For me… I suffer from contamination, intrusive thoughts, “happy thoughts” and hoarding.

When I was younger, my friends would constantly mention that I was a pack rat. I was obsessed with saving papers from school, letters, etc when I was younger. And as I got older, the boxes of things I’d save would start to pile up. Eventually it turned from saving things to purchasing back up of things. I know a lot of people who buy back up’s of their favorite MAC product because normally, they’re limited edition and that’s reasonable. But I backups of random things. Kleenex, bar soap, food’s, pen’s… ELF makeup brushes… just plenty of random things that dont really need to be “back ups”. And for awhile, candles. I bought SO many candles at some point. If I found a favorite scent, I’d buy five of them. Just in case and the bad part about it? I dont light candles. I save them. Even though I have backups, I dont want to lose them. With that said, you can only imagine the things I have piled up in my room (entry about my room and my mess later).

With intrusive thoughts, besides the one I mentioned earlier (about the yes and no) it didnt go beyond that until recently. Recent as in maybe within the last two or so years? I would have little intrusive thoughts here and there, but nothing that kept me up at night. My intrusive thoughts got at their worst when I was able to minimize my contamination problem in 2008. One OCD went down and another went up. It was so bad that I literally couldnt sleep because I was scared. I was paranoid when I drove and when I’d step out of the house. Every sound made me jump. When my contamination went back up, the intrusive thoughts started to go down. When my boyfriend left for Basic Training late last year, I knew that would probably be the hardest thing I could deal with. Who was I going to call when I couldnt sleep cause I was scared? Surprisingly, I tried really hard to be strong while he was gone and I had maybe, 4 or so nights when I wasnt able to sleep while he was away at Basic. So that was pretty good. Right now, my intrusive thoughts havent acted up too much. Though I will admit, I’m scared to get a job because if I have to close, my intrusive thoughts will probably act up badly.

I dont know if there’s a term for this so let’s just call it Happy Thoughts. Its when… say I’m doing something. Writing, drinking something, eating, holding my breath… things that you do where you’re required to stop. If someone is talking and they end a sentence with a word that isnt “happy” I cant stop what I’m doing until they do.

Perfect example of this is something that happened last night.

I was drinking water and my husband was talking to me and he ended his sentence with “die” and I couldnt stop drinking my water. I tried to convinced my OCD we can just go off a word on TV, that’ll work, right? NO. It doesnt work like that. The original person who said the word has to say something else. I eventually ended up spitting up the water. And told him he had to end his sentence with some other word! Oh! And another word you should never end your sentence with when you’re talking to me it. I, myself avoid ending my sentences with that word. And yes, it has something to do with the movie. I saw that movie when I was in the 4th grade and since then I’ve had an OCD about that word. So say I’m in the car and the radio is playing. If is switch the station and the last word I heard from the previous station is “it” or “kill” or something (you know, rap songs these days) I have to switch it back and switch it again on a “happy” word. Same goes for if I turn off the engine, I have to start it again and turn it off again.

Contamination is the most dominant of all my types. It bothers me on a daily, hourly, minute basis. For example, sometimes when my dad is out, he’ll call me and ask me if I want anything eat. When he gets me food, I always always always have to disinfect my drink cup. Before it comes in my room, it had to be disinfected. The only time it doesnt have to be is if I’m planning on showering soon. The rules for my room depend on what I’m doing. If I’m home and I dont plan to shower anytime soon (like now, its 4PM, I dont plan on showering until tonight) then everything has to be clean and disinfected if its not clean. If it were closer to my shower time and I had no plans to go on my computer from the time I’m eating to when I shower, then the cups/plates/etc that come into my room dont have to be cleaned. This has gotten to the point where I’ve disinfected Pepsi can’s and accidentally got disinfectant on the mouth rim. Pepsi and Lysol do not taste good together!

Okay, my OCD may be bad. But at least I’m not like Emma on Glee. I will never disinfect every single grape before I eat it!

Doing laundry (like I did today) can be hard sometimes. I put my clothes in the washer, disinfect the inside top part of the washer so that when I pull the clean clothes out and into the dryer, if something touches the sides I know its clean. Transferring the clothes from the washer to the dryer can be difficult sometimes, especially when its bed sheets or my most hated laundry – my comforter. You can not imagine how stressful that is! After putting my clothes safely into the dryer, I have to wash my hands after pushing the “start” button. Taking it out of the dryer is a hassle as well. I have to make sure the clean clothes are wrapped in each other, nothing is hanging or sticking out and I’m hugging it as close to me as I can. It cant touch the wall or ANYTHING on the way to my room. Not only that but I have to make sure my pajama pants arent touching the wall, the stairs or anything while I’m doing this. And yes, I’m aware of everything that’s going on at the same time.

Like today, I was bringing up some clean clothes up to my room and my slipper back brushed up against the stair, I have to disinfect it later. And my OCD will remind me over and over and over until I do it, it’s reminding me right now. But since I spray it with Lysol spray, I have to wait until shower time to do it. So it cant pressure me to do it now since I physically cant.

When I bring up the laundry, it’s multiple times. I dont just gather everything in one huge ball. No no, that’s a bad idea. I usually take my face cloths/socks/panties and wrap them in a feet towel and bring them up that way. Then I move on to shirts/tanktops/pajama pants and wrap them in together and bring them up that way. Then if I’m washing my bath towel, that usually goes last with any remaining feet towels.

Right now, my OCD is to the point where I cant touch anything that I’m unsure of if its clean or not. Like I got a package yesterday of makeup. It obviously wasnt packed “clean” like and I dont know who touched it before me so as of right now I cant put it away because I’m in my “clean” state. So I have to wait, again, until before shower time.

I hope this made sense, or didnt since I think its not suppose to? But hopefully you have a better understand! Goodness, that was a lot to type up lol.

Morning Ritual

Every morning, I have a ritual. I cant do anything until I finish this ritual or my entire day will feel “off” and most likely, I’ll be irritated the entire rest of the day. And it has to be in this order. This is my current ritual.

• Roll up fleece blanket and place next to towels (which are on my bed)
• Change from pajama’s into “house clothes”
• Put on socks
• Put on slippers
• Pee
• Brush teeth
• Wash face
• Wash glasses
• Wash hands
• Come back to room and fold bath towel, place next to pillow, place feet towel folded on top of bath towel and place clean pair of socks on top of feet towel

If I have to do laundry that morning I do laundry after washing my glasses then I wash my hands, if I dont then I’ll end up having to wash my hands twice that morning.

Night Ritual

• Vacuum bathroom rug
• Wash hands
• Disinfect toilet cover
• Grab towels and socks from my room
• Bath towel on the toilet cover, feet towel on the floor and socks on the bath handle
• Place slippers semi next to feet towel
• Close bathroom door
• Close mom’s bedroom door
• Vacuum room completely
• Disinfect other toilet seat
• Brush teeth
• Undress (in a particular order)

It use to take me an hour to do my night ritual and with practice (not that I had a choice) it was easier and easier to do, now it takes me a total of 10 minutes to set up to shower. On the days I’d work over 12hr shifts at my previous job, doing this at 4AM wasnt my favorite time of the day.

Shower Ritual

• Wash feet
• Shave
• Shampoo hair
• Body
• Face wash
• Rinse face and hair and body at the same time
• Conditioner
• Wash feet again

This use to be different, I use to do everything twice but I realized how much it stripped my hair of its moisture and my skin so I had to force myself to do it only once. And believe me, that was really hard to stop doing.

Like I mentioned, I have other rituals that I do when the situation happens. And today’s one of those days. Why? Because my dad showered today and when my dad showers, he moves everything in the bathroom. It drives me nuts. I have to go and fix everything before I can shower. Seriously, just thinking about it irritates me.

Having two people with OCD living in the same house never goes over well. Ever.