Can I Pluck My Eyebrows If I Have Trichotillomania, a form of OCD?

Answered by Mawlana Ilyas Patel

Question

Plucking eyebrows is haram, yet I suffer from trichotillomania. This falls under the umbrella of OCD. I can’t stop plucking my eyebrows, and thus, their natural form changes, and I have bald spots in my eyebrows. I wonder if it’s still haram because I can’t stop plucking my eyebrows. I’m doing my best to stop, but it still happens without my knowledge when I’m stressed.

Answer

In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful and Compassionate.

I pray you are in good faith and health.

Threading, plucking, and micro blading is impermissible unless one has excess hair or hair not in line with others that seem abnormal. See the link below.

You will be excused while finding a treatment to stop the habit of plucking. However, in the meantime, I would suggest you tint and dye your eyebrows to cover the shape and bald spots following the conditions:

• The color of the dye should not draw attention, so just a regular neat application without overdoing it;
• The use of colors that can attract attention and be seen as the adornment of the shameful;
• The dye is ethical and has no possible harmful or allergic reactions. [Ibn ‘Abidin, Radd al-Muhtar; Indarpati, Fatawa Tatarkhaniyya; Abdul-Haq al-Dehlawi, Lama‘at al-Tanqih]

May Allah Most High give you ease and relief from the illness, amin.

Related:

• Are Women Allowed to Thread and Pluck Their Eyebrows
• Devil’s Tricks – The Path of Muhammad: Birgivi’s Manual of Taqwa Explained [Video]
• Doubts – IPD Session #3 | COJ – an ISIP Youth Chapter Initiative
• The Application of Islamic Psychotherapy for the Treatment of OCD
• Key Principles Relating to Certainty, Doubt, and Baseless Misgivings (waswasa)
• A Reader on OCD and Waswasa (Baseless Misgivings)
• The Application of Islamic Psychotherapy for the Treatment of OCD [Video]
• Satanic Tactics: Seven Tricks of the Devil
• Being Balanced – Emotional and Mental Health

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I pray this helps with your question.
Wassalam,
[Mawlana] Ilyas Patel
Checked and Approved by Shaykh Faraz Rabbani

Mawlana Ilyas Patel is a traditionally-trained scholar who has studied in the UK, India, Pakistan, Syria, Jordan, and Turkey. He started his early education in the UK. He went on to complete the hifz of the Quran in India, then enrolled in an Islamic seminary in the UK, where he studied the secular and ‘Aalimiyya sciences. He then traveled to Karachi, Pakistan. He has been an Imam in Rep of Ireland for several years. He has taught hifz of the Quran, Tajwid, Fiqh, and many other Islamic sciences to children and adults onsite and online extensively in the UK and Ireland. He taught at a local Islamic seminary for 12 years in the UK, where he was a librarian and a teacher of Islamic sciences. He currently resides in the UK with his wife. His interest is a love of books and gardening.