You might be wondering how you will ever be able to control and manage your hair pulling habit. As two mental health professionals who have helped hundreds of people with trichotillomania, we can tell you that it takes time and commitment, but it IS possible. By following the steps in each chapter, you will be able to successfully "trick trich!"

Everyone is unique and so is his or her pulling behavior. People pull their hair at different times, in different places, for different reasons. And what is rewarding and motivating for one person, may not be at all helpful for another. What we have done is set out a way for you to use our overall program in a way that's individualized, positive and rewarding for you or your child.

The program presented in this book will teach the reader how to manage her hair pulling habit.

• First, she will learn how to increase her awareness of her particular pulling patterns – how, when and where she pulls.
• Secondly, she will discover the many different idiosyncrasies of trichotillomania, and will identify which apply to her.
• Finally, she will learn how to develop a plan that she can use in various trigger situations to manage her urge to pull. We believe the most successfully way to treat trich is to teach the person what to do instead, and to reward that behavior.

Many of the young people with trichotillomania who learn and faithfully use the problem solving strategies in this book have little or no problem with hair pulling later in life. We believe that you or your child can have the same success!

A Few Tricks of Our Own: How Puzzles, Sheep, Charts and a Girl Named Sally Can Help

In order to make the book as interesting and clear as possible, we used several "playful" devices. First, we used the concept of solving a puzzle as a metaphor for the problem solving process that we use. There are many interlocking steps to managing the hair pulling habit, and that they are all important. We also want them to keep the "big picture" of problem solving in mind while they are working on each small step, which is similar to what you do when you work on a jigsaw puzzle. So, each chapter of the book is another piece of the puzzle.

Another device is our use of the phrase "tricking trich." We use this phrase repeatedly throughout the book in order to illustrate that the child must develop a "bag of tricks" in order to effectively address the problems that inevitably arise in managing trich. And like a magician who does magic tricks, your child will need to develop skills and to practice those skills on an ongoing basis.

In addition, we have included an mnemonic device, "fiddling sheep," to remind you or your child in a fun way that there are six content areas – Fiddling, Sensory, Habit, Emotions, Environment, and Perfectionism – that should be addressed when choosing appropriate strategies to use in the successful management of trichotillomania. This device helps the user of the book to analyze her use of strategies and check to make sure that she is using a range of strategies that is wide enough.

The last device that we use in the book is a fictional character named "Sally Sample." Sally has trich, and will go through the program, chapter by chapter, along with the user. She will go through some of the same struggles and victories that you or your child may also experience. We hope that Sally Sample’s examples will clarify the concepts and inspire your child to do her best, and makes the book a little more fun for kids to use.

Finally, we have also included some charts to get you started, and a glossary to help define some of the more difficult words and concepts.

The Steps in this Book

By reading this book you will learn:

• How to identify the features of your unique habit
• Why you pull your hair
• Strategies that you can use so that you can resist the impulse to pull your hair
• How to make a "Problem Solving" Chart so you can use the best strategies for each situation
• How to make it easy for you to use your strategies when and where you need them
• How to keep tabs on your weekly progress
• How to stay motivated
• How to put your plan into action
• How to stay on track over the long run

If you are a young person with "trich," your parents’ involvement may be very useful. Therefore, please ask them to read the workbook, too. We even included a parent guide especially for them. If you are seeing a therapist, he or she can also help you complete the program in this workbook. However, we have designed the program so that a determined young person can use the workbook independently.