Nervous habits are your body’s way of combating the desire to run from something threatening OR ease discomfort. As your level of anxiety increases, so does your use of these coping behaviors that lead to your nervous habits with hands.
While most nervous habits with your hands are harmless, they can be an indication of a deeper problem of anxiety or OCD.
In the article, we are going to be covering 10 nervous habits with your hands, what it means, and what to do about it.
Table of Contents:
- Habit 1: Nail Biting
- Habit 2: Knuckle Cracking
- Habit 3: Hair Touching
- Habit 4: Face Touching
- Habit 5: Finger Tapping
- Habit 6: Sweaty Hands
- Habit 7: Shaking Hands
- Habit 8: Scab Picking
- Anxiety and OCD
- Habit 9: Hand Washing
- Habit 10: Touching & Arranging
- When to Seek Help
Let’s jump right in!
Habit 1: Nail Biting
If you occasionally find yourself biting your nails there’s probably nothing to worry about.
Many people bite their nails when they are deep in thought. Others, however, bite their nails when they are feeling anxious or uneasy.
When nail biting is habitually happening multiple times throughout the day, it can have an impact on your health and wellbeing.
Biting your nails frequently can chip your teeth. The underside of your nails is also home to germs and bacteria which in some cases may lead to illness.
Incessant nail-biting can also lead to frequent and ongoing pain and bleeding when they are bitten too short. Frequent open wounds on the fingers caused by nail-biting also increase the possibility of infection.
If you are a nail-biter, do you bite them down to the nubs every day? Do you experience frequent pain, discomfort, or bleeding from nail-biting?
If you answered yes to either of the above questions, you may be experiencing high levels of anxiety.
Habit 2: Knuckle Cracking
“Don’t crack your knuckles or you will get arthritis” my parents always told me. Well good news, knuckle cracking (or popping other joints) doesn’t cause arthritis.
The popping or cracking sound that a knuckle makes is the result of gasses built up in the knuckles being released. By itself, the release of these gasses is harmless.
However, if you crack your knuckles when you are experiencing anxious thoughts or emotions, you may develop the tendency to use too much pressure on your fingers.
In this scenario, knuckle cracking is similar to wringing your hands, except you’re putting all this pressure into just one finger at a time.
According to Robert H. Shmerling, MD at Harvard University, Cracking knuckles too frequently or with too much force can lead to “tendon injuries or dislocations”. These types of injuries can lead to ongoing pain.
(Side Note: This type of ongoing and sometimes permanent pain is commonly experienced in sports like Judo where tendon injuries and dislocations happen frequently.)
If you experience any of these signs it may indicate knuckle cracking due to anxiety is reducing your quality of life.
Habit 3: Hair Touching
Playing with your hair can indicate a range of emotions from attracting and flirtation, to (you guessed it) anxiety.
You may touch your hair as a way to soothe anxiety. This is referred to as a pacifying behavior.
Here are some of the ways you may be touching your hair:
- Hair fixing
- Hair stroking
- Hair twirling
- Pushing hair behind your ears
- Pulling your hair to the other side of you neck
- Pulling on your hair
Touching your hair can be a good way to ground yourself in the present moment through physical stimulation or occasionally soothe a little anxiety.
But if you feel that these gestures are becoming too frequent or obsessive, it may be because you’re feeling overly stressed, insecure, anxious, fearful, etc.
In some cases, hair pulling can become so intense that it can become its own disorder known as trichotillomania.
If you are pulling or touching your hair as a result of anxiety it may be a good idea to talk to a therapist about it. You can also check out our page on Trichotillomania → HERE
Habit 4: Face Touching
When you experience anxiety there is a good chance you will find yourself touching your face more frequently.
When your mind perceives a threat it increases your blood flow and pressure to supply the body’s cells with nutrients and oxygen that is necessary to escape (or fight) the threat.
When this additional blood enters the capillaries in your face and nose, it stretches the skin and can cause a very slight itching or discomfort that leads people to touch their face.
If done too frequently, it’s possible that face touching can lead to depositing dirt and germs into the pores of the face causing outbreaks or redness.
By itself, face touching isn’t usually a major problem but experiencing frequent anxiety can be.
Habit 5: Finger Tapping
Finger tapping can take many forms. It can be drumming your fingers on a desk, spinning a pen in your fingers, tapping your pencil on a desk, or fiddling with your watch.
Finger tapping is essentially done for two reasons.
The first is stimulation. When people are thinking deeply or learning something new, it’s often helpful to stimulate other senses to aid in the memory forming process. In this case, finger tapping stimulates the sense of touch.
The second cause of finger tapping is of course anxiety. Finger tapping can be used as a release of nervous energy.
Habit 6: Sweaty Hands
It’s fairly normal for your hands to sweat to cool your body down. Some people’s hands naturally sweat more than others.
If you feel that your hands are sweating in response to anxiety in combination with other signs of anxiety, it may be time to look into solutions.
Habit 7: Shaking Hands
Shaking hands here refers to the quivering that many people experience in their hands when they are under stress, like when speaking in front of people.
If you find that you are frequently experiencing quivering hands, it’s a sure bet you’re experiencing anxiety. It usually requires pretty intense anxiety to cause this as well.
When you perceive a threat that is significant enough, your body doesn’t just increase blood flow and blood pressure, it also begins to shunt blood away from anything in your body that is non-vital and toward your large muscles like your biceps and thighs.
This means your blood is moved away from things like your prefrontal cortex (the thinking part of your brain), your stomach, digestive tract, and your hands.
Your body also releases chemicals like adrenaline and noradrenaline into your bloodstream which prepares you for massive action like running and fighting.
All of this means that you are prepared for large movements, but you also lose some of your fine motor control which is why you experience shaking hands. You can learn more about the fight or flight response in this short video → HERE
If this is something you experience frequently, it may be a good idea to talk with someone who specializes in anxiety.
Habit 8: Scab picking
Scab picking is very similar to nail-biting. It can provide physical stimulation that helps distract from moments of anxiety. Scab picking is another one of those habits you want to break.
Scabs that don’t heal properly can leave scars or get infected. Habitually picking scabs can also be painful after the initial phase picking the scab to cope with anxiety has passed.
Anxiety & OCD Lead To Your Nervous Habits With Hands
If some of the anxious habits with your hands have gotten out of control, it may be time to seek help. Many people try to stop the habit through sheer force of will. Others try to replace the habit with something that doesn’t create pain, like squeezing a stress ball instead.
Anxiety can be very difficult to live with and may quickly become a problem that holds you back from living your best life.
The ultimate solution is to resolve the problem at the root level. When you are able to resolve your anxiety, you will no longer find yourself using these nervous habits with your hands.
Other nervous habits with your hands may be an indication of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. If you have OCD you may recognize some particular thoughts that you tend to obsess over.
These thoughts seem to compel you to take actions that you cannot stop yourself from doing. This may be checking to make sure the front door is locked 15 times for fear of someone breaking in or washing your hands over and over for fear of contamination.
Most people with OCD don’t find any pleasure in doing the habitual action (and they often realize its irrational behavior). Though the behavior may provide temporary relief from the anxious thoughts, those with OCD often feel trapped by the cycle.
Habit 9: Compulsive Hand Washing
Compulsive hand washing is an excessive and irrational way that some people attempt to cope with their fears of germs, getting sick themselves, and getting people sick.
Compulsive hand-washing is seen so frequently in those with OCD that there is an entire subtype of OCD for this very compulsion.
If you find yourself experiencing obsessions or compulsions surrounding hand washing you may be experiencing some of the following:
- You wash your hands multiple times and still worry about germs when you finish.
- You may have an elaborate routine that ensures everything gets properly cleaned.
- You may feel afraid to touch other people, or objects that may also have germs on them.
- You experience irrational fears like catching diseases from door knobs that aren’t transmissible by touch.
- In extreme cases, some people may wash their hands until they are raw or until they bleed.
If any of these OCD thoughts and behaviors sound like you, there are now highly effective therapeutic treatments that can help you find more freedom in your life.
Habit 10: Touching & Arranging
Many people who struggle with obsessions and compulsions often feel things need to be arranged or moved in particular ways.
They may feel that things need to be organized into sets of certain numbers, touched a certain number of times, or they may want symmetry, spacing all the items evenly apart.
Those with OCD may not have any specific standard by which they arrange things, they may just do so until it “feels right”.
If you are a person who prefers to keep things orderly and it brings you pleasure and satisfaction to do so then there is probably nothing to worry about.
However, if you find yourself feeling compelled to engage in these behaviors, even though you don’t want to, it may be time to seek out a therapist who can help. If you’d like to learn more about the symptoms of OCD check out this video → HERE
When to Seek Help For Nervous Habits With Hands
Below is a list of criteria that will help you decide if it’s time to seek help from a professional therapist.
- Your habitual behaviors are causing you pain.
- Your habitual behaviors are affecting your health negatively in some way.
- You feel that you have no choice but to do the behaviors even when you don’t want to.
- You spend over one hour every day engaging in habitual behaviors.
- You feel that these thoughts and behaviors are keeping you from living your fullest life.
- You experience a high amount of anxiety on a daily basis that keeps you from doing the things you want.
- You recognize your obsessive thoughts as irrational or excessive.
Professionally trained therapists use research-based therapeutic techniques that can help you overcome anxiety and OCD. You can check out some of our success stories → HERE
If you feel you would benefit from speaking with a therapist, feel free to contact us. Psychologist NYC has highly trained therapists available that specialize in helping those with OCD find freedom.
That brings us to the end of this article. What questions do you have about your nervous habits with your hands?
Ask us any other questions about nervous habits with hands in the comments and we will be sure to respond!
