Let's get this blog rolling~!!

When did you become affected by trichotillomania?  Do you recall?  Do you remember your age of onset?  Do you remember how your environment felt to you?  Did you share this information with anyone?  How has it impacted your life?  How IS it impacting your life?  Where/what are your preferred 'pulling areas' of your body?  Do you have preferences of an environment that is most comfortable for you to pull with satisfaction?  Do you have a routine that you follow closely, nearly every time, even every time?

Help me out folks~!  Post please!  Writing is a form of expression that makes (many) people feel very good as it is a form of release.  Trichotillomania is a disorder that tends to keep folks bottled up, shut down from others.  A blog is safe.  You are anonymous~! 

If I can just get 1 person to post, then I can know that I am using this blog correctly.  Frankly, I'm new to blogging.  I am only assuming I am doing it 'correctly'.  So far, no posts, however.  Thus, I am not certain that my information, the blog posts, are coming through, primarily to Twitter, which is where I have been tweeting the post addresses.

Thanks to whomever will just let me know......."You're coming through, loud and clear!"

As ever,
J.T. Bean

Curious.......

Curious here.  How many of you who are pullers grew up or are growing up in what would be called fractious, dysfunctional environments?  Environments that had/have high to very high levels of stress?  Particularly stress that seems to not get resolved?  Perhaps not even noted?

Also?  Would you consider yourself an HSP (Highly Sensitive Person)?  If so, what are your sensitivities, specifically?  Have you read about being an HSP?  If not, that's some good reading.  Reading that I suspect may be highly relevant to trichotillomaniacs.

Food for thought, I hope.

PAHHS (Peace & Health & Happiness & Synchronicity),
J.T. Bean

The Agony. The Ecstasy. Discovery. Recovery.

The Agony; felt during state of 'before'....trying to decide or control 'pulling'.  Also felt 'after'.......the thrill is now done and the damage done must be determined.

The Ecstasy: the clear feeling of relaxation, relief, excitement while 'pulling'.  Felt during the act of pulling.

I've yet to meet a 'puller' who did not experience these two very polar opposite states of being.  Have you?  Even if you've never discussed 'pulling' with another (although you're pretty sure others 'know', it's just the elephant in the livingroom that isn't discussed), it is felt within you.

The 'agony state' tends to have a far greater influence as the 'ecstasy state' is felt only during the actual time one is engaged in the pulling behavior/ritual.  One spends far more time NOT pulling than pulling.  Pulling time is usually rather fleeting, short time span.  So?  Is it safe to state that, although far less time is spent engaged in pulling, feeling the 'ecstasy state', far more time is spent living in the 'agony state' because the results of a 'pulling session' are (dependent upon where one pulls) actually visible to others ?

So?  Based on this, is it any wonder pullers feel usurped with negative feelings and actions?  Shame. Embarrassment. Anxiety of being discovered.  Anxiety that builds in between pulling sessions. Depression.  Poor self image.  Detachment from forming close bonds for fear of being 'discovered'.  Maintaining distance, physically, between one's self and others so to not have others close enough to see the results of a pulling session.  Telling untruths to justify why there are patches of hair missing, eyelashes and eyebrows awry in shape and quantity.

Where are YOU right now?  What state of 'being'?  Agony?  Ecstasy? Discovery? Recovery?