Yesterday the Associated Press ran a press release badly disguised as a health story by Arthur Max promoting one business that has supposedly created a “cure” for nail biting. The Washington Post recognized that the “cure” should be in quotes (as it is in the …
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Well… IF you wear the mouthguard THEN you won’t bite your nails. If the problem is nailbiting then I guess the mouthguard will stop you nailbiting and so it is a cure of sorts. I guess similar cases would include… Stoping a phobia of snakes by moving to new zealand (where there aren’t any snakes). Or stoping a phobia of flying by changing jobs to something that simply doesn’t require you to fly. Or stoping fear of monsters under the bed by chopping the legs off your bed. A cure of sorts… But a fairly unsatisfying one to be sure.
While I completely agree with the overall point of your post, I do have a good friend who got a mouth guard because of his grinding behavior, but he subsequently started wearing it while working at his computer to prevent nail biting. Using the mouth guard, along with regular nail filing, did help him to break his nail biting habit.
It did not, however, “cure” it. He still has the urge to bite his nails, even though he has broken the habit enough to not actually do it.
The only real “cure” that I am aware of is hypnosis. Hypnosis can quickly and easily remove the subconscious desire to bite one’s nails. With the subconscious compulsion gone, the source of the habit is gone forever.