Biting My Nails as a Child -

How to Help Children Stop Biting Their Nails

As a child, biting my nails was a huge issue for me. My parents never seemed too worried about the behavior, even when I would gnaw them down to the point they bled. Later as an adult I was finally able to search out a remedy, but I never stopped completely biting my nails until I was able to realize what was leading to the biting in the first place.

In my case and I believe in the case of many other child nail-biters, the issues was emotional. My nail biting started around the time my parents were getting a divorce, when they would spend hours at a time screaming at one another from their bedroom or the kitchen. This provoked a lot of emotional anxiety and tension in the house which for me resulted in a nervous habit of biting my nails.

With time, the behavior set in and I would gnaw on my nails at school when I was bored or any time I felt the slightest big upset or nervous. I was essentially self-soothing with nail biting. It gave my mind something to focus on besides whatever was making me feel uncomfortable, nervous, or stressed out.

As an adult I was finally able to redirect my self-soothing into healthier behaviors, but that is not always easy for a child to do. If you are dealing with a child who bites their nails, don’t ignore the behavior as my parents did. Maybe they are experiencing some emotional problems or suffering from anxiety, or maybe it is just a learned habit that they are having difficulty shaking. Either way, you need to help them redirect into a healthier behavior while they are still young.

For starters, keep the lines of communication open with the child. If an upsetting event has taken place in their life then that may be the likely reason they are biting their nails. They may need someone safe to talk about their feelings with or they may need a safe zone to relief anxiety and grief. This may not stop the nail biting over night, but it will help relieve the stress and anxiety that leads to the biting, which will definitely help ease the behavior.

You may also need to cover the child’s fingernails with something that will remind them not to bite their nails. You may not want to go with something that tastes horrible, but you can definitely go with stickers or band-aids that are brightly colored. Children will find this a fun way to remember not to put their fingers in their mouth. Even small children may be able to understand what those brightly colored cover-ups mean for them.

You can also turn not biting the nails into a fun game. Set up a chart and tell your child that for every day they are not caught biting their nails they get a sticker. A solid week of stickers could equal out to a small prize that they really want to achieve. This will give them incentive to consciously focus on not biting their nails.

Finally, make sure to explain to your child why nail biting is not good. When I was biting my nails as a child I never realized there was anything wrong with it. That was until I became a teenager and was embarrassed for anyone to see my hands.