OCD or Preference

[Ashley]

I am a big believer in we can only recover if we are 100% honest with ourselves about the impact of OCD on us, even if we can't address it right now or even if we are not honest with others.

But I am stumped on this  ....

So, office story.

Every night when I leave the office I quickly check everything is off (10-15 seconds everything total) and I put the toilet lid down, no anxiety I just do it. I say it’s a preference, but Zoe my colleague in the charity office (well was, she is social distancing from my generic nagging lol) picked up on me doing this (mainly because the lid was down every morning she went into the toilet) and she thinks it’s part of my OCD.  So after days of her nagging at me, I left it up, I even pinned a cheeky note to it and I left it up for a week, still no anxiety.   So I put it down other night when doing checks.

She thinks because I leave it up (I may have said to stop flies getting in) it’s OCD.  I say because there’s no anxiety and I can leave it up as proved it’s a preference.

OCD or acceptable ‘perhaps annoying’ preference???

 

[Gemma7]

From what you describe it sounds like an annoying preference

Because you can break your routine and you have no subsequent anxiety, it doesn't seem like OCD to me. 

[AnxiousAnnie]

I would tend to agree 

[Lollipop]

Agreed!

[PolarBear]

The question is, is putting the lid down a compulsion? For it to be a compulsion, it must be done to try and counter anxiety or another form of distress like fear, disgust shame. Compulsions can also be done to stop a perceived bad thing from happening. 

Only you can answer if these criteria are met. 

In addition, your lack of anxiety when leaving the lid up points to this ritual not being a compulsion.

I'm thinking preference.

[gingerbreadgirl]

I agree. To me this seems like a preference which could be a compulsion if your ocd latched onto it. 

 

[gingerbreadgirl]

10 hours ago, Ashley said:

she is social distancing from my generic nagging

Love this what a great strategy  

[Ashley]

6 minutes ago, gingerbreadgirl said:

Love this what a great strategy  

I'm tired, meant to write 'moaning' not nagging. Me, moan? never. lol

[dksea]

16 hours ago, Ashley said:

Every night when I leave the office I quickly check everything is off (10-15 seconds everything total) and I put the toilet lid down, no anxiety I just do it. I say it’s a preference, but Zoe my colleague in the charity office (well was, she is social distancing from my generic nagging lol) picked up on me doing this (mainly because the lid was down every morning she went into the toilet) and she thinks it’s part of my OCD. 

Just because something is routine or habitual doesn't mean its compulsive. 
I say if its not having any appreciable impact on your quality of life (i.e. you spend an inordinate amount of time making sure its put down 'correctly', you go significantly out of your way to do the task, etc.) then its not OCD.  The lack of anxiety around it too seems to belie the idea that its OCD driven.  Lots of people like to tidy up/set things in order when the leave their home or office each day.  

And even on the off off off off off chance this is somehow tangentially connected to your OCD it would be so so so so so so low down on the priority scale it would be worth simply ignoring and focusing on more important battles. (side note: I think the line between our behaviors is not necessarily as clear cut as some like to believe,  it seems likely to me that theres significant bleed over into how we live our lives in general connected to how we compensate/deal with OCD.  I tend to worry less about non-OCD stuff, and I hypothesize its in part due to the fact that I hate when OCD makes me worry about stuff I don't want to, for example.)