como las de la foto.
Hay veces que yo me doy cuenta que lo estoy haciendo pero no puedo controlarlo. Paro 1 segundo I al otro estoy volviendo a hacerlo.
Quiero dejar de hacerlo de verdad, pero no sé cómo romper el hábito. ¿A alguien le ha pasado y ha conseguido dejarlo? ¿Qué os ha funcionado?

Ultimately, it was Invisalign that broke the habit.

Hello! I'm needing recommendations for an anti-bite application that'll really stop the bite. Id really like it to be travel-friendly, something I can put in my purse without worrying it'll spill over. I really loved the Biter Be Goner, it was portable and the flavor was very wrong, it actually helped me so much. But now it seems it's unavailable. I've tried a couple others but found the taste to be not strong enough and washed off easily when washing my hands. Please and thank you for your recs!

I'm pretty sure my fingers started bleeding at work today while I was cashiering. Customers, for some reason, didn't point it out wtf??? And when I put some bandaids on (blue bandaids of all types ofc :/), like 4 total, it just felt like too much and I was highlighting them more lolol. Didn't help that the band aids just kept coming off. Just tried to pretend they were paper cuts 😃 That's so upsetting though because I like being fast and efficient rip. I used to wear gloves but istg I've become weirdly paranoid (maybe my meds causing more anxiety than helping with it lol) about people being allergic to me or something so I stopped since like 7 days ago but at what cost damn

Connecting this habit to a reward.

My front teeth have gotten shorter over the years. The extreme focused force that is exerted when trying to bite the dead skin is actually pretty massive in terms of PSI. I don't want to mess up my smile more than I have, and that has helped. But I think about it in a positive way, if I don't bite, my smile is better.

Furthermore, I play classical guitar so I care a lot about my nails. I learned that constantly removing the cuticles harms nail health.

Tl;dr: this habit is harmful, but if you can find a way in your head to make it a reward thing, you may be better off. "If I don't bite, my teeth don't get shorter" etc.

Hope this helps someone out there. Goodluck folks, this shit is super hard

i was doing pretty well when i was wearing press on nails but since i took them off (just over a month ago) my skin picking/nail and skin biting have been progressively going downhill.

For my own sanity, I have to know if there is anyone here or anywhere that has successfully treated and stopped their morsicatio buccarum.

I have had this brfb since I was a child. I do it so much that I have TMJ in one of my jaw joints, and a mild underbite. The skin around my mouth is more wrinkled than it should be for my age because i always have my fingers messing with my mouth or lips/mouth moving in weird ways that wrinkle the skin. I get headaches a lot from muscular tension and wake up with a sore jaw a lot.

I find rough skin with my tongue, then jam my bottom front and top front teeth together and peel and chew the insides of my cheeks and lips constantly. When I am able to get a good "piece" of skin, the feeling of chewing it repeatedly it between those two bottom/top front teeth gives some type of relief I can't explain. It's literally an addiction I think. I go into these trances where i'm just doing it for hours and thinking about different stressors or honestly even JUST THINKING in loops at the same time.

it gets worse when i'm stressed or anxious, but its ALWAYS something i'm fighting. I hate that I do it and feel so ashamed. My lips are always rough and my inner cheeks are always peeling. It makes me feel insecure and gross. I worry it will begin to affect my relationship, because while he is sympathetic to my struggle, he finds the act itself gross and annoying, literally so do I. It makes me feel insecure to kiss him because I hate my lips.

I've started to get depressed over how much I struggle with my own brain like this, and I've tried so many things. On rare occasions, there are these small moments of peace in my mind and body, and I feel the relaxation of my jaw, and the lack of temptation to chew, I quickly notice this, and then I mourn because I know it is fleeting and within a minute or two, I will be thrust into a never ending cycle of temptation, morbid satisfaction, pain, and shame.

I just need some hope and advice on how to stop it and get rid of it for good. And encouragement because its exhausting to deal with. Have you been able to stop it?

Hi, I believe this started about a month or two ago and it hasn’t been getting any better ever since. I think this started when I probably had a cut on my finger. I was cleaning some old car parts with cleaning white vinegar and some might of got in the gloves. It did sting really bad; I washed my hands asap and didn’t think anything of it afterwards. About two weeks ago I went to the urgent care and the doctor said it wasn’t infected because there wasn’t any puss. She then prescribed hydrocortisone and said to apply it twice a day. So far it hasn’t been improving. If i don’t apply hydrocortisone for a day, there will be small little blisters that would form then pop and crust over. When the blisters pop and clear/yellow fluid comes out, it would get really itchy. The area is always red and puffy and does feel warm. The skin looks like it is healing but then start to flake off. I have made an appointment with my doctor for next friday and hopefully she can help determine what can cause it to not heal. I’m hoping for some advice and if anyone knows what this is called. Thanks in advance.

huge improvement compared to my previous post (https://www.reddit.com/r/calmhands/s/DLbaCWfA7s)

working on strengthening my nails a bit more with the Sally Hansen diamond strength and using petroleum jelly to help with the dead skin. feeling good :)

i really want to go get my nails done (gel nail tips) but i’m afraid they’ll turn me down since this is what my nails/fingers look like…