A woman almost lost her leg after her skin picking habit became out of control.

Lauren McKeaney, 35, from Chicago, has suffered from the psychological condition dermatillomania all her life. 

Dermatillomania falls under the umbrella of obsessive compulsive-related disorders (OCD) and causes a person to repeatedly pick, squeeze and even bite at their skin.

The habit – which can consume someone for hours in a day and last years on end – causes lesions over various parts of the body.

In 2014, Lauren contracted methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) on her inner thigh.

The life-threatening infection occurs when bacteria that can enter the body through cuts, which Laren’s leg was covered in.

She told Truly: “My condition was at its worst in 2014. Right on my inner thigh, I contracted the life-taking bacteria MRSA. 

“My right leg was just so swollen and infected, and the doctors had to come and talk to me about potentially losing my leg.

“I felt the lowest I had felt but it was there that I actually heard someone say, ‘it looks like she has dermatillomania’.” 

Thankfully, Lauren made a full recovery, despite needing to have eight inches of her thigh removed and spending months in physical therapy. 

Despite having memories of picking her skin since the age of five, Lauren had never been given a diagnosis, MailOnline reported. 

Lauren first began picking at herself when she was just a child and she remembers no one else having “polka-dotted” skin.

Things only got worse for Lauren as she went through puberty, with dermatillomania also causing embarrassment and extreme psychological distress. 

She said: “In middle school, trying to deal with puberty and acne really gave me more triggers to pick at. 

“I thought I was the only one to have this very shameful existence and I was super embarrassed by it.”

Lauren also wrote on her website that she quit figure skating at a competitive level after she couldn’t pull her tights off without ripping scabs with them.

She wrote: “‘Leper’ and ‘Polka-dots’ were nicknames from bullies, sleepovers only happened with friends who did not make fun of my all black sheets.

“A high school nurse incorrectly reported me for self-harming, a college counselor thought I was using meth, a health club manager informed me members were uncomfortable in the locker room with me.

“Dating and intimacy were more about hiding than opening up.”

“I’d leave for work only to see my arm had bled through my shirt and go back to change while thinking of a late excuse this time, and the list goes on.”

Eventually, after getting her diagnosis in 2014, Lauren had some answers and was able to turn things around.

She said: “Even though I had the episode of almost losing my leg, the outcome was really getting the name, the word dermatillomania.”

Unfortunately, there is no cure for dermatillomania but Lauren said she has “learned to live with her condition”.

She has to avoid mirrors – brushing her teeth in the kitchen sink rather than the bathroom – because it can lead to “hour-long picking sessions”.

“I use products that are touchless, very hands off,” she added. 

When Lauren does need to use the mirror to do her makeup, she lifts a drape off her mirror which reveals stickers and notes that remind her of self-love.

She uses fidget objects to help keep her “restless fingers busy and off her body”.

And she has also learned how to sit in positions that won’t inspire her to pick at herself, which can be an unconscious habit.

Lauren said: “A lot of times it’s about knowing where your hands are. 

“Knowing to shift my body weight or sit in a different way helps me not touch as much.”

Lauren said that after almost losing her leg, she could “no longer silently suffer”.

She wrote on her website: “In an innocent stranger’s questioning of what had happened to my leg one day, I experienced a new compulsion- to share the truth. And I haven’t shut up since.”

Lauren set up the nonprofit Picking me Foundation to support the dermatillomania community. 

The organization is “dedicated to raising awareness and inspiring acceptance about dermatillomania for sufferers, supporters, and educational communities alike”.

She wrote: “[This disease is] misunderstood, underreported, and under-diagnosed, and it lacks medical studies, research and funding for treatment.

“We aim to change the connotation of the word ‘pick’ to help patients and parents understand these behaviors are not their fault and to educate the medical world on the dire advocacy this skin picking disorder needs as it affects three percent of the global population.”

This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced here with permission.