Nail biting or onychophagia, is thought to be common in children and young adults with studies showing 20-33% of children and around 45% of teenagers bite their nails. Experts don't really know what causes it but stress, boredom, frustration can all increase the habit, it's not uncommon for people to bite their nails when they are hungry or when deeply concentrating as well.
There are a number of negative complications from nail biting ranging from as infections, jaw pain to more serious issues such as bone infections.
What can I do about it? Well there are barrier methods, using mouth guards, wearing gloves. Keeping your nails very short. Keeping your mouth occupied (chewing gum etc).
Or.... you can try hypnosis.
I work with so many different behaviours but regardless of what I am treating, I always love to have feedback and a testimonial makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, to be honest, knowing I have helped someone to achieve their goals is why I do what I do.
I had the pleasure of working with GS recently. He had bitten his nails for 40+ years and although he is a strong willed person, who likes to be in control, he wasn't able to kick the habit except for a short period of time some years back. GS found this extremely frustrating, most of the time, he wasn't even aware that he was biting his nails. His hands and nails were badly affected and he felt this let down his appearance and annoyed him and his family who constantly pointed out when he was carrying out the behaviour.
Over the course of 3 sessions, we worked on bringing his behaviour into his conscious awareness so that he was able to stop the habit before it began.
Here's what GS had to say after the sessions had ended......
I contacted Coral after deciding to finally tackle my problem of Nail Biting for the past 40years +. I went into the whole process after speaking with Coral, I was open minded and felt comfortable about all that was explained to me. Coral led me through all 3 appointments. I began to feel and see results within 1 week of our first session. I have now finished all my 3 sessions and waited over 25 days before writing my recommendation and post to clearly see if I was still happy with the end result. I am and would recommend Room 101 Therapy (Coral) to anyone who just wishes to improve their life balance. Its simple, easy and mind blowing. I would finally add that Coral carried out all my sessions over Zoom which again during Covid times was fantastic. I would whole heartily recommend Coral going forward