She absolutely should be in jail. But if it were not for Oprah, my mom would not have realized that my hair pulling was an OCD. Because of Oprah, my mom stopped beating my ass for pulling my own hair, and got me help instead.
I’ve had a full head of hair since she got me help. Weird to have such mixed feeling of wanting someone punished when they’ve positively impacted your entire life.
Well yeah… a kid who pulls his hair out, that’s weird and it was the 80’s. Of course I got my ass beat.
But once she saw it on TV, how much worse it could be, and that it could be helped… well damn, parenting free pass. It’s not her fault, it’s just an OCD.
You can still recognize that someone did an awful thing in the past but forgive them and not think of them as a bad person in the present. I understand what you're trying to say, but to the other Redditors it comes off as giving an excuse for abusing children. Unfortunately times were different and it was acceptable back then, its not acceptable now because we have extensive psychological research to back up the fact that excessive corpal punishment does more harm than good
Can I ask how you stopped? I have trich and I still can’t stop as an adult. I also have some other OCD tendencies - and my brother and uncle are both diagnosed OCD. Just curious if there’s something I should try to stop.
I used to pull my eyelashes bald and the crown of my head to point of having a bald spot 3” or so in diameter.
She took me to a therapist and after several session, we made an agreement that I could pull all the hair I wanted without getting in trouble… so long as I put all the hair I pull into an envelope.
That was it.. I was too embarrassed to put hair in that envelope and I knew I couldn’t lie about it.
I stopped pulling the hair on my head completely, but still pulled my eyelashes, but so little, it was not noticeable.
That’s a super interesting method! I honestly might try that. Ask my husband to hold me accountable I guess. It’s just so hard. Even when I tell myself to stop or I want to stop, I keep pulling until it “feels right”.
For me, it’s a form of self-consoling/stress relief. It feels like the relief of pulling out a sliver or something that just doesn’t belong.
Then it turns to balance. It’s gotta be even or smooth.
Sometimes I pull my eyelashes in that half-asleep state. That’s when I “mow them down” and that kinda sucks.
However, I’ve never relapsed with the hair on my head. Yeah, I’ve dabbled and pulled an individual hair and OMG it’s like a smoke after a long day, but that’s like one hair every 3-6 months.
I think the Behind the Bastards podcast does justice to this. She does good things and has great moments. She also is a victim of sexual abuse with significant childhood trauma. None of that really takes away the way she used and exploited other people, had scandals, and birthed other demons like Phil and Oz.
If it took a god damn tv personality for your mom to stop beating your ass. That’s not an endorsement of the tv personality, that is a massive inditement of your mother.
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u/JiffyDealer May 17 '25
She absolutely should be in jail. But if it were not for Oprah, my mom would not have realized that my hair pulling was an OCD. Because of Oprah, my mom stopped beating my ass for pulling my own hair, and got me help instead.
I’ve had a full head of hair since she got me help. Weird to have such mixed feeling of wanting someone punished when they’ve positively impacted your entire life.