How Does a Woman Decide When to Grow or Trim Her Nails?

There's a question which has gone round and round in my head for years, and it bothers me. How does a woman decide when to let her nails grow out long? What sort of thought process goes on in her mind? Does it break on her all of a sudden? Or gradually, like the slow accumulation of snowflakes out of a slate grey sky? Is it a conscious and deliberate decision? Or does she just sort of... drift... into it without any clear or definite game plan?

And likewise, when a woman has been letting her nails grow out for some time, and then she trims them short, or trims them back shorter... what's going on in her head? Does she suddenly think, "Oh, my nails are too long"? Does it break on her as a sudden revelation? Is it a slow insight? Does she think about it at all? Or does she one day just suddenly and thoughtlessly get out her manicuring implements, after a span of weeks or months when you might have thought she was suffering from amnesia regarding the art of keeping her nails trimmed?

There's a young neighbor woman, I'll call her Kelsey. For years now Kelsey has been in the habit of wearing her nails long. Most of the time. Kelsey usually lets her nails grow out maybe a quarter of an inch, sometimes less, sometimes a little more. And then one day Kelsey shows up with all her fingernails trimmed back short, or nearly short. And then immediately Kelsey is letting her nails grow back out long again, just like they were before.

What is going through this young woman's head when she grows, or trims, her long nails? What kind of decision making process, if any? Couldn't Kelsey just as easily trim her nails back slightly, instead of almost completely lopping them off and then growing them back out to the same length again right away?

Every once in a while, say once or twice a year, Kelsey lets her fingernails grow out longer than usual, maybe to a full three-eighths of an inch long. And once in a great while Kelsey takes a break for a month or two or three, and keeps her nails trimmed short for a while. Again, what thought processes are moving her at times like these?

Another neighbor woman in her late 30s, Jean Maru -- I've written in here before about Jean and her gigantic hands, and she's a mouth holder too -- over the years Jean has gone through extended periods when she's let her fingernails grow out long. Then she's gone through extended periods when she's kept her nails trimmed short, or most of them nearly short.

Most recently Jean went through a stretch from September 2007 through November 2008 when she was wearing her nails long, usually in the range of an eighth to three-sixteenths of an inch long. Jean's nails would get to the outer limit of her range, and then she would trim them back a bit shorter, to an eighth of an inch or less, but still grown out long and not short. Sometimes she wouldn't trim her thumbnails, or wouldn't trim them as much, so that the rest of her nails were an eighth of an inch or less, and one or both of her thumbnails were grown out around three-sixteenths of an inch.

One time in the spring, around Easter, Jean let all her nails grow out longer, almost a quarter of an inch long, and the last two nails on her left hand were grown out somewhat longer than a quarter of an inch. That was the longest her fingernails got over this past year or more. Then a few days later she had all her nails trimmed back much shorter, though immediately she began letting them grow back out again.

Sometimes Jean will have a nail or three trimmed off short, or nearly short, evidently because she broke it. The last she had long nails was in early November, when she had her left thumbnail grown out about three-sixteenths of an inch long, and the nails on her left middle finger and left ring finger grown out almost as long, and the rest of her nails much shorter or short. And since then, the past two months, Jean has been keeping all her nails short.

What mental processes are going on in Jean's head when she navigates the process of letting her nails grow out, or trimming some or all of them back shorter, or letting a couple of nails on one hand grow out longer than the rest, or favoring her thumbnails by leaving them longer? How does she decide to say "when!"? How does she come to feel that it's time?

My wife Deb usually keeps her fingernails long, much of the time a little longer than a quarter of an inch. Though this last fall Deb let all her nails grow out longer. The nails on her right hand were about three-eighths of an inch. She grew the nails on her left hand out half an inch long, and her left thumbnail was longer than half an inch. I tried to pick Deb's brains, like, what goes through your mind when you decide to grow your nails out, or when you decide it's time to trim them shorter?

And she was like, "Well, one day I wake up and I realize that I just can't stand having my fingernails so long any more." That's the closest I've ever gotten to a definite statement from a female as to what's driving her in deciding to grow or trim her nails. And you've got to admit, it's a fairly vague and unfocused statement. It leaves me still puzzled, scratching my head, and pretty much in the dark.

Any ideas? Any insights? Any experiences or remarks to share, which might shed light on what's going on in a woman's head when it comes to the whole nail-growing or nail-trimming decision making process???