What Makes Me Like Pulling My Hair Out?
May 18, 2009 by Cari Webbe
Filed under Health & Fitness
‘Why am I always pulling my hair out?’ is an extremely common question. Whether you pull your hair from your scalp, eyebrows, eyelashes or any other part of the body you probably wonder why most other people don’t do it. Is it just you? Are you normal?
You are, in fact, normal. There are hundreds, thousands, of other people who are also asking themselves the question ‘why am I always pulling my hair out?’. The truth is that it is down to a little known disorder that’s called trichotillomania.
What Is Trichotillomania?
I suffer from this disorder myself, and had never heard to word trichotillomania for years. It sounds scary, but all it really means is that you pull out your hair compulsively. This means that it is almost like a habit, but you will also do it at times without realising, making it very hard to stop.
What Causes People to Pull Out Their Hair?
There are so many potential causes, and nobody has a definitive answer. In my case I always had something inside of me that made me want to twiddle with my hair, which later developed into pulling around the age of 10. This is different for everyone.
Some of the other causes of hair pulling include: your diet, OCD, childhood trauma, ADHD, maybe even genetics!
If you pull out your hair then you might never even find out why it is that you started. It will also probably take you a little while to come to terms with it, so relax and don’t frantically search for a cure if it’s too difficult.
Getting Support
It might be the case that you need to give yourself a little time before you seek support. When I was ready, I started to chat with people in online forums, and even started writing about how I felt in a blog. I can’t tell you how much this has helped me – though I’m still not ready to talk to people about it in real life.
Make sure you move at your own pace, and slowly you will come to accept trichotillomania as part of who you are.
The Most Important Thing To Remember? You are not alone and there are thousands of others like you – asking themselves ‘why am I always pulling my hair out?!’. The only reason you haven’t heard about them is because they like to cover it up, just like you probably do as well.
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