Dental anxiety contamination ocd - need support as very worried !

[alisando123]

Hello,

Haven't posted for a while as was relatively under control with my OCD, but recently it has come back again quite badly, and I'm feeling very anxious

So I've been to the dentist recently for some quite intense procedures on my tooth, I've had a couple of appointments for this, and each time, when I leave I get more and more anxious. Noticing things that could "contaminate" me and make me ill.

One of things I really worry about is cross contamination. I worry in particular about catching HIV/hep c. The first time I went to the dentist I was particularly anxious about the dental nurse using the computer while I was being treated. I wondered if she removed/changed her gloves half way, or maybe if the keyboard was cleaned between patients. She was touching all the dental equipment and passing it to my dentist who would pass it back to her, and then would go and use the computer to type things about my treatment presumably. I kind of calmed down between the appointments thinking surely they use medical keyboards and wipe everything down between patients, or maybe they even swap the keyboard out. 

Skip forward to my next appointment and I knew I would be super on edge about it. I've come out feeling pretty low OCD-wise. I'm absolutely convinced that I've caught something and I'm going to get really poorly, or I won't find out and I'll get really sick. I was looking all over the place thinking about what could be contaminated. Analysing everything the dentist was doing and such. I was watching whether gloved hands were being used in several places, without changing them etc. I even tried to have a look at the computer to see if it had a cover on etc, which it didn't. From what I could gather the dental nurse and dentist kept the gloves on the entire time, even to type on the computer, which presumably is contaminated with other people's mouth germs. I checked out the make of the keyboard (which I know is a compulsion) and they don't do medical ones, so the likelihood of it being wiped between patients is slim.

Question is, what do I do now? Do I just try to move on from this somehow? Do I need to wait a couple of months and get tested for blood borne diseases? Do I need to try and find out the cleaning procedures used? I would have really thought they wouldn't touch a keyboard with germy gloves on, especially not right now with Covid. Am I being overly paranoid? I'm just so worried and feel very alone and daren't tell anyone how scared I am I also feel bad for worrying. The dentist I saw was really wonderful and caring, so I feel bad for even having these thoughts

 

 

[PolarBear]

Yes, you are being overly anxious. You are being anxious about something that doesn't exist.

What you need to do is nothing. I suggest next time you go that you look at nothing, get in the chair, close your eyes and focus on relaxing. That's it.

OCD is a liar. It never tells the truth.

[alisando123]

1 hour ago, PolarBear said:

Yes, you are being overly anxious. You are being anxious about something that doesn't exist.

What you need to do is nothing. I suggest next time you go that you look at nothing, get in the chair, close your eyes and focus on relaxing. That's it.

OCD is a liar. It never tells the truth.

Thanks. I did assume I probably would have to do nothing. Although it is a huge worry for me I know there is a lot that goes on behind the scenes to protect from that kind of thing, but it just seemed a bit odd to me... It's hard to tell the difference between a real threat and ocd playing tricks on me and exaggerating the risk, which is probably negligible. I know others wouldn't have even noticed this. I'm sure over time the anxiety will subside. I felt a bit better when I stopped googling about it and tried to get on with something else. 

I've finished my treatment now so I won't have to go back until I have a regular check up.