I am pretty obsessed with my meditation app Headspace. For the longest time, I was one of those people who would hear a person talk about setting aside 20 minutes (or a half-hour or whatever) to meditate and think to myself, "Gee, that sounds nice. I could never sit still for that long because within 5 seconds, I'd start pulling out my hair."
I remember going to a Trichotillomania Support Group meeting in Austin about 3 years ago. A woman there talked about how much meditating had helped her, but she was also a little ambivalent. It took me about another year and a half before I actually downloaded Headspace and tried meditating, and that was only because I was hospitalized and knew I needed something to calm my nerves (or else I'd spend the whole time in the hospital pulling out my hair).
From there, I meditated regularly for about a month, and then I dropped off for a few months. Then I read Charles Duhigg's book The Power of Habit and decided to meditate every day upon waking. I kept that up for well over a year, but I dropped off again this summer and am getting back into it while I'm in Spain.
The biggest change I noticed towards the end of that year was that I could actually sit still without pulling my hair or even needing to fidget. To most people, that might not seem like a big deal, but for a trichster, it's huge. Some days it's better, some days it's worse, but meditation helps me ensure that the bad days are fewer and further between.
However, as much as meditation has helped (and trust me, it's helped me a lot), it isn't a cure for a BFRB. It's just one part of the process of self-care and one step in the long road to recovery.
I remember going to a Trichotillomania Support Group meeting in Austin about 3 years ago. A woman there talked about how much meditating had helped her, but she was also a little ambivalent. It took me about another year and a half before I actually downloaded Headspace and tried meditating, and that was only because I was hospitalized and knew I needed something to calm my nerves (or else I'd spend the whole time in the hospital pulling out my hair).
From there, I meditated regularly for about a month, and then I dropped off for a few months. Then I read Charles Duhigg's book The Power of Habit and decided to meditate every day upon waking. I kept that up for well over a year, but I dropped off again this summer and am getting back into it while I'm in Spain.
The biggest change I noticed towards the end of that year was that I could actually sit still without pulling my hair or even needing to fidget. To most people, that might not seem like a big deal, but for a trichster, it's huge. Some days it's better, some days it's worse, but meditation helps me ensure that the bad days are fewer and further between.
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