BigDave

You can definitely do it. It’s not easy but make sure you appreciate the victories however small!

Thank you Well if he had greasy hands, then I’d get grease potentially in my console and I’d not like that As a side note, I seem to be having a bloody annoying night again with a disc I had a disc in my hand after I went for to the bathroom and it slipped out of my hand and I know I had a wet patch on my shorts having been for a wee I’m thinking, maybe I have got a bit of wee on my disc now. I put up with the anxiety and carried on using the disc but I feel like I have urine in my console now. Sad times!

Thank you so much. It actually went great. I just faced up and it’s fine. Not saying today has been easy but dealing with that situation was!

So a really quick one. I found an imperfection (like a chip) on a video game disc so I as panicking it might damage my console. After a while, I thought, I will ask my Dad as he will know best. When I saw him, he was cleaning the cooker (greasy greasy) and he came over to look at it with just wiping his hands with a towel. He looked at the disc and then as I was walking away, he pointed and said, what is it. Now I’m not sure if he made contact with the disc. It seems rather stupid me even worrying about this but as I put the disc back in the console, I’m thinking - have I got grease in it?? Answer is probably not but my OCD is having a field day!!!

Ok so first I apologise for another post from me (you guys are so amazing for listening us ramble on a daily basis, I can’t thank you enough for being a sounding board). This evening, I’ve kind of gone into a mode of acceptance. On the one hand, I think it’s good. But it also has made me kind of sad. Essentially, I have come to the conclusion that given my brothers lack of cleanliness, I have two options. The first, which is to spend all my time as nauseam cleaning everything for the rest of time all day every day. The second option is to just accept that things aren’t going to be as clean as I want and just “suck it up”. I actually know what I have to do but it’s going to be incredibly hard. The hardest part of it all is going to be my bedroom. My bedroom is my safe space. My clean space and which I have certain rules that I follow on a daily basis to keep things a certain way. I figure the only true way around this is basically to integrate my room into the rest of the house. It’s not great because my stuff is going to get “contaminated” but what choice do I have? I know to say that it isn’t, is a lie is w stretch too far. My brother doesn’t wash his hands unless told to and to manage that all day is impossible. So stuff is going to be in contact, first hand, second or third with stuff that isn’t clean. But again, what can I do? Spend my life walking around with wipes? As a side note, I’m worried that my 3D glasses came into contact with the underside of my belly/crotch area while I was getting changed (they were in my drawer). I have an overwhelming urge to wipe them but I probably should just leave them as is because I have a problem with depth perception and I have no idea half the time how close or far things are. It may not have touched at all. Just feeling about down and resigned.

Well the week has been going OK but I still feel frustrated because I don’t feel like I’m breaking through the wall that I want to. I know what @PolarBearwould say. He’d say “stop the compulsions”. The problem is the huge fear of not doing them. For example, I have recently been to the toilet and I can feel a wet patch on my crotch. If my hand as much as glances that area or is perceived to, then I have to wash my hands. Well, no, I don’t have to wash my hands technically but I also don’t want urine on everything. Anyway, the same applies to all my issues I guess. The problem is that I know that to just give in and not do any of the compulsions would be liberating but my life would be definitely more unsanitary. I can’t convince myself that that is a worthwhile compromise. I mean, logically it is but I also don’t want my brother’s pee on my foot or whatever else on my hands and then In my bed or on my computer. It’s so frustrating!!

I used to use Twitter a lot because of loneliness but I realised that actually it just stoked my anxiety. I am really glad I don’t use it anymore and I would never ever recommend anyone look to the Twitterverse to get medical help.

Like Caramoole said, reassurance has this can get knack of providing a temporary release of anxiety but it doesn’t deal with the problem and the anxiety will return. If you sit with the anxiety, eventually it will go down without the compulsion. And it is long term more effective.

Thanks Malina! I think I’ll get there. It’s just a learning curve.

Hi Caramoole. It’s actually what I meant to talk here!

I don’t think you should ruminate on it more. I think that would be a mistake. I think that you need to let these thoughts just lie. Accept that they are thoughts, just that and nothing more. You are wanting certainty and it’s often really hard to get absolute certainty. So you say what if? Fact is that if you aren’t sure anything happened, it very likely didn’t. Give yourself a break, distract yourself. Why don’t you and your partner take your kid and enjoy the sunshine

I understand Nikki. I really do. Do you want to talk about it? I’m here for you x

I agree, facing the disgust is always the best course of action. I’m trying hard, albeit I had a little slip in the bathroom this morning where I wasn’t sure if I touched my knee after going to the toilet. In essence, I’m pretty sure I did but at worst, if I’m really unlucky, I may have tiny amounts of poo on me, not radioactive waste. That’s how I need to start looking at it anyway I believe. You’re awesome @malina thank you!

My therapist said the following to me one time and I implore you to consider this. “if you aren’t sure something happened in OCD, chances are that it didn’t”. The panic is all in your mind and you are putting thoughts in your head that worry you, but in truth the idea of any harm disgusts you because you are a good person. You aren’t alone x

I think the hardest part of OCD is accepting that it's the disorder; that the fears and worries are just that and not actual facts. The responses you get are just autonomic and really mean nothing. People with OCD will focus more carefully also on regions that worry them and will resultantly misread sensations from said regions. Someone with fears about being gay and has OCD might read that a slight twitch in his lap while seeing a naked guy must be proof that he's gay (it isn't, it could be for a multitude of reasons he felt that). By the same token, someone with contamination OCD might be so focused on his arms while walking past a door that he can't judge for himself anymore in his mind whether his arms touched the door or not as he walks past (even though he didn't). The point, remember that thoughts aren't proof. They are thoughts. You are obviously disturbed by these thoughts and they make you very upset. You obviously also love your brother very much and don't want any harm to come to him. It's all OCD!

Hey all, Thanks for taking the time to read this in what may be a lengthy post but that is aimed to come up with a proper plan of action for moving forward. I want to start by saying that I am already doing a pretty good job at the moment, not to blow my own trumpet. But I feel at this present point, there needs to be more done to continue moving in the right direction, as seen by my recent post where I was a bit flustered by the possibility of my leg touching the toilet basin. In my defence, my brother does pee all over the toilet and the bathroom and there is a chance that I could have potentially got urine on me. That being said, I do know that I blow things up out of proportion and my reaction is more down to feelings of disgust as opposed to actual worries about things doing me harm. Anyway I digress. I've actually been taking a lot in from these forums as of late. I have to thank the recommendation of people like Polar Bear for recommending to read more of the posts. The reason that I have learnt so much from these forums is that, whether people who post realise or not (I'm talking about the ones currently suffering more so than those recovering/advising etc) but most cases if not all follow a near identical construct. Obviously that is why it is OCD after all but it's really simple. You have fears or concerns -> you perform compulsions to relieve that concern -> you tell yourself that the compulsions are essential and that you have to do them or otherwise everything will go to pot. There is obviously a whole lot of denial in there as well where you try to convince yourself that the reason that you're doing this isn't because you have a disorder but because there is something inherently wrong with you or that, in some cases, other people just aren't seeing things clearly enough. I know with me and my contamination aspects, I'm always looking around at other people and thinking to myself "why does that not bother them?" Eventually the realisation does come that the reason it doesn't bother them is because the reality isn't as anxiety provoking as you feel it to be. It's interesting though reading other people's situations and my heart goes out to everyone. I do think though that we can all beat this. In truth, I've found following set programmes of CBT quite hard, partly because I'm currently doing zoom calls with my therapist rather than in person and also because I am not as organised as I would like to be (which is ironic since I am also very particular and organised in other aspects). But anyway... I do have a lot of issues and I am not going into each of them. I think a really good thing that has developed over time is that I now know clearly when I am performing a compulsion. That isn't to say that I always avoid doing the compulsion, I am not there yet, and yes, sometimes doing it does temporarily make you feel better, but I can nevertheless look back on an action and say "no, you didn't need to do that!". What's interesting also is that I started this post thinking that I was going to try and work on a schedule with your help to improve things. To list down every compulsion I do would take forever mind you and also, getting you to tell me the answer in a way would not be a good thing because it's reassuring me, right? That being said, I do find myself hitting a few stumbling blocks and I don't really know how to break them. The most common of these stumbling blocks involves the bathroom and bodily fluid "contamination". The main culprits are urine, faeces and semen but sure, it goes beyond that to sweat, blood, spit and anything else that you can excrete from your body. I think the first thing that my therapist has tried to tell me is that "if it comes from you, then it can't harm you" and that is a smart way of looking at things. That being said, I do get discomfort at the thought of any of these excretory products on my person, whether it be hands, clothes or whatever. It's true that whenever I go for a pee, I usually end up changing at the very least my shirt. The reason for that is that I do have bladder issues and I can potentially/if not likely get some urine on me. It might land on my leg or feet or shirt in varying amounts. Tonight, I was too sleepy to care about it landing on my foot, came back to my room, realised what I did and then was like OMG OMG, I need to wipe everything. I haven't wiped everything , although I will admittedly say that I did sniff a couple of things but I did come to the realisation that even if I did get some urine on my property, and it didn't dry on my foot before I even went to my room, then it's not going to do me any harm. That's not an easy conclusion to come to trust me but here I am typing on my computer after sniffing some things and I could potentially have a speck of urine on my hands or presence and i am still using my computer. That's a risk I am just having to take - I risk I might add that deep down know has no consequences besides revulsion at the thought of there being urine on there. In terms of other stuff, I think SnowBear did an amazing job in trying to calm me down in terms of semen. I guess again, it's one of those things where the revulsion of it being blown out of proportion and why I have no desire to pain my room with it, if I make a concerted effort to keep clean, wash my hands, sure, there might be a speck of it on my clothing or what not but it's not really the end of the world that I feel it is. In terms of faeces, it's a bit more of a complicated situation. The thought of having that on my presence really disturbs me and is something that I actually really struggle with. Actually, going to the toilet for that purpose is probably one of the most challenging things I do every day. Part of the reason for that is that my brother pees all over the floor (he's autistic) and I have to mop the floor usually before I can sit on the toilet but putting my shorts near or on the floor isn't really something that I am particularly thrilled about when I'm going. And then there is the whole wiping stuff which in itself is really distressing. Without the intention of distressing or upsetting anyone, I do kind of figure that I can't be the only one to occasionally get my hands slightly unclean in the process of wiping myself down, at least I hope not. I feel like it's just one of those things, especially if you happen to be using poor/cheap loo paper. The problem for me is that, if I do find myself in that situation and I know that my hand isn't clean, trying to get my trousers and boxers up without contaminating my clothes is a real problem. Again, I have spoken with my therapist about this sort of thing and he will tell me that it's something that people have been doing for years and years and people just don't think about it. That being said, if someone is consciously aware that they have poo on their hands, I don't know how they just go "OK, I am going to pull my pants up anyway" knowing full well that they could be getting that very stuff on their clothes. I am also very conscious about which hand I use to turn the tap on, which hand I flush the toilet and so on. I don't think though in these cases, that is particularly a weird thing to do. Changing your clothes after you've been is probably overkill but I think to myself, OK, I have my brother's urine on my shorts from the toilet floor or my shorts aren't clean because i've pulled my pants up and I think it's the safest option. In reality, again, there is probably no harm that is going to come from it if I did have some on me but that doesn't really comfort me. Probably the most distressing thing though about the contamination side of my OCD does involve my brother though. Like I said, he is autistic and has zero concept of hygiene. He will go to the bathroom without washing his hands for starters. He'll use the food bin which is notoriously a bit rank and not have a second thought about then touching the fridge or a cupboard afterwards without washing his hands. There are a lot of other things too. The reason I mention this is not to slag off my brother at all but to really try and work through these issues. My therapist will say things such as "well, your parents deal with it and they're still alive and well", which is a fair point. I do think however that I obviously have a very very high standard when it comes to cleanliness and, in essence to adapt to the fact that my brother is how he is, have accepted that they have to lower their standards somewhat. And gosh, that's fair enough I guess. At the end of the day, they want to provide my brother with love and affection and allow him to have as normal a life as possible, so of course they'd let some things slide. The problem is for me that I find it very difficult to do. It's bad enough me worrying about getting my OWN bodily fluids on stuff, never mind other peoples. AGAIN, I want to be clear that I am well aware that we don't live in a perfect or perfectly clean world. Everything we touch is probably contaminated to some degree. Even the money that we use probably has lots of contaminants on it. It's just, very hard to swallow when you think about that sort of stuff being brought over to the bed that you sleep or your computer or television remote or whatever. And yeah, I know I don't put any of that stuff in my mouth or whatever but it's just a horrible thought. My OCD is by far solely related to these contamination thoughts but I figure this is as good a start as anything to be working on. I figure if I can break the camels back on one of these things, then everything else will follow suit. It's just a matter of trying to get my head around everything. I would REALLY appreciate your thoughts on this. True enough, probably the easiest way of dealing with is to just succumb and say YES, there might be some poo on my shirt or urine on my shirt and or semen and it might get on my computer or remote or whatever. But so what. I might even push that sentiment to my brother too and say, yep, there is a good chance I'm going to have all that stuff on my presence and on my stuff which I love but it's all really inconsequential. Obviously, I'm not advocating having lumps of stuff on me or a t-shirt drenched in urine but if it is small proportions, then really maybe I should be letting this go? I ask that as a question but I am pretty sure I know the answer. I guess what I am doing right now is trying to convince myself. It's not the easiest. Anyway, I just want to say thank you to everyone who shares their thoughts on here. It really helps you in more ways than one to kind of process your own situations. I really hope that people can find the peace they deserve with this rubbish illness because it's not fair. I know you guys can pull through however - it's what I intend to do myself.

That’s the best way to deal with it in my books. Do not engage! And run free!

I actually have great news that I I managed to get on with my day, play video games and have a good evening. So yay! Thank you all for the love!

Well I haven’t changed my clothes and gone back to bed. I think that was the right decision to make!

I don’t know why but I’m currently going through a phase where I’m constantly wondering whenever I’m in the bathroom that my leg is touching the toilet. The problem isn’t such that it is touching the toilet but the fact that my brother whizzes all over the place and that probably means the toilet basin has whiz on it. Obviously my folks clean it and it could have been clean but I can’t help but feel unclean at the thought of it. Can you just walk me through this? I think that the way to go is assume that if I’m not sure something happened, it probably didn’t. But there is a chance it could have brushed and I not feel it. But does it matter? It probably doesn’t. Just kind of annoyed at myself because I’ve been doing so well recently.

I can understand. Being with your mum will help and it’s good that your partner is supporting you. Just be kind to yourself, know that they are just thoughts and that you are ok.

I think long distance relationships are always hard and I can completely understand your discomfort in that. But here is the best advice I can give you. Basically, in any relationship, you have to have trust. Of course, with OCD, you are going to have unwanted intrusive thoughts but that’s all they are. Just let them fade away and try doing something that will occupy your time. Also, if she does cheat on you, she isn’t a great catch anyway?

Hi there, I’m sorry you are going through a rough time. It sounds like you are really struggling and the doctors haven’t been too great a help. I know the thoughts cause you a lot of anxiety but the worst thing you can do is give them any credibility. Just try and acknowledge them as thoughts that are passing by and with time the anxiety will start to fade away. It will get better. Try doing something like chatting or something to take your mind off of it.

I know you can do this Nikki!

Oh Nikki, I’m sad to read that you are feeling bad. It sounded like you were making positive steps so don’t give up. You just have to keep going. Remember every time you give into your compulsions, it’s like going back to square one. Don’t give in. I know you can do it. Regarding what life can be like, I wouldn’t accept to having a lesser life. You deserve to have exactly the same kind of good life as everyone else and you shouldn’t accept less. Of course, there might be relapses but with the right techniques and tools, you can work through them. Look at Polar Bear as a shining example.