Almost 4 Year Old Biting Nails

My son is 3 and a biter/picker too. I bit my nails from early childhood until I had a toddler of my own to chase around. Since NOTHING my parents tried worked and since I can't think of any behavior he could replace the nail biting with that wouldn't annoy me more I decided to ignore it and NOT beat my head against the wall......

And to get her to stop you'll have to find another behavior for her that meets the same need....

My daughter did this for years. I never found a perfect cure but fingernail polish worked pretty good. Especially if you paint something " cute" or "pretty" on them. Not only does it not taste good but the paint flakes are no fun and they want to preserve the picture or bling on them. Other than that keep hand lotion or hand sanitizer on her...they taste bad! Good luck!

Although completely annoying and irritating...very normal my DD has been doing this for quite a while. Hopefully, she'll stop as she gets old. She is 5 now and started this around the same time yours has.

Not sure if this would work for your daughter or not because she is quite young but there is a Berenstain Bears book about biting your nails. In it the grandmother suggests giving the child 10 pennies (one for each nail). The child keeps the pennies with them as a reminder not to bite the nails. At the end of the day, the parent checks the nails. The child returns one penny for each nail she bites. Whatever pennies are left belong to the child and are put in a jar. The next day she starts with 10 more pennies. The idea is that it is easier to remember not to bite the nails when you have something tangible (money) as a reminder. The reward encourages the child to stop the bad habit and in the end they can buy something with their jar of pennies.

I have a 4 yr old boy that had been biting his nails and fingers for almost a year. Does anyone have a suggestion for a boy? I cannot paint his nails...smile. I tend to think it is nerves. My peditrician told me it's a phase and it will stop eventually. I think if i had a little girl I would try the polish and paint different pictures or sparkles. Thanks

My daughter used to pick and bite at her nails all the time. At night I started putting socks on her hands so she didn't have access to them. If there was a time during the day or in the car where she just couldn't keep them out of her mouth or stop picking, I would put socks on her. It helped.

I asked dd's pediatrician about this and she said her fingers may be irritated. Ketchup (big kid food) is acidic. Make sure you keep her fingers moisturized.

I didn't go the nail polish route because I didn't want my daughter ingesting it, even the tiny amounts it may have been.

My son started biting his nails in kindergarten. He bit them so low he ended up getting an infection in his thumb, really bad. Had to be on antibiotics. I talked to his teacher since he wasn't biting his nails at home and discovered he was doing it during story time (they would all sit on the floor) and apparently he was bored. I asked her to help me by letting him know when he was doing it. Well, it stopped and now he's 17 and has been doing it again for a couple years. Now it's a bad habit. His nail beds are deformed and guess what? He came to me Sunday night complaining about pain in his thumb and it was swollen 3x the normal size. Yep, another infection. Sometimes nail biting is a bad habit, sometimes it's a horrible one! Okay, sorry this was so long but for your daughter I would try to figure out when she's most likely doing it and occupy her hands with something else until the habit breaks. Easier with a 4yo than a 17yo. Good luck!

mine does that. Does she like the idea of getting her nails done at a salon?
I just keep reminding mine if she has no nails then they can't be painted.
I try to do a home manicure for her at least once a week for but if no nails then I can't do it.