Some advice - cleaning and germs

[taurean]

What is normal is probably accepting, but seeking to help overcome, unhelpful issues that our wife has. 

Realising we are overreacting due to OCD, and thinking how someone, others, we know would treat the issue, and how they would respond. 

They wouldn't obsess about it. They would determine a course of action, apply it then not worry about the outcome. If it was unhelpful, they would simply try something else. 

There would be no obsessing, no absolute judgement, no carrying out of compulsions. 

My wife is a mind-reader. She also has white-coat hypertension. I  lived with it for many years - didn't really have time to tackle it using what I have learned in CBT.

But we are working together on this, using CBT. And she is unrecognisable now as to how she was before - it has helped her enormously. 

Part of that process is observing how I, without those issues, operate. I am her "normal" model. 

[dksea]

2 hours ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

"Anything less than total disclosure about everything makes me a terrible wife" etc. It's black and white thinking, filtering, etc. But what is a more flexible belief to work on long term? 

It can indeed be challenging to know what "normal" behavior is when dealing with OCD, especially if you've been dealing with a particular theme for so long.  It's like being airdropped in to a foreign country and told to act normal.  Maybe smiling is normal, maybe its not.  Maybe shaking hands is normal, maybe its horribly offensive.  Who knows!  It might not be easy to know what "normal" is at first, and you probably will make mistakes trying to do the "normal" thing, and thats ok as long as you are working towards being better at learning the difference between normal and not normal.

So what can you do?  What are some steps you can take to learn how to be "normal" about something.

One way, and its the way we all learn what normal is to begin with is to observe others.  Obviously that doesn't work for all situations, but its a start. This can be people in your real life and also people in media (TV/Movies/Books), though of course be careful as people in media especially don't always behave in a normal fashion ;-)

Another way is to get advice from people you trust.  For example, one area i have problems with from time to time is health anxiety.  Its usually too dangerous to run to Google, so if i'm really struggling to decide whether something is worth following up with my doctor or not, I'll ask my mom.  Now, you have to be careful here too as this can turn in to a checking/reassurance compulsion pretty easily.  I use various criteria to limit how often I ask (has this been bothering me for awhile or just a day or two? is it something similar to what i've felt before? does it appear to be an imminent concern or can it wait? have i asked about something similar/related recently? have i asked about anything health related recently?) in addition I make sure that once i've asked, thats it, no repeat questions, no "ok you said it was ok, but what about...".  Because unfortunately I still often have doubts, thats just how OCD works.  But I learn to trust that my moms suggestions and own behavior are "normal" and if i'm going to be better I need to try my best to stick with what she says. 

You therapist/doctor is another good source of learning where to draw the line.  Be proactive and work with them to set up general guidelines you should follow that are healthy and manageable.  Its especially helpful if your significant other/family members are participants in this so they know when its ok to answer your questions and when not to.  You might set a limit on the number of times you are allowed to ask for reassurance when you are feeling anxiety for example.  Or the types of questions its ok for you to ask/them to answer.  If everyone is on the same page its a lot easier to manage than if everyone is trying to guess.  And even if they are not available to join you for a therapy session, you can still discuss things with them and set limits.  For example you could (assuming you haven't already) talk to your spouse and say something like "hey, I know that i tend to confess about X a lot.  Is it ok if I don't confess about X to you?"  Then you don't have to worry about whether or not its ok, they've already told you.  Of course your OCD is probably gonna try and wiggle out of this (sure they said don't confess about X, but what about X+Y? surely thats different riiiiiight) and you have to be careful about having this conversation too often or in too much detail because then its just confession all over again.

Anyway, hope those ideas help.  And remember, its a learning process, so don't be too hard on yourself!

[gingerbreadgirl]

Thank you so much Roy and dksea for such long and thoughtful responses. Lots of food for thought here. Hope you're well  x 

[Avo]

Hi GBG,

 not sure I can add anything to the excellent advice you have received from Roy and Dksea - some wise words there 

Hope your doing a little better today? 

[lostinme]

15 hours ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

Hi all,

Thank you very much for all the fantastic and thoughtful advice, again!

I understand that behaviorally I should be challenging this by doing exposure. But what I am not sure of is how I should address this cognitively  (something I think is often overlooked in self help treatments). I know I have an unrealistic and extreme belief underlying this obsession  i.e. "Anything less than total disclosure about everything makes me a terrible wife" etc. It's black and white thinking, filtering, etc. But what is a more flexible belief to work on long term? This is why I asked about what's  'normal'. Not dissimilar to people asking about what is a normal length shower etc.  

Thank you  x 

To start working on things cognitively I think firstly you need to work out what is your core belief surrounding this. What do you believe will happen if you don’t disclose everything to your partner? You need to be totally honest with yourself, do you use this as an excuse as a reassurance seeking behaviour? if you ask your other half and she says it’s not an issue don’t worry do you get temporary relief because she as said it’s fine? However if she doesn’t give you the answer your hoping for does this cause you to get anxious and upset? These are things only you can answer. 

Im not sure you can get a answer as to what is normal? Every body behaves differently, one person could take five mins to shower, another could take twenty mins and the next person could take forty mins to shower and we can consider them all to be normal. So how do we work out when we consider something we do not to be normal? 

[taurean]

Normality is subjective. The newsagent here would consider it normal for a man to buy cigarettes, some booze then go into the bookies for a bet. 

But I don't smoke, hardly drink and don't gamble. So in my newsagents eyes I wouldn't be normal 

When I prop up the bar with my mates in the pub and read the Times, they - although mostly blue collar workers - would consider that normal for a retired businessman - they wouldn't expect to see me pull out The Sun to read - but of course I might expect them to. 

Most people might consider it normal to carry a large amount of credit debt, buying things they wanted  and charging them to the card.

We don't do that. And traditionally if there was a significant need for money we didn't have, e.g.a replacement car or a new roof, we would take out a personal loan at sensible interest terms. That's our normal re finance matters. 

I think the key may lie back in senses of values in marriage or a live together relationship. 

Each partner needs space and time to themselves, and consideration of their personal special needs. 

But if a partner has a specific issue that is annoying to the other - we must evaluate whether to interfere or leave well alone. We can't expect our OH to have exactly the same values as us, the same leanings - so for me it would be normal to mostly accept the other half for what they are. 

My own sense of values meant I eliminated from my search for a wife anyone who smoked. Nor anyone not of similar class and intellect. 

But I don't let my wife's mind-reading go unchecked - I am gradually helping her to overcome that as to me its an unhelpful cognitive thinking distortion and she agrees. 

Edited October 12, 2018 by taurean

[gingerbreadgirl]

12 hours ago, lostinme said:

To start working on things cognitively I think firstly you need to work out what is your core belief surrounding this. What do you believe will happen if you don’t disclose everything to your partner? You need to be totally honest with yourself, do you use this as an excuse as a reassurance seeking behaviour? if you ask your other half and she says it’s not an issue don’t worry do you get temporary relief because she as said it’s fine? However if she doesn’t give you the answer your hoping for does this cause you to get anxious and upset? These are things only you can answer. 

Im not sure you can get a answer as to what is normal? Every body behaves differently, one person could take five mins to shower, another could take twenty mins and the next person could take forty mins to shower and we can consider them all to be normal. So how do we work out when we consider something we do not to be normal? 

Hi Lostie,

I think you are right in that I hope for my partner to reassure me and that makes me feel safe.  It's almost like: "if she knows everything about me and still thinks I'm good then I can't be that bad, right?!" This belief has led to an obsessive need to confess everything whether big or small.  My partner is very sure of herself morally speaking which makes me think she must be *right* about everything and if she is then everything is stable and safe.    I have become obsessive about wanting to meet her approval in everything whether big or small.  It does her head in and she just wants me to be OK.  I am totally aware that it is not healthy and so is she.  

I am trying to fight this and have actually made a lot of progress - but I think behavioural changes can only take you so far when you have some faulty cognitive assessments going on in the backroom!

I guess what I want to know is - is it normal for couples to keep certain things private from each other? E.g. with me and the cleaning thing, if I do something like touch the bin and I know my partner wouldn't like it.  Is it normal to keep something from your partner in order to not rock the boat? Would that be considered a secret? I have lost all perspective on this and would really appreciate some outside input.  

Thank you  xx

Edited October 13, 2018 by gingerbreadgirl

[gingerbreadgirl]

11 hours ago, taurean said:

Normality is subjective. The newsagent here would consider it normal for a man to buy cigarettes, some booze then go into the bookies for a bet. 

But I don't smoke, hardly drink and don't gamble. So in my newsagents eyes I wouldn't be normal 

When I prop up the bar with my mates in the pub and read the Times, they - although mostly blue collar workers - would consider that normal for a retired businessman - they wouldn't expect to see me pull out The Sun to read - but of course I might expect them to. 

Most people might consider it normal to carry a large amount of credit debt, buying things they wanted  and charging them to the card.

We don't do that. And traditionally if there was a significant need for money we didn't have, e.g.a replacement car or a new roof, we would take out a personal loan at sensible interest terms. That's our normal re finance matters. 

I think the key may lie back in senses of values in marriage or a live together relationship. 

Each partner needs space and time to themselves, and consideration of their personal special needs. 

But if a partner has a specific issue that is annoying to the other - we must evaluate whether to interfere or leave well alone. We can't expect our OH to have exactly the same values as us, the same leanings - so for me it would be normal to mostly accept the other half for what they are. 

My own sense of values meant I eliminated from my search for a wife anyone who smoked. Nor anyone not of similar class and intellect. 

But I don't let my wife's mind-reading go unchecked - I am gradually helping her to overcome that as to me its an unhelpful cognitive thinking distortion and she agrees. 

Thanks Roy, this makes sense and I see your point about normality being subjective x

[lostinme]

12 hours ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

Hi Lostie,

I think you are right in that I hope for my partner to reassure me and that makes me feel safe.  It's almost like: "if she knows everything about me and still thinks I'm good then I can't be that bad, right?!" This belief has led to an obsessive need to confess everything whether big or small.  My partner is very sure of herself morally speaking which makes me think she must be *right* about everything and if she is then everything is stable and safe.    I have become obsessive about wanting to meet her approval in everything whether big or small.  It does her head in and she just wants me to be OK.  I am totally aware that it is not healthy and so is she.  

I am trying to fight this and have actually made a lot of progress - but I think behavioural changes can only take you so far when you have some faulty cognitive assessments going on in the backroom!

I guess what I want to know is - is it normal for couples to keep certain things private from each other? E.g. with me and the cleaning thing, if I do something like touch the bin and I know my partner wouldn't like it.  Is it normal to keep something from your partner in order to not rock the boat? Would that be considered a secret? I have lost all perspective on this and would really appreciate some outside input.  

Thank you  xx

It sounds like it’s become a compulsion as well as reassurance, your splitting the hyper responsibility you feel by confessing because then you are not held solely responsible. You feel that she is confident and morally right so if she says it’s all good then everything is good, stable and safe and you don’t need to worry. You don’t seem to feel confident enough in yourself to act on your own judgement and make decisions without asking for her approval because you are worried that you might morally make the wrong decision.

I agree you can only do so much behaviourally and then you have to work through your thinking behaviour to make the necessary changes  to continue to move forward.

I won’t personally go out of my way to keep secrets, if something directly affects my partner as well as myself then I will share this with them, however if it doesn’t I won’t. When making decisions I won’t seek his advice I usually make my own decisions unless this affects him too xx

 

[gingerbreadgirl]

13 hours ago, lostinme said:

It sounds like it’s become a compulsion as well as reassurance, your splitting the hyper responsibility you feel by confessing because then you are not held solely responsible. You feel that she is confident and morally right so if she says it’s all good then everything is good, stable and safe and you don’t need to worry. You don’t seem to feel confident enough in yourself to act on your own judgement and make decisions without asking for her approval because you are worried that you might morally make the wrong decision.

I agree you can only do so much behaviourally and then you have to work through your thinking behaviour to make the necessary changes  to continue to move forward.

I won’t personally go out of my way to keep secrets, if something directly affects my partner as well as myself then I will share this with them, however if it doesn’t I won’t. When making decisions I won’t seek his advice I usually make my own decisions unless this affects him too xx

 

Thank you lost, you have hit so many nails on the head here! Lots for me to work on. Such as making decisions without looking to my partner for approval. This is all fantastic advice.

Thank you for taking so much time to help me. Hope you're well  x 

[lostinme]

8 hours ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

Thank you lost, you have hit so many nails on the head here! Lots for me to work on. Such as making decisions without looking to my partner for approval. This is all fantastic advice.

Thank you for taking so much time to help me. Hope you're well  x 

Don’t forget it won’t just work overnight it will take lots and lots of practice, but eventually the more you do it the more confident you will become in yourself and you won’t feel the need to rely so much on her and have to put everything past her before you make a decision. This will eventually be better for the both of you xx

[gingerbreadgirl]

On 14/10/2018 at 22:25, lostinme said:

Don’t forget it won’t just work overnight it will take lots and lots of practice, but eventually the more you do it the more confident you will become in yourself and you won’t feel the need to rely so much on her and have to put everything past her before you make a decision. This will eventually be better for the both of you xx

Thank you lost, I've very much taken on board what you've said x 

[gingerbreadgirl]

Hi all 

This continues to be a big problem for me. I am finding it almost impossible to resist the urge to be hyper vigilant of my actions in terms of how clean they are. I have totally lost perspective on what's normal and what isn't, and my partner is a terrible frame of reference cos she has her own issues with this. I keep realising I do things without thinking that are actually kinda gross, and it's made me think that I'm doing all kinds of things my OH would hate if she knew about theM. She is really trying her best not to feed my compulsions but it doesn't make it easy for her though when I keep confessing to stuff she'd rather not know about. I know what I should do ocd wise but I feel like I would be deliberately doing something my partner would hate and I can't bring myself to do that. And so I'm stuck in a stale mate and it's dragging me down. Not sure what to do. 

Edited November 5, 2018 by gingerbreadgirl

[Gemma7]

This is what i would do. I'd talk to my partner about how living up to a set standard is affecting my OCD and that it's making me unhappy and from now on I need to be the boss of my own cleanliness decisions. The reasons for this are so that my confidence in my decisions increases, my attention is less focused on what is right and wrong regards cleanliness therefore making me happier and more able to focus on productive ways of having a happy loving relationship. 

Then after that conversation I'd focus on guessing where you want to place your cleanliness standards irrespective of whether they are 'correct' or not. You have to guess the balance and readjust according to whether you are happy with the outcome. The essential thing is to not have it impact on your day to day life. Remember before you focused on it how you got by just fine? Aim for that version of GBG and see how you get on. 

[gingerbreadgirl]

Thanks gemma. We have actually had that very conversation about  a hundred times! I tell her i can't live up to these standards and she tells me she doesn't want me to, she wants me to use my own judgment, etc. The thing is although she says this in theory, in practice whenever a specific example comes up she can't help making her feelings known. And this feeds into my ocd, I've got so many compulsions around this now  - only just this second I cleaned my phone with anti bac because I worried i got it contaminated at work. I know I shouldn't do it but I can't bring myself to not because I feel it then becomes something I've done on purpose. I feel there such a big difference between doing things unknowingly - like before - and doing them on purpose which it would be now because I'm so vigilant of it. If that makes sense! I know all this is irrational but it is so hard to shake. 

Hope you're OK  x 

[Gemma7]

22 minutes ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

she can't help making her feelings known.

Well then she needs to try. This requires both of you doing what's best for you and your relationship. 

 

23 minutes ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

And this feeds into my ocd, I've got so many compulsions around this now  - only just this second I cleaned my phone with anti bac because I worried i got it contaminated at work. I know I shouldn't do it but I can't bring myself to not because I feel it then becomes something I've done on purpose. I feel there such a big difference between doing things unknowingly - like before - and doing them on purpose which it would be now because I'm so vigilant of it. If that makes sense! I know all this is irrational but it is so hard to shake. 

Yes it makes sense. Nothing has changed except your perception of your responsibility in this. Feeling responsible like any emotion can be ramped up by behaviour and that's what the compulsions are doing. The more compulsions you do the worse you feel, you know this. The question is, who benefits from you acting this way?

[gingerbreadgirl]

5 minutes ago, Gemma7 said:

Well then she needs to try. This requires both of you doing what's best 

To be fair she does try incredibly hard and she rarely says anything  - it's only because I know her and I can see it on her face. I know this is hard for her and she has been really supportive of me. 

You're totally right that nothing has changed except my perception, and every compulsion I do adds to this. I've had a chat with my OH just now saying all this and that I have to do what is best for my ocd even if she wouldn't like it and she agreed. So I feel like we have a good platform now to work from. 

Thanks again gemma your help is much appreciated x

[Gemma7]

2 minutes ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

I've had a chat with my OH just now saying all this and that I have to do what is best for my ocd even if she wouldn't like it and she agreed. So I feel like we have a good platform now to work from. 

That sounds really good, I'm glad for you both. Hopefully you will get a handle on this very soon x

[gingerbreadgirl]

Thanks gemma  x

[gingerbreadgirl]

Aargh massively struggling with this right now. Have overwhelming urge to confess something to my OH who keeps adamantly telling me not to! Need someone to give me a gigantic kick up the bum! 

[Gemma7]

Come on GBG! No confessing. Make the choice for your mental health, your life free from OCD, don't give OCD a leg up!

[gingerbreadgirl]

Thanks gemma. I needed that. I am digging deep! 

[gingerbreadgirl]

Well I have resisted the urge basically by taping my mouth shut and I think the danger zone for confessing has passed, for now anyway.  

Why is it so flipping difficult!

[taurean]

Because it's OCD. 

You seem to have a particularly pernicious version of this urge to confess

In general terms, I reckon we can - when we manage an upward curve of resistance (with occasional setbacks)  - reach a gain line beyond which the power of the compulsive urge diminishes and we start to regain control. 

Keep resisting and refocusing GBG. You know the cognitive side of this, what the illness is doing and why. And you know that the compulsion hinders not helps. 

 

[gingerbreadgirl]

Hi Roy,

Thanks for this. I resisted the urge to confess and it has faded somewhat; although it is still there to some degree. As you say I just have to keep biting  my tongue over and over. I also get the urge to "neutralise" cleaning things so I don't need to confess. I feel constantly annoyed at myself for feeling like this and can't honestly explain it because I know it has absolutely no basis in reality. I am just trying to get on with my day though and not over think what I'm doing. 

Thanks again x

Edited November 7, 2018 by gingerbreadgirl