Question for those with contamination OCD

[Ashley]

A question that will become a little more obvious why I am asking later, but I wanted to ask those specifically with contamination OCD, do you actually get any pleasure at all from cleaning?

For example, I have to scrub myself head to toe, and I hate it, I wished I did not have to. I also live in a right typical single bloke mess, the bathroom is grimy from all the soap mess, and so I get no pleasure from cleaning up or my body cleaning rituals, in fact I detest it.

I wondered if other people with contamination OCD get any pleasure from cleaning? I don't mean relief from the OCD, but actually enjoy it?

[joanne123]

I hate it. When i feel dirty and have to wash or clean i just find it a chore. I don`t enjoy cleaning at all and get no enjoyment from it.

[Guest FobicFairy]

I don't like cleaning because I feel lethargic a lot of the time, but when I do have energy like today I have really gone to town on the tidying and filled up bags for the charity shop.

Even though I don't enjoy the cleaning itself I do love the house afterwards when things are shiny because of the polishing, and the carpet has fluffed up again after vacuming. Sometimes I keep looking at rooms we keep shut off just to see how nice and clean they are.

I don't like having my daily bath but that isn't OCD related, it's about having an empty mind and sometimes ending up thinking about past events. I try to get up and launch myself into the bath to get it over with. I do enjoy a bath if I am going out somewhere special, I am loving the bath bombs, mud masks and exfoliating.

Maybe you should get a woman in for a few hours a week Ashley, just to do the bathroom and kitchen, the dust in the other rooms doesn't matter. At least it would make you tidy up once a week if you had someone coming in. I am tempted to get someone in when I spring clean my kitchen cupboards, all that climbing up and down does my head in and knackers me. Failing that I might get my parents involved so we can have a production line taking things out, washing them, drying them, then passing them back to me to place in the cupboard.

I do envy people that can afford to have cleaners in every week like my inlaws, they have a gardener as well! How the other half live eh!

FF xxxx

P.S. Are you working on those bodily fluids yet Ashley?

[Guest Living with OCD]

No, I absolutely hate it!

My cleaning rituals leave me in pain because I frequently draw blood, they leave me feeling exhausted and they make me a prisoner in my own bathroom.

On top of all that they've now left me heavily in debt. (I currently owe Thames Water £1,357!!!!!)

[Northern Star]

I hate my OCD cleaning rituals, absolutely detest them. They make me miserable yet I still do them because the fear / guilt / shame is so great.

However, when I am in a tidying-up mood (which isn't my OCD), I do enjoy tidying and cleaning, especially the results like FF says.

But no, when it comes to OCD cleaning it's horrendous, no pleasure at all apart from the obvious OCD relief.

[Guest FobicFairy]

Ive just done the dreaded job of cleaning the loo brush and holder. Yuk. The main thing is that I can do it now, go back 5 years and you would be hard pushed to get me to sit on the loo seat unless it was cleaned first!

Get down and dirty!

FF x

[Guest LucyS]

No, I hate and actually can fear it too. I lose myself in cleaning sometimes but I think that's the relief from carrying out the compulsions rather than actually enjoying it.

[Guest nervous]

I dont like it because when I start I get caught up in doing more and more

[Guest JC123]

I hate cleaning too, I agree with Nervous.

[Guest Annabel]

I'm the same as you, I loathe it! and like 'nervous' once I start I find it harder to stop.

I got stuck in the shower for two hours earlier and felt absolutely rubbish. Sometimes I feel relieved that I'm cleaner, especially when I perceive that there's some risk to health and I'd hate for soap, water and disinfectant not to be available but cleaning is so exhausting and so painfully stressful!

Are you okay Ashley?

Also I hope you're able to manage that bill 'LivingwithOCD', it sounds worrying. Our electricity and shopping bills are sky high because of me and I get through a lot of cleaning products (carex, wet ones, anti-viral hand foam, shower gel, shampoo & conditioner (use a large amount twice-thrice a day), soap, bleach, bleach spray, dettol) which all cost £70 or more a week.

Edited February 4, 2013 by Annabel

[Guest legend]

dont water companys make concessions for those with ocd if you fit into certain criteria ?

Edited February 4, 2013 by legend

[Guest FlyingEagle]

No i don't get any pleasure from it.

[whitebeam]

No pleasure at all from cleaning - I used to hate doing it but just had to to be safe etc.

I did sometimes feel relief when cleaning but only because I had probably battled in my mind whether I needed to clean or not - and almost certainly decided I did need to.

[Lost_in_a_Dark_Maze]

No pleasure for me either - I find cleaning very stressful and exhausting.

[Guest Annabel]

I need to shower/bath before bed but I can't face it after the two hours earlier. My feet are dirty so I'll have to dettol/bleach my feet so that I don't contaminate the bath but if I shower, I'll get stuck for hours. OCD is exhausting and definitely no enjoyment involved!

[Northern Star]

Hi Annabel,

Changing the subject slightly but am just a bit worried about you using Dettol / bleach on your skin. I've done that before and it's not very comfortable. Could you maybe use a basin of water with some anti-bacterial soap in instead? It will have the same effect of killing "germs" (that I know aren't on you and you know aren't on me...but that's a different discussion! ;-) ) but it won't hurt your skin so badly. I still sometimes end up with anti-bacterial surface cleanser on me and find my skin reacts but try to avoid it as I know it hurts my skin.

[Guest Annabel]

Hi Annabel,

Changing the subject slightly but am just a bit worried about you using Dettol / bleach on your skin. I've done that before and it's not very comfortable. Could you maybe use a basin of water with some anti-bacterial soap in instead? It will have the same effect of killing "germs" (that I know aren't on you and you know aren't on me...but that's a different discussion! ;-) ) but it won't hurt your skin so badly. I still sometimes end up with anti-bacterial surface cleanser on me and find my skin reacts but try to avoid it as I know it hurts my skin.

Thanks for caring N.S, I am trying to wean myself off the sprays- first I'm stopping the bleach, then the dettol. I used dettol in the end last night but I did manage to shower for less than an hour the second time I hope you're okay today xx

[Guest PaulM]

No. I don't get any pleasure from it. Sometimes I will have a feeling of accomplishment but that is rare. More likely I will worry that all I have done is spread the dirt around, or introduced more contamination from the cleaning chemicals used, due to my own inability to perform the task correctly.

I hate going home because of the necessity I feel to shower as soon as I get in from the outside world. And that will likely last at least an hour of well thought out scrubbing to prevent further contamination.

My place is often a mess due to the stresses of touching contaminated objects during the tidying process. A few years ago a friend stayed over after a night at the bar. I was nervous for her to see it. But she commented that even my mess was ordered in some ways. I didn't get that. All I see often is a tip. I have mail I haven't opened because I think it's contaminated.

[Guest Living with OCD]

Posted by Legend on 04 February 2013 - 04:46 PM

dont water companys make concessions for those with ocd if you fit into certain criteria ?

Apparently so, Legend.

I have been told, by my local Citizens Advice Bureau, that Thames Water run a payment scheme for their vulnerable customers called WaterSure. (To qualify, you have receive state benefit and have a medical condition of some kind - a medical condition that requires you to use a lot of water!)

I am now applying to join this scheme. If my application is successful then my annual water bill would be capped at £268.

[Ashley]

Thank you to you all for your responses, sorry I could not explain more clearly but it was not so much out of personal OCD problems, but I was trying to seek clarification in case my own OCD was clouding my judgement.

Sarah's thread explains it clearer: http://www.ocdforums.org/index.php?showtopic=52474 and we have just published a statement on our website now that channel 4 have confirmed this evening they don't see anything wrong with their website or programme. http://www.channel4.com/info/press/programme-information/obsessive-compulsive-cleaners

[Guest Asta]

I hate my OCD, everyday its the same I dread getting up because the rituals & number counting start from the time I wake up until I go to sleep.

Having a shower it takes me Hour's, I have to do the same ritual's in the shower & when I have finished my shower then it takes me about one & a half Hour's to get dressed & do my ritual's.

I just wish I was normal & some Day's I do wonder if I can carry on, because my OCD for the past 18 Month's has gone wild, I don't know why, I have had OCD for a long time but I have coped but still found it hard, but the past 18 Month's I have no life, it has taken over.

Going for a wee takes me at least 25 minutes, I have 4 pieces of soap ready my spray bottle, the clean bar of soap as I call it, I have to spray myself do the same ritual's & number counting until I feel ok, it is the number counting that is making me so tired, I do thousands of numbers from the time I wake up until I go to sleep.

My house is not clean by any means, because I do the same ritual's & number counting everyday & they take all my Day up.

I just want to close my eyes & make it all go away.

Edited February 6, 2013 by Asta

[Guest exhausted]

I'm so tired of all that cleaning etc but after I have clened it feels good. During the shower i have to wash my skin many times with soap, I wash my hands many times and usually also hair about two or three times. I hate it and I hate myself for doing it but I feel I have no choice but clean it. So I don't enjoy cleaning but usually afterwards it feels really good.