Kicking Bad & Initiating Good Habits: [Hoping Will Become] My [New] Best Things

image source: thegloss.com

Everyone has a nervous habit or two, right?  Well, being the generally anxious person I am, I have lots of them.  The worst one is probably my tendency to pick my lips when I'm stressed (primarily) or bored (secondarily).  My dentist recently yelled at me for doing it, saying that I'm "lacerating" them.  While that word is a bit dramatic, the picking does occasionally get to the point where my lips end up bleeding (which can't be good).  A lot of the time I'm not even fully aware that I'm doing it.  At the end of my dentist appointment, when we were talking about other bad habits of mine (back to those in second), she actually swatted my hand away as I subconsciously reached up to start picking.  Oy vey.

Coincidentally (or not?) two of my other very bad habits (well, one is a bad habit, the other is the lack-thereof of a GOOD habit) also have resulted in damage to my mouth (hence the extended wrist-slapping from the dentist): I grind my teeth and I don't floss as regularly as I should.  The grinding I'm not sure I actually have much control over (other than trying to stop right away when I feel myself doing it during waking hours [I can't exactly walk around with my mouth guard in all day, can I?]), but the flossing officially needs to be stepped up.

Seeing as we are now 4 days into 2012, I'm hereby making resolutions to curb the picking and amp up the flossing this year.

HOW I will be able to stop picking after 20 odd years of doing it I'm not entirely sure.  Some basic google searching has taught me that it is a pretty common OCD behaviour in the vein of Trichotillomania, and therefore therapies used to treat manifestations of OCD are often suggested.  The first step is identifying WHY and WHEN.  Answer: see above (though this is boiling it down to the very basics).  The second step is to learn alternate coping strategies including "instruction in competing motor responses that actually prevent you from picking - for example, keeping your hands busy by holding and squeezing a rubber ball whenever you feel the urge to pick at your skin."  A supportive/sympathetic friend recently gave me a large packet of information from the OCD center of LA to read over, which I will begin to tackle tonight.

As for the flossing, I have already been making a concerted effort to floss every day.  Over the holiday break I missed a couple days, but I've been really trying.  I think it will be easier for me to pick up this new good habit than to stop the bad one.  We'll see how it all goes.

If anyone has any suggestions, stories, or words of wisdom in this department, please comment below - I could really use the encouragement!

Also, what are your resolutions for 2012?  I've seen this list popping up on the interwebs if you need some inspiration...