Do you know what is under the bald patches and missing eyelashes and eyebrows that you see?

My students often share that before they found my TrichotillomaniaFree Women’s University online program, they did not have a way to uncover or express their truths.

Through years of counseling, willpower, anti-depressants and anxiety drugs, Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT), hypnotherapy, NLP, EFT, EMDR, special diets, supplements, taping their fingers …through both conventional and alternative treatments, ignoring the problem and even religious or spiritual approaches to stopping trichotillomania, these truths sat silently waiting for the day when my students could finally express their inner experiences.

At last, these are their words…words they were never before able to tell themselves, let alone tell you. [Read the rest of this entry...]

Want to know what goes on in TrichotillomaniaFree Women’s University?  A ton! There’s an amazing curriculum, an honest and engaging continuing dialog about the truth of trich and an incredible worldwide support community completely focused on healing.

There’s no conversation about how to live with trichotillomania for the long-haul. Because for our students that not even an option.

Ever wondered what real support looks like?  Here’s a snippet–only the names have been changed to protect our students’ privacy:

[Read the rest of this entry...]

Trichotillomania: The Inside-Outs of Compulsive Hair Pulling

I recently read this from a practitioner who treats trichotillomania sufferers,

“It is not necessary for you to find or know the cause of your hair pulling.”

Whoa! While this sounds good on the surface, there’s a big problem with it.

Also, if you don’t learn the cause of your pulling, how can you be sure that the problem is solved and you will never pull again? You’ll always be powerless with your trichotillomania and with those whom you rely on to help you stop pulling.

[Read the rest of this entry...]

This coming May, I will have been free of Trichotillomania for 16 years without medication, dietary changes, behavior therapy, hypnosis, supplements of any kind, or any outside intervention. After 27 long and painful years, I found the answers within myself. So can you!

[Read the rest of this entry...]

“The first time that you challenge your addiction, and the second, and the third, you may not feel that anything has been accomplished.  Do you think that authentic power can be had so easily?  As you hold to your intention, and as you choose again and again and again to become whole, you accumulate power, and the addiction that you thought could not be challenged will lose its power over you…”                                                                               –Gary Zukav

Abuse is incredibly contagious.  It is passed from generation to generation.  The experience of abuse creates a deep hole and a lack of belief in the self.  Whether or not you think so, it affects you and me.  Truly, we are all victims and we are all perpetrators because we all respond in our own way to fear and pain, though some of these ways are socially acceptable and others are not.

Abuse is a very personal experience.  Sometimes very sensitive people can experience something as abusive when many others may not consider it so.  So keep in mind that we must remain focused on each person’s personal experience and not necessarily the exact truth of a situation.

What is Abuse?

There is no universally accepted definition of abuse.  I propose that,

The experience of abuse causes a feeling of having been seriously injured at a deep core level regardless of what did or did not occur physically as in sexual abuse, or physical abuse, or verbally, as in verbal or emotional abuse.

As you allow this definition to sink in, remember that a major premise is that it is absolutely possible to heal from this type of core injury.

Relational trauma is when a situation in your child’s life (remembered, or not) caused your child to perceive that her positive relationship with someone she cherished was severed or ripped away against her will, never to return.  Unvalidated relational trauma often goes underground, remains unresolved and turns into a deep wound.

Here are a few of the characteristics of the compulsive hair pulling child’s perspective on the family:

In childhood, we each felt abandoned and on our own without adequate skills or guidance.  We struggled with, now how to thrive, but truly how even to survive.  Our families were chaotic and volatile.  It was difficult to find any sense of peace.  Other family members became angry or upset if we voiced our own needs.  We learned to keep them to ourselves if we recognized a need at all. Hair pulling was a way for us to deal with the chronic anxiety that came from shoving ourselves aside in this way.

Now, more than ever, you may be asking yourself, how is it possible to have any hope at all of ending my child’s hair pulling?  But frankly, hope is just another four-letter word unless it is backed up with a six-letter word, action.  You can have all the hope in the world, but unless, and until, you take action, you and your child will remain exactly right where you are now.

Therefore, I implore you, do not just hope, take action.  You, and only you, are the key to your child’s freedom.