I have a confession to make. I’m a picker. And not just because that’s my mother’s maiden name. No, I pick my cuticles, those areas around your finger nails that most people can just leave alone. Mine are too tempting.
This is something I have done since at least high school. I have tried multiple times to stop both at my mother’s instigation and my own. In high school my mom bought me rubber thimbles to wear to keep me from picking. It didn’t help, I just picked at those—band aids get the same result.
When I started medical school I tried really hard to stop, who wants a doctor with ugly, bloody fingers?? I have stopped for short periods of time, but I always start again. I think its stress related. Sometimes I don’t even know I’m doing it.
Right now my fingers look pretty good except for my right middle finger. After Eric, I attacked this finger with a vengeance. It spent months horribly swollen and usually bloody and would wake me at night with its throbbing. I didn’t care. It is better than that now, but not better. Every time it starts to heal, I go at it again. Part of this is because it’s raw, and easy to pick and it’s just what I do. Part of this is because I don’t want it to heal. It’s like I need an outwardly visible representation of the pain inside. My own stigmata. It’s not like I want people to notice, in fact it’s ugly and embarrassing, but I don’t want it to heal either. If it heals does that mean I’m over him? Silly, I know, but still….that’s how I feel.
So I guess I’ll continue the cycle of letting it heal long a bit and then picking it open again as long as I need to. And who knows how long that will be?
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