When you can't stop pulling your hair
Specialist, shame-free therapy for hair pulling (trichotillomania) — and for skin picking, if that's part of it too. Understand the urge, reduce the pull, and find what actually helps.
CBT, hypnotherapy & counselling in Fareham, Hampshire, and online
Help with hair pulling and skin picking
If you pull your hair or pick your skin and cannot seem to stop, it is not a lack of willpower. Trichotillomania and skin picking are recognised, treatable conditions, and you are far from alone with them.
Fareham, Hampshire, plus online therapy UK wide
Free · Confidential · No judgement · Nobody will ask to look
Understanding it
What are trichotillomania and skin picking?
Trichotillomania is the recurrent urge to pull out your own hair, from the scalp, eyebrows, eyelashes, beard or elsewhere. Skin picking, or dermatillomania, is the closely related urge to pick at your skin. Both are recognised conditions, classed as body-focused repetitive behaviours, and both are far more common than the silence around them suggests.
Often it happens without you fully noticing, while you are watching television, reading, driving or lying in bed. Sometimes it is entirely deliberate, in front of a mirror, and can go on for a long time. Most people do some of both.
It tends to intensify with stress, anxiety, boredom or low mood. It is not a weakness, not vanity, and not something you should have been able to stop by now.
You might recognise some of this
How it tends to look
Everyone's version is different, and you do not need to recognise all of these.
- Pulling scalp hair
- Eyebrows or eyelashes
- Beard or body hair
- Picking spots or scabs
- Picking at fingers or lips
- Doing it without noticing
- Doing it deliberately at a mirror
- Worse when stressed or bored
- Hours lost in front of a mirror
- Covering with makeup or hats
- Avoiding swimming, wind or rain
- Never having told anyone
If several of those land, you are in very ordinary company. Most people who come to us have been doing this quietly for years and have never said it out loud.
Why it keeps going
The cycle, and why shame makes it worse
Pulling or picking brings a moment of genuine relief. That is why it happens, and it is also why willpower alone rarely holds.
What follows is usually frustration, embarrassment and a sense of having lost control again. Those feelings are themselves stressful, and stress is one of the main triggers, so the shame quietly feeds the very thing you are ashamed of.
That loop is the thing therapy interrupts. Not by trying harder, but by understanding the trigger, catching it earlier, and taking the self-criticism out of the equation. People are often surprised how much changes once the shame is dealt with.
An honest answer
What actually helps
Habit reversal training, which comes from CBT, has the strongest evidence for body-focused repetitive behaviours. It works in three parts: building awareness of when and where it happens, learning a competing response to use instead, and reducing the triggers around it.
Hypnotherapy is widely used and many people find it genuinely helpful, particularly with the automatic side of the behaviour and with the stress underneath. The research behind it for these conditions specifically is thinner than for habit reversal, and we would rather say so than let you assume otherwise. The two are often combined.
Counselling matters here more than people expect, because so much of the difficulty is the shame and the concealment rather than the behaviour itself.
What none of it is, is a switch. Progress usually means less, rather than none, at first. That is still a considerable change.
The approach
How we help you regain control
We match the approach to you, and usually blend more than one.
Habit reversal
Building awareness of the moment it starts, and putting a competing action in its place, so the urge has somewhere else to go.
About CBTHypnotherapy
Works with the automatic layer where the habit lives, easing the urge and the stress that feeds it, rather than fighting it consciously.
About hypnotherapyCounselling
A confidential space for the shame, the concealment and whatever sits underneath, often the first time it has been said aloud.
About counsellingManaging triggers
Practical work on stress, boredom and the specific settings where it happens most, from the sofa to the car to the bathroom mirror.
About anxiety therapyThe thing that stops people booking
Nobody will ask to look
The most common reason people put this off is the fear of having to show someone. You will not be asked to remove a hat, a wig, makeup or a sleeve, and nobody will inspect anything.
You will also not be told to just stop, or asked why you do not simply put your hands down. Your therapist understands that if that worked, you would have done it years ago.
What you will get is someone who has heard this many times before and does not find it strange, unpleasant or surprising.
How life could feel
Getting the time and the small freedoms back
Not spending an extra twenty minutes each morning covering patches. Not checking the weather to see whether it will be windy. Not steering away from swimming, or bright light, or someone standing too close.
People describe those small freedoms as the thing that changes most, ahead of the appearance itself. There is also the plain matter of getting the time back.
No surprises
What happens when you get in touch
- 1
You send a message or call
A line or two is plenty. You do not have to describe it in detail or explain how long it has been going on.
- 2
A free 15 minute call
A relaxed, confidential chat with an experienced therapist. Nothing on the call will be difficult, and nobody will ask to see anything.
- 3
We match you with the right therapist
We suggest the approach and therapist we think fits, in person in Fareham or online, and you decide whether to start.
CBT and hypnotherapy from £90 a session. Counselling from £72. See all fees
This is more common than the silence suggests
Almost everyone who comes for this believes they are the only one, and that it is somehow shameful in a way other difficulties are not. It is neither rare nor shameful, and telling one person is usually the moment it starts to loosen.
Your questions answered
Hair pulling and skin picking questions, answered
Will I have to show anyone?
No. Nobody will ask you to remove a hat, a wig, makeup or a sleeve, and nobody will inspect anything. This is the most common reason people delay getting help, and it is not how we work.
Why can I not just stop?
Because it is not a decision. These are body-focused repetitive behaviours, largely automatic, and they usually do a job for you around stress, boredom or difficult feelings. Willpower is aimed at the wrong part of the chain, which is exactly why it keeps failing.
What actually helps?
Habit reversal training, from CBT, has the strongest evidence for these behaviours. It builds awareness of when it happens and gives the urge somewhere else to go. Hypnotherapy helps many people with the automatic side and the stress underneath, though the research behind it is thinner. Counselling addresses the shame. A blend is common.
Is this the same as OCD?
Not the same, though they are related and often grouped together. OCD involves compulsions carried out to prevent a feared outcome. Hair pulling and skin picking are not usually about preventing anything, they are more like a habit that soothes. Some people have both.
Will I be judged?
No. Our therapists have heard this many times and do not find it strange or unpleasant. Everything is confidential, and you will not be told to just stop or asked why you cannot put your hands down.
Does it help children and teenagers?
Yes. Hair pulling and skin picking often begin in childhood or the teenage years, and young people frequently respond well to gentle, age-appropriate work. If you are a parent, the free call is a good place to start, and it is worth avoiding telling them off about it in the meantime, since that tends to make it worse.
What if I have tried and relapsed before?
That is normal and it is not failure. These behaviours tend to come back under stress, and a return is information rather than a verdict. What matters is having something to do about it that is not self-criticism.
How many sessions will I need?
It varies with how long it has been going on and what sits underneath. Focused work on the habit itself can be relatively short. Where there is a lot of stress, anxiety or shame involved, it takes longer. You will get an honest idea after the first session or two.
Should I see my GP too?
Worth doing if picking has caused sores that are not healing, signs of infection, or significant scarring, and definitely if you swallow the hair you pull, since that occasionally needs medical attention. Therapy works alongside that care.
Can I have sessions online?
Yes. You can be seen in person at our Fareham practice or online from anywhere in the UK. Many people find online a more private way to raise something they have never told anyone, and it works just as well.
Whenever you are ready, we are here
Start with a free 15 minute call. A relaxed, confidential conversation with an experienced therapist, with no cost, no obligation, and nobody asking to see anything.