Toddler is biting his nails - any suggestions?

[Iris75]

My oldest has developed the habit of biting his nails. I think he does it when he is nervous or sometimes when he is bored or concentrating hard on something (so basically there are many occasions for him to do this). I would just let it be and wait for him to grow out of it (I bit mine for a little while as a child but just grew out of it) but he bites them so short that I worry about damage to the nails.

We bought some stuff to put on his nails which tastes disgusting and for a while that helped but now he claims that he's just got used to the taste.

We tried everything - initially I was quite cross with him but then I realised that he really wants to stop but it's a habit now and he just can't do it, so what's the point of being angry. We tried to encourage him but that isn't working either. He says that he just 'forgets'. We've now agreed with him that every time he forgets he'll give us one toy to put away for a couple of days and that does seem to incentivise him to remember - he hasn't had any 'accident' in the last day or so - but I fear that that will be short-lived too.

Does anyone have any other ideas what we could try? I've been thinking of cotton gloves for the night and I'll see our GP about that, but that still leaves the daytime. I don't really want to 'punish him' by having him walk around all day with cotton gloves on...

[Tweakster]

It's an impulse control thing.  How old is he?  Can you talk to him about it?

[Zoey]

I wonder if a positive consequence would be better than a negative one.

Not knowing how old the child is... perhaps you can think up, together a code word... say Popsicle.  Each time you see him biting his nails, say the code word as a reminder not to bite his nails.  Start a chart with stickers and reward him for periods of time when he didn't bite, setting the number of uses of the code word.  At the end of a given period of time he gets a treat.

If he needs to bite, or have something in his mouth... perhaps at the times when he is nervous/needing to bite his nails... give him something acceptable to bite or do with his hands.  Some sorta of soft stress ball... pretzels to munch... etc.

Positive enforcement almost always works better than negative.  He isn't isn't being "bad" or acting poorly - he has a habit, and needs help breaking it.  I'm not sure taking his toys away is going to help.

BIG HUGS!!