When I was about 5 I used to bite my nails, my dad said that if I didn't stop I would get hookworm - one day I would be walking down the street and the hookworm would fall out my bum & hook me to the sidewalk & I'd have to stay there until someone saved me & everyone would know that I was a dirty little girl.
Stopped me from biting my nails in record time.

Ann

My grandmother installed such a believe that if I kept biting my finger-nails that I'd grow a hand in my stomach, that when I had the flu at school I told the teacher that this is what I thought it the problem was.

Debbie Pittioni, Richmond Hill

When I was little, I bit my nails. My mother told me that if I didn't stop, I would look like Venus de Milo. I had no idea that was a famous armless statue. I thought for years it was an old Italian woman who lived on our street.

Catherine Marenghi

To get me to quit the never-ending nail-biting, my mom used to say that the bits of nails I swallowed would give me appendicitis, and then she pointed at the spot in my lower belly where my appendix was supposed to be and described the horrible pains I’d suffer. I never quit, but because of that odd prognosis of hers, I pictured my digestive system as a very simple mechanism consisting of 2 metal chutes going from my throat to my lower belly – one which would take all food and drink to the left, I guess to the stomach, and the other which would recognize and separate nails only and then send them to the right, straight to the appendix.

Bel Seslaf, Brazil

My mom bought this bad-tasting clear nail polish to make me stop biting my nails. I asked how it was supposed to get me to stop and she told me it was poison and it would kill me if I tasted it. I accidentally bit my nails in the middle of the night and sat up all night, crying, waiting to die. I still bite my nails.

Anon

I was once told that there is the same amount of dirt under ones finger nails as there is on a toilet seat, so biting your nails is like licking a toilet seat. i still get this image in my mind every now and then ... strangly enough it doesnt seem to stop me

kc

I always bit my nails really bad when I was little. One day my cousin, who is much older then I am, was at my house and seen me. He told me that there was poisen on my fingers and my fingernails and if I continued to bite them that the poisen would go down into my stomach and then spread throughout my body. He had me scared to death! I would forget what he said and bite my nails and then start crying cause I thought I was going to die.

*Middie*Wae*

six years ago (when I was a seventh grader). One of my friends bit her nails like CRAZY. She bit them until they bled, she did it non-stop, she even did it while talking. It was awful. So my two other friends devised a plan. We went up to her and told her that there was (some sort od mineral we made up) Deolxiumnotrate in nails. Which caused cancer. She totally bleived us! We even made up fake symptoms like it caused sneezing, puffy eyes, and dry mouth, whenevr she had these "symptoms" she would freak out! She left our school in junior year, and even then she still believed it. To this day i think she still belive that nails-biting causes cancer. (hey! At least we cured her!)

Fiona, destroyer of bad habits...

When i was 23 i saw a kid biting his nails and his mom told that he would have a tummy like the lady who a sitting two seats next to them, the lady was pregneant. The kid stopped biting his nails and whilst jummping of the bus he went to the preagnet lady and said I know how you got this fat.
;) lol,,,,,,,

baljeet

My babysitter used to tell me that if I bit my nails, hands would start growing in my stomach. I had nightmares for ages.

lucy

I was a nailbiter, and my mom told me the nails were forming a sharp ball in my stomach, and when big enough, it was going to cut my stomach open, and I would bleed to death........which made me bite my nails even more! Gads! What a terrible thing to tell a child. sheesh!

Coyotebleu

My dad was always told that if you bite your fingernails, you'll blow up like a balloon. This was "confirmed" by his dad whenever a pregnant lady walked by. Grandpa would point and say, "see, she bites her fingernails." needless to say he never bit them.

Anon

my mother told me once that the bottle she was dipping my fingers into was embalming fluid used on dead people and if I bit again I would shrivel up and die that was when I was 6 stopped me for a week though and I'm still here.

jeffrey l. johnson

I used to be scared that if I chewed my cuticles and swallowed a piece of skin, I would become a cannibal.

Anon

I bit my nails all though my childhood, and the rest. Mum told me that you only grew nails as far as your elbow and once you"d used them up, you would run out and not grow anymore. I bit my nails anyway in fear that it was the last nibble I'd ever have!

Sam

this is nasty but funny... anytime my pops saw me biting my nails, he'd ask me how the poo poo tasted... i believed there was poop under my nails... lets just say, dont bite my nails anymore hahaha

Sparkle361

Fingernails... My Dad told me that he knew a man that when he died they took a whole cup of fingernails out of his stomach.....needless to say I stopped bitting my fingernails. The days of always believing my Dads stories are far behind me.

Cindy

My mothers' friend once told me that if I bite my nails too much that the nail pieces would pop holes in me and when I drank water it would just flow out the holes. I can't remember how old I was, but I remember finding it funny and biting my nails anyway.

Angel

When I was in 2nd grade the cutest boy in my class was biting his nails. I asked him why he did. He said that some tasted like chocolate ice cream and others tasted like vanilla. I started biting my nails that day...he was cute!

amy

It's strange how you can justify your bad habits...I always believed biting my nails was the reason I'd never had a filling or tooth out at the dentists...something daft about fortifying my enamel with calcium...and that I should keep eating my nails for nutritional value...

Anon