Healing Dermatillomania with Yoga and IFS: My Honest Journey

Emma's skin transformation over the months through before and after.

✍️ Final Chapter of the Series:

After *exploring my relationship with the body, time, breath, aging, and core values, I wanted to end with a deeply personal topic — one that ties together almost every theme we’ve covered

Because yoga hasn’t just helped me find physical balance or a professional direction.

It also allowed me to reconnect with parts of myself I’d been running from for years (and no, I promise I’m not schizophrenic…)

This article — difficult to write, yet incredibly liberating — is about emotional regulation, inner voices, invisible self-harm, and a little-known compulsion: dermatillomania — the urge to pick at your skin, often unconsciously, sometimes until it bleeds.

🧘‍♀️ Unsurprisingly, yoga once again gave me a space to feel without reacting, to welcome my emotions without judgment.

🧩 But it was IFS (Internal Family Systems), a powerful therapeutic approach, that allowed me to put names and faces to my inner tensions.

My journey with IFS is just beginning, and I’ll likely dive deeper into it in future articles once I’ve made more progress.

But here, I wanted to lay the groundwork. To share this first moment of internal encounter. Because… honestly, it was deeply powerful. In just a few sessions, I went further than I had through years of other therapies…

🌹 Feeling… without reacting

For a long time, I thought I was just too sensitive.

People had told me so since childhood: “You cry over nothing.”

And it was true — at least through the eyes of adults.

I felt everything, intensely. Too much, maybe, for others.

At school, a simple remark from the teacher could trigger uncontrollable tears.

In middle school, forgetting the keys to my bike lock sent me into full-blown panic.

Every emotion ran through me unfiltered. My body reacted as if everything were an emergency.

At the same time, I moved a lot as a child.

Each time we arrived in a new town, I had to start all over again: observe, adapt, blend in.

So I built a quiet but remarkably effective armor:

👉 the smile.

Smiling at everything. Everyone. Even when I was scared. Even when I was angry. Even when I was humiliated.

People started calling me “The Joker,” sometimes even “The Thing”… because eventually, my smile puzzled them. It became almost disturbing.

So I hated myself for it — for that smile, for not having a comeback, for not knowing how to “be myself” anymore.

The worst part is, behind that mask, the reality was very different.

At home, my loved ones received all the emotional overflow I kept in elsewhere.

I turned into this volcanic, unmanageable, hypersensitive Emma.

😈 “This is my real face!” she might have screamed, if only she could.

But emotions never disappear. So eventually, they found another way out.

👁‍🗨️ Dermatillomania: when the body becomes the outlet

One day, I had a small pimple on the top of my forehead. I popped it.

It turned into a scab. I scratched it. It bled. Then I scratched it again. It never healed.

And without realizing it, it became a ritual.

Gradually, the picking spread. I started scratching my face, then my arms, then my scalp. Sometimes to the point of bleeding.

And more and more on visible, troubling areas...

I hid behind the excuse that I had acne. That I was just “cleaning up.”

But deep down, I knew: it wasn’t really a skin issue...

It was a compulsion. An automatic gesture.

An invisible outlet. A form of self-harm… daily.

It literally ruined my life.

I remember once, I was supposed to go to a laser tag party.

I almost canceled.

My forehead was bleeding. I had completely stripped my skin and was trying my best to cover it up with layers of foundation that didn’t work. It was too raw. You could see the damage underneath...

I was ashamed. I went anyway… avoiding eye contact all evening and feeling deeply uncomfortable.

I remember constantly keeping my distance.

I would step back from people so they wouldn’t see the details of my skin.

Or I’d look down, hoping to go unnoticed.

When MSN, then Skype, then Snapchat came into my life — it was a nightmare.

I hated seeing my face on screen. Even with filters. I couldn’t bear to look at myself.

I tried everything and came up with more and more elaborate strategies: makeup, skincare routines, scarves to hide my chin, even cutting bangs to cover my forehead…

And of course: tons of “miracle creams” I knew by heart and felt embarrassed to buy at the pharmacy — knowing the pharmacists might judge me.

But none of it worked.

Because it was never about the skin.

It was an unconscious but powerful emotional regulation strategy.

Like a smoker saying, “Just one cigarette.”

Except here, once your fingers touch your skin… you find micro-imperfections. You pick. And you can’t stop.

Later, I came across the website SkinPick.com, which I highly recommend to anyone struggling with this disorder.

It offers evidence-based resources, online programs, and a supportive community for people living with dermatillomania (also known as Excoriation Disorder).

That’s how I discovered I wasn’t alone.

That this condition had a name: dermatillomania.

But… despite all that, I was turning 29 and still had “teenage skin”...

I was in distress… unable to find a long-term solution...

🧩 A late discovery: IFS

For a long time, I tried to understand what was wrong.

I explored different approaches: cognitive therapy, hypnosis, values-based work… Each gave me insights and brief relief — but none seemed to reach the heart of the issue.

Until I discovered an inner approach that deeply resonated with me: IFS — Internal Family Systems.

This model is based on a simple yet powerful idea: we are not just one single voice or identity, but rather an inner system made up of different “parts” — protective, wounded, reactive… that sometimes live in harmony, and sometimes don’t.

It was during a festival in Croatia (yes, that festival again… it keeps coming up! 😄) that a facilitator (Ilove her) introduced me to IFS during a beginner’s workshop.

She presented it as “a form of therapy that supports her every day — one she could never live without.”

I was intrigued. I placed a lot of hope in it.

But… during the actual workshop, I didn’t feel much.

Still, in the weeks that followed, something began to take root in me.

A curiosity. A desire to dig deeper…

👁‍🗨️ A first, life-changing encounter

After coming back from the festival, I truly began diving into the power of breath, Kundalini, and the idea of creating a daily discipline to shift my habits.

I talk more about that in this article.

Then one day, I missed my usual morning meditation.

I postponed it to the evening… and just before sitting down to practice, a violent episode of dermatillomania erupted.

Within minutes, my face was red, swollen, inflamed.

And all I could think about was the promise I’d made to my partner — who was away — that I’d see him “with perfect skin.”

I felt I had hit a breaking point.

Something needed to change. I couldn’t go on like this.

Especially since I had started meditating specifically to deal with this.

I had been consistent for almost 30 days — and while I had noticed many benefits, when it came to dermatillomania, nothing had changed. No improvement. Still the same irresistible urge.

So that evening, I set a clear intention for my session: to reconnect with a part of myself… the one that had once broken free from a deeply ingrained habit.

I was seven years old. My best friend had invited me to a sleepover.

The thing is, I still sucked my thumb… and slept with a stuffed toy.

But I was so afraid of being judged or ridiculed that I trained myself in a week.

Thumb and stuffed toy? Abandoned. For good.

So I told myself: “I’m going to talk to her. She must know how to do it.”

When I found her, she told me calmly:

“What worked for me back then won’t work for you today. Because what others think of you doesn’t impact you the same way anymore.”

And she was right.

Today, I can go out with a swollen face.

I know the looks. I know my tricks (foundation, concealer…). And I go out anyway.

It doesn’t stop me anymore.

So I called on other parts…

The ones who know things. Who manage. Who want to “do well.”

But none of them had an answer.

I almost gave up the session.

And then I stayed with it. Until an inner face appeared.

Or rather: a presence. A silhouette. An energy.

Curled up. Trembling. Crying.

She didn’t say a word. But I knew who she was.

She was Emotional Emma.

The part I had buried long ago… because she made too much noise, took up too much space, disturbed too much.

The one who, as a child, cried whenever she was scolded, panicked for no reason, felt everything too deeply.

She looked at me. And she said:

“It hurts so much… it’s unbearable.You forgot me.You pushed me down.You didn’t want me to exist anymore. And every time you hurt your skin, you hurt me directly.”

And then, everything clicked.

It wasn’t that I didn’t know how to manage emotions. It was that I had erased them completely.

I had silenced them…

And they had come back through my skin.

Dermatillomania wasn’t a coincidence.

It was a form of interrupted dialogue with myself.

I started talking to her.

Not in my head — out loud. Like in a movie. Like Gollum and Sméagol in The Lord of the Rings (yep… you’d have thought I’d lost it…).

There was the rational voice, soft but clear, the one who listens. And then the trembling, emotional, shy voice — long silenced.

I told her:

“I’m so sorry. I forgot you. I left you alone. And every time I picked my skin, I was hurting you. I don’t want to anymore.”

And I felt something shift.

This wasn’t one of those decisions you jot down in a journal or stick to your fridge.

It was a sacred promise.

A promise made to that wounded part of me.

Not to “fix” her. Not to silence her. But to give her back her place. Her voice. Her right to exist.

🧶 Pulling the next thread

A few weeks later, I shared this experience with my therapist, Claire.

She suggested we go deeper. To anchor that connection with Emotional Emma. And, if possible, to explore another energy that had been hovering over me for years — the voice of the Judge, the one I used to mistake for my conscience.

Even before the session started, she took over completely.

She criticized everything: the setting, the idea of closing my eyes, my posture, the method itself. She said it was weird, that Claire would judge me, that it was pointless.

But I held my ground.

I came back to my breath. Let that voice spin in the background without trying to shut it down. And slowly, silence settled in.

That’s when Emotional Emma reappeared.

She was doing better. She looked radiant.

And she shared a memory with me.

One I already knew — but had never truly allowed myself to feel:

“Your mother told us: ‘If you keep eating like that, you’re going to blow up, fatty.’”

That sentence broke her.

It was brutal, humiliating. And from that moment on, she felt rejected, ashamed. She began to withdraw. To go silent.

She explained that ever since then, she’s been bursting out — sometimes in tears, sometimes in panic. And often… through the skin.

Dermatillomania had become her only way to exist.

🫀 The unexpected face of protection

At Emotional Emma's invitation, I agreed to meet the other part.

The one who orders me around, controls me, pushes me to always do more, do better, go faster, be perfect. The one who says “you must,” “you have to,” “no failure allowed,” “no rest.”

I saw her.

She stood upright like a soldier. Straight, rigid. Almost frozen.

I nicknamed her: Emma the Judge.

When I tried cracking a joke to loosen things up, Claire gently stopped me. She said: “Do you hear that? That’s another part speaking. Maybe a sarcastic part, another layer of defense.”

So I came back to my breath.

And I spoke to her.

I asked her why she was there.

She replied: “To protect you. I’m afraid that without me, you’ll lose control. That you’ll mess up your life. That you’ll end up alone. That no one will love you anymore.”

I then asked:

“But… where does that fear come from?”

And she answered:

“From that sentence. The one about your weight. I believed that if you didn’t become what she wanted, you wouldn’t be loved anymore.”

💡 An Unexpected Revelation

At that moment, Emotional Emma sat up straight.

She said, shaken:

“Wait… does that mean she’s my friend? Not my enemy?”

And just like that, everything shifted.

Judge Emma wasn’t a tyrant.

She was an overwhelmed protector, born from a moment of distress. She had shaped herself to help me fit in, to never feel that rejection again.

But she had taken on the wrong role.

She thought she had to direct me, control me, scare me… to keep me safe from shame.

When in fact, she too just needed to be heard.

🌿 The Interdependence of Yoga and IFS

Today, I know that yoga played a huge role in making these insights possible.

It taught me how to come back to the body, to ground myself when everything feels shaky, to stop reacting impulsively in the heat of the moment — and instead, to breathe. Just breathe. And often, that’s enough to shift the whole dynamic.

When conflict arises, frustration creeps in, or a part of me wants to scream, run, or judge… I close my eyes. I reconnect with my breath. And I choose presence over reactivity.

That doesn’t mean I have it all figured out. But I no longer feel hijacked by my inner impulses. I can give them space — without letting them take up all the space.

In that way, yoga helps me harmonize my parts. Not reject them. Not control them. But listen to them. Welcome them. Love them, simply.

And I find that same capacity to listen again in my IFS sessions.

Today, when I lie down to meditate or connect with a wounded part, I can reach that subtle state much more easily — that attentive calm where the mind softens, and the truth quietly surfaces.

Because now I know the keys.

Because my inner space feels more stable.

✨ A final note… or a true beginning.

This is probably the most intimate and difficult piece I’ve written so far.

And no: this journey isn’t over. It’s only just beginning.

I can feel that the gradual fading of dermatillomania, that long-standing compulsive gesture, is becoming the first stone of a much broader path.

A door slightly ajar onto a journey of reconciliation — with my body, my emotions, and the most vulnerable parts of myself. A journey toward freedom. Toward self-love.

And I’m excited to see what comes next.🧡

Thank you for reading this far. Thank you for holding my parts’ hands along the way.

I’ll share more resources on IFS as I continue my therapy.

Until then, take care of yourself. Of your breath. And of your body.

With gentleness,

Emma 🪷