I'm a very orally fixated person. It's led me into several bad habits over the years (chewing on my sleeves, blankets, my nails, smoking), and the only thing I've found that works for breaking me of those habits is gum chewing.
I'm just curious if you guys have anything in particular you turn to when you're trying to kill a habit. I'm currently killing nail biting, and going through around 5 packages of gum every 10 days. >_>
Really? O_O I chewed gum for like 7 months but I never got rid of finger nail biting.
I'd suggest something but it would be inappropriate 
| Akito wrote: |
| Really? O_O I chewed gum for like 7 months but I never got rid of finger nail biting. |
I just chew gum any time I feel like chewing my nails, with painted nails at the start to remind me of what I'm doing. :)I have the same problem with nail biting and still getting over using chew in high school and college (country boy, I have an excuse). Chewing sunflower seeds helps but I don't think this habit will ever be totally broken.
man, that's better than me. I chew gum and it doesnt stop me from biting my nails AND my packs last a day if I'm lucky 
Just count yourself you're not a smoker! They have THE hardest time with oral fixation, obviously, and it's a much harder addiction to break than nail-biting. I bite my cuticles, but that's mostly because I MUST figit....whether with hands, feet, hair, doesn't matter. I change position every 5 seconds, I swear 
. | Aless wrote: |
| Just count yourself you're not a smoker! They have THE hardest time with oral fixation, obviously, and it's a much harder addiction to break than nail-biting. I bite my cuticles, but that's mostly because I MUST figit....whether with hands, feet, hair, doesn't matter. I change position every 5 seconds, I swear :-P. |
I was a smoker, actually. >_> Only for around 2 years, and have now quit.
I stopped biting my nails way before I stopped biting my cuticles.. that's only happened in the last few weeks. XDI play with my jewelry all the time >...< it's really not good, I had a bracelet taken away from me when I was in elementary school >.>;;
| KronikSindrome wrote: |
| I'd suggest something but it would be inappropriate |
YIKES!!!!heh...for realz tho....I might be a stupid smoker and dirty deek suka -
BUT - my nails are gorgeous. 
Substitute a bad addiction for a less bad addiction, but then if that doesn't work out you have the same addiction with another addiction!
Its Mind over matter, so if you don't mind it don't matter.
| KronikSindrome wrote: |
heh...for realz tho....I might be a stupid smoker and dirty deek suka -
BUT - my nails are gorgeous. |
Well...At least someone around here can get me at a loss for words. | zanzou wrote: |
| I'm a very orally fixated person. It's led me into several bad habits over the years (chewing on my sleeves, blankets, my nails, smoking), and the only thing I've found that works for breaking me of those habits is gum chewing. |
I don't think trading one habbit for another counts as breaking it. At best, your merging several into one. Stopping a habit entirely - without replacement - is one of the more difficult things in life (right after taxes, actually). 
| Nameless wrote: |
| I don't think trading one habbit for another counts as breaking it. At best, your merging several into one. Stopping a habit entirely - without replacement - is one of the more difficult things in life (right after taxes, actually). :? |
I don't think so. I'm not in the habit of chewing gum-- it's just something I do when I have the urge to do something else. I'm just changing how I'm expressing an oral fixation, which is something that is NOT going to change. >_>;I used to bite my nails, ALOT. I killed my habit my applying this solution to my nails. It makes your nails taste horrible...when you put them in your mouth it tastes ew, so you know not to put your hands in your mouth again.
Take up a hobby which uses a repetitive, therapeutic motion (like knitting). When I used to knit, it stopped me from snacking constantly ('just for the sake of it'), and kept my hands occupied.
For chewing, that bitter nail-polish styff works very well for me. I don't bite my nails but I'm terrible about chewing my cuticles and knuckles.
I have the bad habit of trying to find something to do, so that I don't go to sleep in time, this results in me going to bed very late during school days. How do you break a habit like that???
I used to bite my nails a lot, luckily for me, atleast before.. my ex used to slap my hand whenever she caught me doing it. Broke the habit after that.
| carlospro7 wrote: |
| I have the bad habit of trying to find something to do, so that I don't go to sleep in time, this results in me going to bed very late during school days. How do you break a habit like that??? |
I wouldn't say that's a habit necessarily. You probably just aren't tired so you don't try to sleep?
When that happened to me I just got up very early and wouldn't let myself nap, so I was forced to adjust my schedule. | zanzou wrote: |
| Nameless wrote: | | I don't think trading one habbit for another counts as breaking it. At best, your merging several into one. Stopping a habit entirely - without replacement - is one of the more difficult things in life (right after taxes, actually). |
I don't think so. I'm not in the habit of chewing gum-- it's just something I do when I have the urge to do something else. |
That's ... kind of ... what a habit is. | Nameless wrote: |
That's ... kind of ... what a habit is. |
It really isn't.
"A recurrent, often unconscious pattern of behavior that is acquired through frequent repetition." (Answers.com, probably also on wiki.)
Me chewing gum could be compared to a smoker going out for a run any time they have the urge to smoke. You aren't in the HABIT of running-- you're running to escape the habit of smoking.
I don't have any sort of random compulsion to chew gum, unlike I did with chewing my nails.Im a smoker myself and it really sucks, i wish that i would have never picked up the damn habbit in the first place. I have yet to find anything that works for me... i have tried the whole gum approach which usually resulted in me having a cigarette while chewing some juicy fruit 
Nothing seems to work for me not even those damn patches.. | zanzou wrote: |
| Nameless wrote: |
That's ... kind of ... what a habit is. |
It really isn't.
"A recurrent, often unconscious pattern of behavior that is acquired through frequent repetition." (Answers.com, probably also on wiki.)
Me chewing gum could be compared to a smoker going out for a run any time they have the urge to smoke. You aren't in the HABIT of running-- you're running to escape the habit of smoking.
I don't have any sort of random compulsion to chew gum, unlike I did with chewing my nails. |
Now hold on. It's clearly recurrent, a pattern of behavior, and you're repeating it (frequently, apparently). You're meeting all the requirements.
And if your chewing of gum is defined by avoiding a compulsion, then it is indirectly compulsive too. At best you could claim to only have an indirect habit of chewing gum, but I'm not sure that even counts as specifically definable separate thing.
(... Now I'm feeling a bit like this. 
) | Nameless wrote: |
Now hold on. It's clearly recurrent, a pattern of behavior, and you're repeating it (frequently, apparently). You're meeting all the requirements.
And if your chewing of gum is defined by avoiding a compulsion, then it is indirectly compulsive too. At best you could claim to only have an indirect habit of chewing gum, but I'm not sure that even counts as specifically definable separate thing.
|
I still say it isn't a pattern of behaviour, especially because since I've actually BROKEN the habit of biting my nails, the amount I chew gum has gone down drastically. I'm not at about the same rate I would be at if I just had gum on hand.
Gum chewing CAN be a habit-- but it really isn't in my case. If I threw out all the gum I have (I bought a five pack, so it would be quite a bit), I wouldn't have the urge to go out and get more.
>____> I'm quite sure there is no such thing as an INDIRECT habit. It's either a habit you have, or you don't. If I was in the habit of chewing on pencils, and I had a rubber band to snap myself with every time I did it, I wouldn't have a habit of snapping myself with a rubber band. I would be purposefully doing something OTHER than my habit, in over to break it.
