A general word about a bad habit of mine ...

I've tried to wear hoods and hats to stop it. When I'm watching TV, I'll regularly sit on my hand so as to not do it. Yet for all my efforts, I can't fight the compulsion ...
I can't stop pulling out my own hair.
That's the hair on my head, mind you. It's an unconscious nervous tick I have, not an inclination toward Brazilian wax.
It was a habit I picked up in middle school. I grew my hair long, got nervous, and over the course of several weeks, progressively yanked fistfuls of it out.

My parents were upset. They recommended a buzz cut to fix the situation. No hair, no pull, right?
Well ... yeah. A novel thought. Unfortunately, that didn't solve the problem of the newly-christened bald spot on my noggin. Let's just say it was a tough couple of days for me at the middle school.

You'd think the "bald-spot incident" (BSI) of 1998 (never forget) would have taught me a lesson: Stop yanking out your hair or face social isolation.
But, no. I've been pulling it on and off since then. And the social isolation ... well, there's like 5 million other reasons for that ...

Apparently, there's a really fancy-pants named for the "disorder" -- "Trichotillomaina."
And while I can't object to the first part of that word, since my Greek is ... well, terrible ... I do take issue with the "mania" part.
I mean just because I have a impulse control disorder bad habit, doesn't mean I'm "nuts," right?

I equate mania with white walls and pills in little Dixie cups, not the perpetual cowlick and occasional bald spot that have been the only lasting effects of this habit. And I like my cowlick, thank you very much ...

Anyway, that's a general word about a neurotic habit I've been unsuccessfully trying to combat for years.

What about you Internets? Any bad habits you've been fighting off? Why not share them below.

In the meantime, I'll just sit here yanking out more hair ... settling into, you know, a deeper and deeper state of mania.