How do I deal with these obsessions? They're about poop. Yup

[ineedahug]

I'm just going to say the word "poop" here because that's what it is, plus it's G-rated

I have always had an obsession with poop.  I'm not really afraid of what it will do, other than get on things it shouldn't.  I'm most afraid of it being on me, and having to walk around being aware that I have poop on me, I couldn't possibly feel OK about myself and relax.

I often have found myself getting up just to check because I was triggered by something.  One common trigger was simply thinking of it or imagine myself pooping my pants, and at the same time feeling a muscle spasm down there.  Sometimes the thoughts come first, triggering the spasm (my body's response), and sometimes a random spasm will trigger the thoughts. Either way, it would always turn out to be nothing.  This specific fear-- pooping myself because of a mere thought or spasm, is less of a problem now.  However, I do still have a few  big obsessions in this category, and they seem a little to real to me.

1) Fear that I didn't wipe hard enough

I usually wipe until bleed, but I have found that if I wipe softly, I don't get everything.  It's hard to know how to get that balanced right.  If you don't wipe hard, there usually will be some brownish tint on the paper, at least for me. It wouldn't be a lot in this case, but you can definitely see it if you have decent lighting. Is that normal?

2) Fear that I spread the poop while wiping

Similar to the first one, but the fear here is that I might not be paying enough attention and accidentally wipe too far up or to the side, which would spread the poop.  Then I would wipe until clean, but I might not cover the same surface area.  As in, maybe I spread it to the left a little the first wipe when it was dirty, and then never got to that area with the last wipes.

3) Fear that I pooped after the last wipe

What if, after my last wipe and seeing that the paper is clear, I poop into the toilet without knowing? It always feels like I did, probably because the wiping irritated the anus, so it spasms a little.  There's a certain pressure and it always feels like I just pooped again. This turns out to be nothing when I check again as the paper is still clear.

The thing is, there have been a few times I have wiped again, after thinking I was done, and there actually was an uncomfortable amount of poop there.  So that makes a case for all 3 of these fears.  How can I know when I am done wiping when there have been times when I thought I was done but wasn't? I could have poop on me at any time!

4) Fear that I got poop on my hands while wiping and it will transfer to my clothes

We wash are hands after wiping because it's possible there's poop there.  But one thing happens before you wash your hands.  You pull up your pants, so that hand will inevitably touched either the button or the zipper, and then if there was something on the hands, there it would be on your pants.  I would then walk around with my head hanging low, knowing that in some small way I may have **** on me. 

So how do I deal with these? Just accept that there's about a 99.99% chance that there is some poop on me (enough to be visible)? I can deal with the fact that there is a 100% chance that we all have microscopic poop particles on us... that's actaully slightly comforting.

[PolarBear]

HI ineedahug and welcome to the forum.

If you're wiping so hard you bleed, you're wiping too hard. You are risking getting an infection and that is not good. You need to work on that.

As for the rest, you're really asking for reassurance. You're asking, "How do I know if..." The simple fact of the matter is you don't know and you will never know 100%. The rest of the world's population is okay with that; doesn't even think about it, really. That's where you need to get to -- a place where you do your best and don't really care whether you do or don't. You should also know that reassurance seeking is a compulsion. Getting direct answers to your questions might give you a bit of relief temporarily, but soon enough doubt will creep back in and you'll want more reassurance. And round and round you'll go.

One thing you need to do is identify the compulsions you do after you get intrusive thoughts of poop on you. You identified one already: wiping so hard you bleed. That's a compulsion. Beyond that, I imagine you spend considerable time ruminating over the thoughts -- going over the possibility you have poop on you, in your mind, again and again. That's a compulsion too and it's something you need to stop.

On the cognitive side what you can be doing after you get an intrusive thought about poop on you is say to yourself, "Maybe I do have poop on me. Oh well." Then leave the thoughts alone as best you can and get on with your day.

[ineedahug]

6 minutes ago, PolarBear said:

HI ineedahug and welcome to the forum.

If you're wiping so hard you bleed, you're wiping too hard. You are risking getting an infection and that is not good. You need to work on that.

As for the rest, you're really asking for reassurance. You're asking, "How do I know if..." The simple fact of the matter is you don't know and you will never know 100%. The rest of the world's population is okay with that; doesn't even think about it, really. That's where you need to get to -- a place where you do your best and don't really care whether you do or don't. You should also know that reassurance seeking is a compulsion. Getting direct answers to your questions might give you a bit of relief temporarily, but soon enough doubt will creep back in and you'll want more reassurance. And round and round you'll go.

One thing you need to do is identify the compulsions you do after you get intrusive thoughts of poop on you. You identified one already: wiping so hard you bleed. That's a compulsion. Beyond that, I imagine you spend considerable time ruminating over the thoughts -- going over the possibility you have poop on you, in your mind, again and again. That's a compulsion too and it's something you need to stop.

On the cognitive side what you can be doing after you get an intrusive thought about poop on you is say to yourself, "Maybe I do have poop on me. Oh well." Then leave the thoughts alone as best you can and get on with your day.

Thank you PolarBear, that makes sense.  I do realize I'm reassurance seeking, but I suppose I see it as something that needs to be done with a few of the trickier compulsions.  I just want to know how other people think about these things so I can continue with my CBT.  You mentioned the rest of the world's population being okay with that, but what exactly are they okay with? I feel like if they realized the same possibilities that I did, they would not be fine with it.

[PolarBear]

See the difference is, the rest of the world doesn't think about the possibilities. They're fine without thinking about them. And that's where you need to get -- to a place where you're not even thinking of the possibilities. That's the thing with OCD -- the disorder latches onto something, blows its significance all out of proportion, and won't let go. In response you perform compulsions, which strengthen the obsessions and makes the whole thing even a bigger deal in your mind.

[ineedahug]

3 minutes ago, PolarBear said:

See the difference is, the rest of the world doesn't think about the possibilities. They're fine without thinking about them. And that's where you need to get -- to a place where you're not even thinking of the possibilities. That's the thing with OCD -- the disorder latches onto something, blows its significance all out of proportion, and won't let go. In response you perform compulsions, which strengthen the obsessions and makes the whole thing even a bigger deal in your mind.

I can't imagine how freeing that must be.  I don't think I can stop thinking about the possibilities though.  I've had some very bad things happen because I wasn't thinking about the possibilities, because I wasn't worrying about it enough.  So how can you recommend not thinking about possibilities at all?

[PolarBear]

I don't think you want to believe that the reason some bad things happened was because you didn't worry enough. Worrying does no good. It's just spinning your mind wheels without going anywhere. It's getting yourself all anxious over the possibility that something might go wrong when there is an equal chance that nothing bad will happen. You want to worry less, not more.

As I said, start telling yourself that it doesn't matter. When you pull up your pants and you get the thought, "There could be poop on my fingers," tell yourself, "Oh well, I guess there could be." Then get on with your day. Refuse to get into mind debates over these minor things. It takes a lot of practice to get it right. It won't work right away.

[ineedahug]

3 minutes ago, PolarBear said:

I don't think you want to believe that the reason some bad things happened was because you didn't worry enough. Worrying does no good. It's just spinning your mind wheels without going anywhere. It's getting yourself all anxious over the possibility that something might go wrong when there is an equal chance that nothing bad will happen. You want to worry less, not more.

As I said, start telling yourself that it doesn't matter. When you pull up your pants and you get the thought, "There could be poop on my fingers," tell yourself, "Oh well, I guess there could be." Then get on with your day. Refuse to get into mind debates over these minor things. It takes a lot of practice to get it right. It won't work right away.

One time I had sex with someone who had sores on their genitals.  I panicked about it for a short time, then decided I wasn't going to let it bother me after this person assured me several times it was only a birth defect.  I believed this person, told myself it's just my OCD.  Next thing you know I have syphilis, a relatively rare disease.  If I had let my worrisome thoughts take control I would have prevented one of the worst mistakes of my life.

[PolarBear]

But you can't sit there worrying about every possible thing that could go wrong. We'd all go nuts if we did that. And you certainly don't need to worry about things that the rest of the population doesn't even think about.

[Handy]

ineedahug, there are numerous poop topics, aka feces.  Try searching this forum for them.