University student, blogger, and mental health advocate Skye McAdams shares:

“Having Trichotillomania, at first, is like living on an isolated island in the middle of nowhere – that even the idea of trying to describe such a metaphorical island is a tad pointless because no one will find or see it. Yet I guess that’s what it’s like trying to describe to people that you have Trich; it seems utterly pointless because people stare at you as if you are either a nutter, weird or someone making a fuss out of nothing. I mean, how do you tell people that you sit in front of a bathroom mirror, for up to an hour, strategically deciding which eyelash to pull out next to satisfy the anxious voice in your head because you’ve made a mess of trying to pull out that one particular lash for a long time now?!”

She also writes about how the symptoms are easily dismissed as a “bad habit” and how she’s been “pull free” for 2 years.