h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It's not funny, it's not not big, it's not clever.

So why do I do it? My normal excuse is "ah, but with being a bass player I have to keep my nails short" (normally accompanied with a smug look) but, as we all know, that's a lie.

And eating crisps is agony! That "rubbing salt in the wound" phrase really has meaning to me when I'm enjoying my salt 'n' vinegar....

I know that my mother, when trying to stop my then toddler aged sister from biting her nails, applied nail polish to them as an incentive to stop biting. Sort of the "ooh, pretty... now, why on earth would I want to bite something so pretty?" idea.

I suppose it would work with adults as well. Nail polish can't be that tasty.

Yes, polishing nails does work. It was the only way that I managed to stop biting after around 18 years (my parents say that I started biting my nails soon after I got my first tooth!). But polishing leads to a new bad habit: polish picking. This is when you chip off bits of polish from your nails. Is this worse or better than biting? it's gross, but it doesn't hurt, so I am going to have to say yes.



Ami of zx

The polish thing didn't work for me. I've tried it a few times, and all that happened was I picked the polish off before I bit my nails.

Although I never thought of my self as a little capitalist, it was cold, hard cash that made me stop biting my nails.

I used to bite my nails as a young girl, not down to the skin as some others do, but enough so as you would notice. When I was about 11 or 12 my Dad said he would give me $50 if I stopped biting my nails, it worked a treat and now 20 odd years later I still have lovely,long, unbitten nails.

j888
(regretting spending the 50 large on Smash Hits mags)

Learn to play guitar.

At least if you are learning to play guitar and need nails on your right hand you can concentrate on growing them. However many guitarist still nibble on their left hand which needs to be short to play the strings.

Of course the reverse in true for left handed guitarist. I wonder if Sir Paul chews the fingernails on his right hand

Of course extreme repeat offenders could just cut off their fingers. However this would lead to them gnawing at the end of their arm. Maybe we should just wire theior teeth together.

My friend has a pretty bad nail-biting problem. He does it all te time for some reason. Usually when he's bored. It is really bad for him.

Warning to all nail-biting offenders - Keep it up, and you'll end up with nails that are 1 centimetre long!

It's true, believe me.

spook

One of my friends still bites her nails all the time, and her nails really are that short! It looks awful....

When I was a kid I was a chronic nail biter and tried all the usual tricks - bribery, nail varnish, etc etc....

I ended up cutting down on nail biting gradually. I restricted it to one fingernail on each hand (my little fingernail), and once I saw how long my other nails grew, it was a simple step to stopping altogether.

I first got the idea for biting my nails from an old 'Popeye' cartoon.

(how weird is that?)

But the biggest thing is that I do it now when I'm under strees or when I'm reading at night.

The stress thing is easy to fight - find other ways to relieve that stress (walking, making a phone call to a friend, meditating). As for nail-biting while reading, it's more a matter of being conscious of it and attempting to stop.

When I got married, I didn't bite the nails on my left hand for weeks before the big day so that my nails weren't all chewed to bits when we posed with our hands overlapping with the rings visible. Of course the right hand was a ruin.

I've found that I can get rid of my bad habits with a strong dose of willpower. Then, once I've not engaged in that bad habit for a few weeks, it seems strange to pick it back up again...

I transferred from biting my nails to obsessively pushing back my cuticles and biting the bits of skin around my nails (see the nose picking thread if you aren't eating). Now I only bite them out of necessity when they grow too long and snap so I bite them back to stop myself getting hangnails or rough edges...I don't file my nails or cut them with scissors but they're extremely smooth and well shaped

A fail safe way to stop nail biting (are you ready for this fantastic insight...)

Put plasters over the tops of your fingers. Yes they will go wrinkly. But it really does work, as there is no access to nails to bite them down. I used it for 3 weeks. After that I had no futher urges to bite my nails, and as DD will attest (), my nails are now lovely, long and sharp. I think it has to do with the fact that the 3 week period gives your nails time to grow back. During this time, you will put your fingers in your mouth to bite, but only hit plaster - which isnt the most pleasant experience. Thus you also get used to not putting your fingers in your mouth. When the plaster comes off you see your lovely nails and you no longer have any urge to bite - leaving you with beautiful hands.

Thats how I got over that habit anyway!

better then plasters: Gloves!

Put gloves on your hand and you hand is kept warm, and ou can't get to your nails to bite them!

spook

oi';m, treyuonmgf oitr nmopwe@!!

Bah, too hard to type with gloves on!

I think I was about 30 years old when I finally kicked the nail-biting habit. I'm still not quite sure how I managed it but somehow I did. Strangely enough I was always disgusted by the sight of my nails and I was immediately put off if I met a man and saw that he too bit his nails! There's hypocrisy for you! I don't have wonderful nails now, they're very soft and break easily (perhaps through having been mistreated in the past?)but at least I've got white bits on them now and I have enough to paint if I feel like it.

History is now repeating itself because my 22 year old son bites his nails to the quicks, much worse than mine ever were. I think we've tried just about every remedy there is but nothing has worked so far. Oh well, perhaps in a few years time he will just stop the habit as I did.
dl

I stopped biting my nails using a nifty combination method:

1) A group of us did it together, for support.
2) We all put in 10p a week, and chose a nail (say left pinkie).
3) We all stopped biting that one nail for a week, and checked each other's progress.
4) Any failures didn't get their 10p back!

Combination support group, gradual reduction and bribery. We had a 100% sucess rate.

One additional tip: if you break a nail, NEVER be tempted to bite it smooth. The habit comes back and you bite it right off. Keep emery boards in every room in the house, in the car and in your wallet. They keep temptation away.

Mojo

What a lot of us nail-biters there are!

I started in emulationof my big sister - how silly is that? I have still not kicked the habit fully 30+ years later. Here's my tips, such as they are:

False nails (this is how said sister kicked the habit). This is great for women, but rather less socially-acceptable for men. You can buy false nail kits - complete with double-sided sticky tape or super glue - but you're not liable to get a neat result, making it to easy to nibble them off. Invest in a proper treatment at a beauty salon: the cost incurred will help to work as an incentive. Ask the beautician to fix the nails *very* firmly and to cut them quite short - this will give you chance to learn that your fingers are now a quarter of an inch longer. It's good if you can learn now, because until you doyou will find that you may bend your nails back much more than non-nail-biters too.

If you can keep the nails on long enough - don't fiddle with them! By the time they come off, your nails will have grown, and you'll know how to live with them - all in one easy step!

But this solution didn't work for this researcher. I didn't have the discipline not to fiddle with the weird-feeling things, and the sides of my nails are so damaged that the nails did not sit cleanly.

I was one of those people who finds that they just stop biting their nails. It's happened on and off since my early 20s, and I still can't work out why. It's not that I'm less stressed at certain times, or that I'm trying not to bite. It just happens, and always in the same order: left hand before right, last three fingers before thumb and forefinger. It lasts 3-6 months, and then I'm back to square one, but I live in hope that one day it may be permanent.

If you can't stop biting. Tell yourself that it's got to be one of the better bad habits: compared to what the excesses of drink, drugs or cigarettes can do to people, your habit is mild indeed, but it does have its dangers. My big sister (her again!) bit one finger so badly as a child that it went sceptic, and had to be lanced, resulting in a damaged nail bed (it has never grown back) and a deformed finger. So the set of beautiful, natural nails she has now comes to just nine.

I'm intrigued to know how people started biting their nails. I started when I was about 5 and saw a TV programme about someone that bit their nails and for some reason thought it was a good idea.

I'm deeply ashamed of the state of my nails and have tried everything to stop. The only thing that work is a full set of false acrylic ones. I stop for a while once they come off then start again as soon as I am stressed.

The problem with false nails is that it makes it very difficult to a) type b) play the piano, both of which I enjoy very much. So I make a sacrifice for vanity.

I've heard that a lot of people just stop when they get inot their 30's - maybe its a self assurance thing that comes with age.

Oh my...I never knew so many people had this problem...and it is a problem..i have 4 kids and i find myself "sneaking a nail" so they don't pick up the habit...i'm also sort of a clean freak..so i have to wash my hands real good first..i can't stop..when i was a child my parents would spank me, put nasty tasting stuff that was sold for the purpose of stopping the habit...they even tried hot sauce and that started my spicy food addiction..my nails are so ugly, no pretty nail polish for me...the hubby thinks its some kind of self mutilation..i guess it is. He calls my fingers E.T. (as in the alien) cause my fingers look so funny from biting.
I've tried many times to stop and have failed every time. The only good thing about nail biting is I don't have to smoke..I quit before I got married and had children. I guess everyone has some kind of obsession. At least this one won't kill me..unless i choke on a nail..yuk.
T.

My ex-girlfriend did the cuticle thing all the time. No, I really do mean A_L_L T_H_E T_I_M_E_!! Eventually she started on mine, after she'd pushed her own all the way up to her wrists. I would wake up in the middle of the night and she'd be all over my cuticles.
In the end it wore me down to the point where I started biting (and, dare I say it, eating) the dead skin around my nails.
- Which I do to this very day.