The Gourmet Nail Biter

Ever since I was a child, I have bitten my nails. This seemed to be
an obsessive exercise for me, one that took place almost every hour of
every day. I remember trying to discover new areas of my finger nails
which would provide fresh fuel for my teeth to grind against. My finger
tips would be so sore; it wouldn't be an unusual occurrence to see
fresh blood seeping from around the nail edge; or to see dried blood
patches forming a pattern at the end of my fingers.

It wasn't just the nails that my teeth enjoyed, but also pieces of skin
torn from underneath the front white edge of the nails, or from around
the pink cuticle area. This usually accounted for most of the blood and
most of the pain. That was until I took nail biting to the next
level.

Whether it was due to the amount of Normal Nail Biting I was engaged
in, (which consisted of gnawing the edges of my nails to bite off as
much of the nail as possible; sometimes manically, appearing to be some
sort of half-crazed cannibal that hadn't eaten meat for three months
and was suddenly drawn, out of sheer desperation, to devour his own
hand), (and which is also the type of nail biting I observe a lot of
other Nail Biters engaged in), or whether it may have been due to the
enormous amount of layers I could take out of a nail, (which consisted
of gnawing in just the right way at the end of the nail; identifying
with my tongue the many different and available layers of my nail;
lifting the layers of nail - sometimes one piece at a time, sometimes
many pieces, sometimes too many - and pulling on them with my teeth
until they reached the top and came off; bleeding), (and which I wonder
if other people could possibly contemplate doing), I'm not too sure,
but all of a sudden my nails suddenly had holes in. These holes would
grow through my nails, starting at the top, underneath the cuticle and
then move towards the end of my nail.

This was too good an opportunity to miss as far as I was concerned. I
developed a new technique for exploiting these Nail Holes to their full
potential. This involved using teeth that other people would consider a
little excessive, even amongst dedicated Nail Biters. The first
challenge involved getting a firm enough grip underneath the layers of
the nail. Once that was achieved using my tongue and my canines, it was
a matter of pulling on the captured layer until it detached from the
nail. Sometimes this detachment didn't occur and so it was necessary
for me to detach the section of nail swiftly - by cutting through with
my teeth - or endure an increasing level of pain. When the detachment
exercise was finished, I quickly stored the Nail Piece and inspected my
nail. It was usually very sore and bleeding at this point.

However, that wasn't the issue. I had achieved my Nail Piece. If done
correctly, this could be achieved almost every time. I sometimes had
the whole nail off my finger I was that desperate to chew my
nails.

Here we come to the mid-way point.
My parents had never tolerated that I chewed my nails. They said it
looked unsightly and that they looked sore. As I was more or less
disposed to chewing my nails at any time, it would come as no surprise
that I would chew them in the presence of my parents. This meant that
under any circumstances I might interact with my parents, there would
be an interruption to the proceedings because they were telling me to
stop biting my nails. My Dad had this habit of reacting to my habit by
looking at my fingers after he'd seen me biting them. They were
disgusting, I had to admit.

That was the thing, you see. The thing that made me realise I couldn't
do this for much longer and not do something about it. The thing was
the pain and the unsightliness of my finger nails. They really hurt
sometimes. Especially when after taking layers and layers of nail off I
reached the bottom of my nail to see there was nothing left, and then
the flesh underneath would start to expand and expand over the edge of
the nail that was left, cutting itself in the process as it grew larger
and eventually becoming infected. I remember not being able to play
volleyball very well because it kept getting knocked and that really
did hurt. Not only that, but people would keep looking at my nails. I
could see them and sometimes they would grimace. I have to admit, I was
ashamed of them.

My Mum and Dad bought me some nail biting solution from Boots, (which I
thought was very ironic, because otherwise I would have sued Boots for
falsely advertising "Nail Biting Solution"), in the vein effort of
helping me kick my habit, but it didn't work. It smelt like Pear Drops
when you put it on, as it was like a clear nail varnish, (in fact, it
probably was), and when it dried it was supposed to wean you off
because it tasted vile. What did I do? I got used to the taste. After a
while, I didn't even realise it was there. Why bother putting it on? So
I didn't.

I didn't think anything was going to work, until I had an idea. Why
didn't I just admit to myself that I liked chewing my nails, but that I
didn't like the result of what my chewing did to my nails. What would
be the easiest way to resolve this conflict?

Let my nails grow.

It started gradually at first. I would grow about four nails and then
bite them and chew those nails. The quality of these nails was good and
my nails didn't look as bad as before. Over the following months as I
lay off attacking my nails so much and waited for my nails to grow, I
looked forward to the end result, which would be better quality
nails.

It worked.

My two thumbs and one finger suffered a bit during the process of
waiting for the results. Sometimes I attacked them badly. However, they
recovered exceptionally, and are now pretty strong.

All of my nails grow pretty quickly now and the yield pretty good Nail
Pieces. I like chewing my nails; I find it relaxing, grinding them
between my teeth, sorting out the largest and thickest (the best) from
the broken or cracked (the best to start with). I've thought that maybe
sometimes it would recycle nutrients or strengthen my teeth. For
whatever reason I want to come up with and even if there is no reason,
I must chew my nails. Maybe that will change, but that's in the future
and I don't know what will happen then. For now, I must do it, but I do
not do it to the detriment of my finger nails, or my parent's health.
It's done cleanly, because I wash my hands before I cut the nails, and
my hands look healthy.

I do have to wait longer though for the better quality nails. Yet, as
far as I'm concerned that's not a bad thing. I would rather wait for
better quality than just have the quick fix, simply because it doesn't
do so much damage. Anyway, to have too much of a good thing is to make
me less appreciative of it. This way, the anticipation of having good
quality Nail Pieces far outstrips in terms of quality what I do when I
ruin my finger nails. Half of getting anything is the anticipation. The
delicious taste of fantasy that my mind provides me with when I am
looking forward to something. Yet I'm so disappointed when that
something underperforms, underplays, underachieves, or under does what
it was supposed to do, according to how I wanted.

So I modify what it was that I am anticipating.

In this case, I was able to make my Nail Pieces of better quality.