What does the habit of picking your nose mean? And how to get rid of it?

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Inserting a finger or other object into the nasal cavity to remove dried mucus, or picking the nose, can occur in children and adults. For many, this is a way to distract themselves and get rid of stress. This not only looks unsightly, but also allows infections to enter the mucous membrane, causing wounds and damage to the nasal cavity. To avoid such consequences, it is important to rid your child of this bad habit.

Causes

The main reason for nose picking is improper hygiene of the mucous membrane.

Nose picking appears as a medical symptom. It all starts with common colds. Any virus initially attacks the upper respiratory tract. The body’s natural reaction is to put up a defense against the virus. This protection is mucus, which clogs the airways. This actively develops the need to pick your nose.

In its natural state, this mucus should be liquid. Once it starts to dry out, it turns into hard or thick clumps. Mucus irritates sensitive receptors. The result is some discomfort. The child will want to get rid of dried lumps. In this sense, picking is a normal baby’s reaction to stimuli.

The habit of nose picking usually develops in young children. The reason for this is curiosity.

In many cases, picking is accompanied by depression, stress and nervous breakdowns. Trying to overcome fear or anxiety, a person remembers his bad habit and again finds himself doing a very unpleasant activity.

How to wean children from a bad habit?

First of all, you should get rid of the lumps of mucus located in the sinuses. The reason for their formation may be a prolonged runny nose, which requires treatment (rinsing and using drops). The mucous membrane dries out even if the apartment is very hot and the humidity is low. In order to eliminate this cause, you need to ventilate the room more often, turn on humidifiers and maintain the air temperature at 18-22 degrees.

Just in case, you should check whether something much more serious than snot (a small toy or button) has “settled” in your nose. In this case, you need to urgently consult a doctor. There is no point in scolding your child for unwanted behavior. It is best not to draw close attention to this process.

Trim your child's nails. If they have short hair, then picking their nose is inconvenient. In addition, the child’s hands should be occupied with something interesting (crafts, needlework, etc.). Then the nose will be left alone. Often hands reach out to him simply out of boredom.

Stages of rhinotillexomania

There are a number of stages when picking goes from the stage of ordinary mucus removal to the stage of rhinotillexomania in adults.

The following stages of the occurrence of rhinotillexomania are distinguished:

1. At the initial stages, the child just wants to clean his nose. So he starts picking his nose and pulling out dried lumps of mucus. There is nothing wrong at this stage yet and the process of picking your nose is normal and harmless.
2. Habit formation. Spending a long time doing this activity may indicate a psychological disorder. Improper care of the mucous membrane encourages you to poke around even more. Children get used to it faster than adults. In two weeks, picking will become a habit for them.
3. Worsening. The worsening of the habit occurs due to the incorrect reaction of adults to this action. Adults begin to scold the child. Or laugh at him and shame him with him.

Wrong actions of adults and hyperactivity of children will lead to undesirable consequences. And the usual need to clean your nose can turn into a psychological addiction.

Worsening bad habit

You can, without knowing it, worsen an unpleasant habit. Any strong emotional reaction will lead to undesirable consequences.

Here are examples of some of these reactions:

1. Screaming, coating fingers with something bitter, beatings. Parents do this instead of just going and washing their child’s nose. Such a sharp negative reaction will make him afraid of mom and dad. It will leave negative memories in your memory and become a childhood trauma. In the future, picking your nose will be one of the ways to quickly and easily overcome stress.
2. Joke and laughter. For a child, this will mean permission to take action that caused laughter. He will also want to repeat the situation that caused laughter, and will put his finger into the mucous membrane on purpose. To re-ignite emotions of approval or laughter in adults.
3. Manipulation of shame and humiliation. It is easy to evoke negative emotions such as shame and resentment in anyone. It is enough to point out his shortcomings or get personal. The child may no longer pick at the mucous membrane with his finger, but he can remember the feeling of shame for the rest of his life. Better teach to defend your dignity and accept your shortcomings as they are. Help your children admit what they are doing wrong. Let them realize this. Then it will be easier to deal with your own negative reaction and the child’s habit.

Any bad behavior is corrected with the usual word “no”. Another option is to calmly discuss the misbehavior with your child. Just explain to him that picking will not end well and only indicates the child’s bad manners. Other reactions, such as screaming or physical punishment, can make him nervous and worried.

Prevention

In order to prevent the appearance of sores in the nose that do not heal for a long time, it is necessary to normalize the immune system. Maintain a balance between work and rest, adhere to a healthy lifestyle, supplement your diet with a vitamin-mineral complex in tablets or capsules, and take immune medications during the epidemic season.

Do not touch your face with dirty hands. When in contact with people with herpes, try to avoid shaking hands. When a runny nose begins, rinse the nostrils with antiseptic solutions. When the mucous membrane dries out, lubricate it with special oil products.

Vasomotor rhinitis and sores that do not heal for a long time are a sufficient reason to consult a doctor. Increased production of nasal secretions disrupts the acid-base balance of the nasal cavity, and ulcerative defects can be symptoms of specific diseases that require special treatment.

Correction methods

This habit is antisocial. It will be difficult for such a child to adapt to society or get rid of ridicule.

Get rid of a bad habit using the following methods:

Nose picking – when does the problem become urgent?

To appreciate the versatility and complexity of diagnosis, it is enough to imagine a toddler sucking a finger or picking his nose. Such a picture does not cause condemnation, except perhaps a smile. Another thing is an adult. A young man’s finger working in the nasal cavity causes a storm of negative emotions in many: condemnation, indignation and even disgust. The negative is not only the external unattractiveness, but also the danger to the vessels located in the nasal cavity.

Cleaning your nose too often and vigorously with your finger can simply disrupt the integrity of the blood vessels, causing nosebleeds. This suggests the conclusion that nose picking is regarded as a bad habit if it is repeated too often and becomes obsessive.

Help from a psychologist and self-medication

When it comes to an adult, correction is only possible as a result of the person’s recognition of this behavioral feature. Nose picking in an adult can occur unconsciously. In the mild stage, an ordinary person can correct his behavior by increasing awareness and analyzing his behavior.

Self-correction consists of the following elements:

1. Keep your nose clean. Make it a rule to clean it only in designated areas.
2. Observe your emotions that arise during this action. They can be associated with negativity, guilt, lack of attention and love. This may be accompanied by boredom or overthinking, restlessness and anxiety. Remorse may be tormenting. Only after establishing the cause can you work with the habit further.
3. Correction of negative factors, strengthening of positive ones. You can get rid of negative factors in two ways. You can remove them from your life: change your environment, place of work and residence, you can change your attitude towards them. And you can take your relationships with others to a new level.
4. Keep your hands busy with something. Rosary beads, sewing, mobile phone - in this case, anything will do. You can wear gloves. It will be difficult to pick with gloves. And also a great solution is to go in for sports. Not only will it help to distract you, but it will also benefit the person who suffers from this problem.

When this reaches a painful stage and a person can no longer cope with this problem on his own, the help of a psychologist is needed. To rid a person who picks of a bad habit, group or cognitive behavioral therapy, hypnosis, neurolinguistic programming (NLP) and other more serious methods of psychocorrection may be needed.

Why do people pick their noses?

The habit of picking one's nose originates in childhood, when at about two years old the child begins to enthusiastically explore his "depths." For a child, this is one of the forms of knowledge of his own body, which gradually fades away as he grows up.

In older children, nose picking can often be a sign of increased anxiety, stress, and emotional tension. In such cases, it is necessary to visit a child psychologist or neurologist, because ordinary tugging and remarks will not help rid the child of this habit. In rare cases, nose picking may indicate serious complications of a neurological or psychological nature, as well as certain genetic diseases.

Thus, nose picking can be:

1. Physiological need. This is a desire to get rid of discomfort caused by the presence of foreign particles in the nasal cavity: lumps of mucus, small debris and dust that settle on the nasal mucosa during breathing (so-called boogers). Usually, such “picking” is not intrusive, and as soon as the nasal cavity is cleared, the person no longer feels the desire to put his fingers there again;
2. Psychological dependence. Here everything is more complicated than in the first case: a person picks his nose not because of the desire to clean it, but because of an irresistible desire. In the most severe cases, psychologists talk about rhinotillexomania. This is the name for painful aggressive picking of the nose until bleeding or other damage to the cavity. However, very few people who like to pick their nose cross this line: most often this process remains nothing more than an unaesthetic habit;
3. A symptom of a genetic disease or psychiatric disorder. In such cases, treatment tailored specifically to the individual patient is necessary. To be fair, it is worth noting that picking the nose in such patients is usually the least of the problems.

In cases where nose picking is an annoying habit that is not associated with genetic or psychiatric disorders, it is quite possible to cope with it on your own.

If you want to give up a bad habit, you first need to admit to yourself that you have it and you want to get rid of it. Then analyze what makes you constantly pick your nose. Perhaps you simply have nothing to do with your hands, or this process calms you down. Or maybe you recently suffered from a disease that caused itching and irritation of the nasal mucosa or increased mucus production? If the last assumption turns out to be correct, you first need to visit a specialist who will help you select appropriate medications and give recommendations, otherwise it will be very difficult to get rid of the urge to pick your nose.

What else should you pay attention to?

1. The space where you live and work. Dry air, especially during the heating season, dries out the mucous membranes of the nasal cavity. As a result, a person experiences itching and irritation, which, as a result, causes the desire to pick his nose. Therefore, try to ventilate the room more often and humidify the air in it, which can be done either with the help or simply by placing containers of water. These do not have to be bulky basins or unaesthetic jars: water can be poured into original vases or decorative aquariums.
2. In cases where ventilation and humidification of the air do not help to avoid dry nose, you can irrigate the nasal cavity with special moisturizing sprays based on sea water.
3. Clean your nasal cavities properly. This should be done in the mornings and evenings, rinsing them with warm water. For greater effect, you can add a little salt to the water: this will not only clean your nose more thoroughly, but will also relieve swelling, strengthen capillaries, and improve blood circulation.
4. Control yourself. Whenever you realize that your finger is in your nose, immediately remove it from there. Don't let the habit turn into a reflex, otherwise very soon you will start picking your nose in public.
5. Keep your nails short. This will significantly complicate the process of removing mucus and other formations from the nose.
6. Keep your fingers busy with something that will calm your nerves and distract you from a bad habit. Activities such as handicrafts (sewing, knitting, embroidery), music, carving, etc. will perfectly cope with this.

Nose picking is strongly associated primarily with children. However, unfortunately, there are many adults who are susceptible to this habit. It is possible to wean yourself from this activity, but it will require some self-control and effort, just like getting rid of any other addiction.