As an art therapist, I have always encouraged people to make art about their personal struggles. Creating these hands was a way to extend that same gift to myself.

This work grew out of a desire to explore my compulsion to bite and pick at my cuticles. Body Focused Repetitive Behaviors, including Dermatillomania (skin picking), Onychophagia (nail biting) and others, affect approximately 1 out of 20 people. By creating works of art that playfully reflect and examine this compulsion, my hope is to de-stigmatize the behavior and illuminate some of the underlying mechanisms that give rise to it.