How to stop kids from biting their nails

How to Stop Kids from Biting their Nails

2021-10-14T10:30:00+00:00

By Virtue Digest

It is amazing to know that some adults still bite their nails; some say they do when they are deep in thought, scared, anxious or even daydreaming. I often hear people ask this question, ‘Can an adult learn new tricks?’ Children grow into adults with habits formed while growing up. So it is only clever to help crop some habits such as biting their nails before they mature.During childhood, one of the major leisure habits for kids is biting their nails. Oftentimes, as parents, you wonder how these kids develop such a habit at a tender age. Imitation is not the only reason why kids bite their nails; it could be as a result of boredom, nervousness, curiosity, unconscious effort and many more. For some kids, they can outgrow it while for some if the habit isn’t curbed at the early stage, it becomes harder later and you find such kids grow into adulthood with such habit.It is important to help them stop this habit before it becomes too difficult. This is mainly because nail biting is an unhygienic habit. The kids could easily transfer some germs into their bodies when they constantly put their hands in their mouths.Therefore, here are some tips to help kids overcome this habit:Yelling and spanking is not the solution, what it does to kids is to make them conscious of not biting their nails when parents are around them but they keep up with the habit in your absence. The goal of parents is to ensure that their kids permanently break out from such habit. Therefore, as a parent, first, find out the cause of him/her biting their nails and work on it.

Have a subtle discussion with your child on breaking out from such a habit. Look for books and kiddies TV programmes that discourage biting the nails. This will make them more conscious to break from the habit more quickly. Kids often learn from what they read and watch.Always remind him/her to break out from the habit by tapping their hand each time they start biting their nails. Better still, if you are afar, call their name gently to make them conscious of what they are doing.Ensure that their nails are regularly well cut and trimmed to the lowest minimum. This will help a lot because once they try to bite; there will be little or no nail to bite with their teeth.Once you observe that your child doesn’t bite his/her nails for a day, reward them. It makes them excited and they will want to strive hard to drop the habit permanently.