I made Low Fuel Light to mark a significant turning point in my BFRB journey, but I’ve had complicated feelings in sharing it. I’m excited to share a metaphor that’s been so useful for me, but I’m apprehensive as well. I’m worried people with BFRBs will be mad at me. “How dare you say your BFRB is your friend, I hate my BFRB!”

For this reason, I’m so thankful to have met Stacy this past year, as she taught me about the psychodynamic therapy approach. It’s an approach that has deeply enriched my own therapy practice and the understanding of my own compulsive skin-picking. In a world where CBT has become synonymous with therapy, I recommend everyone to do a bit of homework and learn what is out there when finding a therapist. Therapist dating is frustrating! I sought out therapy from 6 different professionals before I found the right fit for me.

What I like about a psychodynamic approach is it seeks to understand and heal the root of the issue whereas CBT seems overly fixated on replacing the symptoms. For me, I couldn’t just “think” my way through my BFRB. I find that CBT generally treats the BFRB as the enemy to be removed, whereas, like what Stacy writes in her book, I found it useful to ask instead “what is your BFRB trying to communicate to you?”

My journey with Low Fuel Light followed Stacy’s first task to replace shame with self-compassion. Compassion was an amorphous concept and seemed inaccessible to me. I was disgusted by my weakness, and didn’t feel deserving of love. But seeing my BFRB as a feature, a resource, and an asset, I found a way to appreciate it. It allowed me to take a step back and see certain patterns. My urge intensified when I was exhausted or stressed, so rather than yelling at myself to stop picking or to be stronger, I canceled plans and got rest. My awareness of my needs and my confidence to assert boundaries grew.

I’m not saying CBT is not useful, it’s just I want people to try out other approaches too. Since I’ve learned about the BFRB acronym from a random facebook post, I’ve been hungrily consuming anything people are willing to share. I wish I could tell you there’s one silver bullet that will solve everyone’s BFRB, but it doesn’t exist. If it did, we’d know about it. While I don’t believe you can “find” an answer for your BFRB, I do believe you can “build” one. It won’t be shiny like an Apple product. It will be duct-taped together from many bits and pieces you’ve gathered from far and wide. And so, love it or hate it, I hope watching Low Fuel Light will help you appreciate there’s many different ways to go about managing your BFRB. It also has a glimpse of what Stacy talks about in her book. These are things that helped me on my journey, and I wish you the very best on finding what works with yours.

Jason’s Bio

Jason Yu is an intern counsellor with Island Clinical Counselling. He focuses on BFRBs with an approach that emphasizes empowering neurodivergence and developing practical management skills. He has found his way into counselling after leaving a career in civil engineering and overcoming a decade of shame and anxiety with his own compulsive skin-picking. He also hosts Fidget, a podcast for your BFRB toolbox. He lives in Vancouver, Canada.

Learn more at https://fidgetpodcast.com/

It's hard to express how much pride I felt watching former client Stacy Nakell stand in front of a crowd of colleagues, friends, and family last Friday in the lobby of her therapy office holding HER NEW BOOK: Treatment for Body-Focused Repetitive Behaviors!

Stacy is a therapist who specializes in body-focused repetitive behaviors (BFRBs) — aka hair-pulling and skin-picking. For decades, the primary treatment for these behaviors has been cognitive behavioral therapy — basically training people to think differently and eliminate the behaviors of picking or pulling without exploring the reason why someone might pick or pull. (This is like trying to get an alcoholic to quit drinking without ever questioning or exploring what might have driven the alcoholic to drink in the first place.)

A lot of people who attempted cognitive behavioral treatment for their BFRBs — not surprisingly — “relapse” and carry into their next therapeutic container a lot of shame and a sense of failure.

Stacy's work as a therapist brought her to a psychodynamic approach — that is, creating a secure, safe relationship between therapist and client, with no immediate emphasis on stopping the behavior. This allows space and time to establish trust between the client and therapist so they can explore all the unexpressed emotions that motivate the behavior. Through this emphasis on the whole person, and not just the frequency of picking or pulling, Stacy's clients have seen profound changes.

A lot of people engage in hair-pulling and skin-picking, but there's not a lot of research on it. As a result, a lot of therapists don't recognize the behavior if it's happening and don't know how to approach it when or if a client brings it to their attention. Enter Stacy, the first person to write about this topic in this way.

The publication of Stacy's book means more people with BFRBs can understand themselves, and more therapists can effectively support their clients in uncovering what the behavior wants to say, and the unexpressed needs that have gone unaddressed for too long.

Stacy worked so hard on this book, y'all! All while running a full time one-on-one and group therapy practice, speaking at conferences, and editing Austin's group therapy association newsletter. She always turned in her pages on time, even between sessions where she told me she hated me. (I knew she was actually telling me she hated how hard it is to write a book.) But no matter how much she “hated me,” I knew this book was NECESSARY. She knew it too.

This book is going to change lives — directly and indirectly — and now it's here to do just that. Thank the Goddess Stacy never gave up, even when everything in her wanted to walk away.

If you know someone who experiences skin-picking or hair-pulling, this book offers deep insight into the possible reasons why and how to seek treatment. And if you know a therapist, please make sure they're aware of this book!

During our work together, I learned so much from Stacy about BFRBs, about therapy, about animal behavior. Stacy is actually the reason I went to group therapy for 3+ years, which is where I birthed one of those new versions of myself (the version that can speak her mind in emotionally fraught environments)!

My biggest heartfelt congratulations to Stacy!!!! I'll be recording a conversation with her soon and posting it in our Cosmic Rescue series, so more folks can hear from her! You can support her by purchasing a copy of her new baby! Or telling people who need to know about it.

Cecily wrote this celebration as part her weekly newsletter, which is crafted to inspire creative practice and exploration. Cecily continues to support humans in developing a creative practice centered in joy, pleasure, and freedom. You can learn more about her work or subscribe to her newsletter at typewritertarot.com.

Guest blog with Jason Yu: On the Making of Low Fuel Light, A BFRB Animated Short Fil

Reflections from my long-term writing coach Cecily Sailer on my NEW BOOK!