Do It Anyway

• I haven't kept track of the exact number of days, but it's been weeks since I've done one of my hours-long hand washing rituals. While I have, probably 3-4 times, washed my hands for longer than a normal person would, the longest I've done that is less than 10 minutes.

• I've been putting all the groceries away as they come home. Nothing has stayed on the floor for a very long time.

• I've been having a healthy breakfast and taking a multivitamin every day for a while now, and I'm feeling better.

• I'm exercising much more regularly.

• I'm doing more things I enjoy.

• I finally got that blanket out I was working on for my daughter, the one I was afraid to touch because it was "contaminated". I'll continue working on it now.

• I've allowed a visitor to stop by twice now. That's huge, and a first since 2009.

• I finally got the living room arranged just the way I want it! That's also been on hold since 2009.

• I've been asking for less reassurance, and almost never asking for a "spotter" to watch me do things. Major improvements on that front.

• I'm cooking more! And eating healthier in general.

My fingernails are growing - not just back, but kind of long! I have not had any length to my nails in years. Kinda makes me want to paint them. I just might.

My mantra, as I press on through this week, this journey, this fight, is: be afraid, and do it anyway.

DO IT ANYWAY.

"Courage is simply the willingness to be afraid and act anyway."

Ufffgh

I took an unintended break. Things are much the same with most of my issues. I think the laundry might be taking a backslide. Scratch that, I know it is. But my hands! I went without washing them at all for several nights. It's been weeks since I did one of my hours-long pre-bed rituals. My hands have shed layers of dead crap which had basically created a shell. I have feeling in my fingertips again! The backs of my hands are so incredibly soft. They have no bled in weeks. My nails are beginning to thicken to a point of near-normal, and some of them even look...dare I say pretty? But I still have redness. I don't get that. I no longer have the ring at at my wrist, clearly indicating where I repeatedly and painfully wash to to many, many times per day. That makes me feel like I've conquered at least something.

However, I am on the floor again. I've been taking the easy way out. I've been letting the bitch ocd win far too often. But I didn't really want to be in my bed. Not after the things he said to me at the beginning of this month. Hell, I didn't even want to exist after that. Sure, sure, he followed it all with sometimes I feel that way, but the damage had been done. Those words had been etched into my very freaking soul.

It's a slow climb, and one I'm not completely sure I want to make. I feel like I have done this so many times, only to have the rug yanked out from beneath me. There's only so many times a person will run after a 10 mile goal, only to get to 8 miles and have the marker moved to 30. Lather, rinse, repeat. I'm tired, people. Tired. Bone tired, and mentally exhausted. I ask what the hell I am fighting for when (a) it seems like everything I thought I had is gone and (b) it never seems to really matter anyhow.

I've been in a dark place, not suited for blogging. And yes, I know I have potential. I know I could do great things. I know I could have a good life. Thing is, half of me feels like it's missing. I feel shattered and broken. It's an effort to summon the desire to live every day, let alone do anything else.

But, I got up today and ate a healthy breakfast. I took a vitamin. I ate a healthy snack. I started thinking about healthy recipes. I forced myself to tackle a couple of chores that scared me. I guess I am trying again. However, if I am to be honest here, I am so close to breaking point that I don't know what will happen if this all falls apart and something like what happened at the beginning of the month happens again. At that point, I think I'd like to crawl up my own ass and die. It usually takes days to a couple of weeks for me to find my center again. It took a month this time, and I can't even say I'm really there even now. I'm forcing myself. I have to. I keep hoping there's something to all of that "fake it 'til you make it" shit.

Meat Blood and Skin Pieces

I woke up today feeling pretty good and clean. Which is, with ocd, a bad thing. The urge is to stay as clean as I currently am, and that gets me nowhere but into a fearful avoidance routine.

On the menu for dinner tonight was a roast, which I was to make in my newly-cleaned slow cooker. The slow cooker had spent the past couple of years in a cabinet beneath a drawer in the kitchen which previously was home to many a band-aid and thus it and anything in the cabinets below it was considered "contaminated". The other day during my mass cleaning spree, I said screw it and got my slow cooker out and ready for use.

Now, I'm not a big fan of meat. I don't care to eat it, and I really don't care to touch it uncooked. Red meat is much worse because it looks all bloody - and if you've been reading my blog for more than a day you know that blood and I don't get along particularly well. But even that is something I can usually deal with; I slice open the bloody meat package with a knife and use said knife to stab the meat and lift it ever so carefully into whatever thing I'm cooking it in. But today, as I was rather confidently slicing the package open, I noticed wet blood on the outside. The out-freaking-side of the package.

So shit. I have a difficult enough time dealing with meat blood on the inside of the goddamn package. At least when it's on the inside, I can be reasonably certain that it is from the meat and not an injured human being handling the meat. The fact that it was still wet blood didn't matter much to me, because I'd had it stored inside of the plastic grocery bag in the fridge overnight. Conceivably, this could have kept the blood wet if it was not from the meat. Likely? No. Probable? Unlikely. Possible? The ocd can make anything seem possible. And the way ocd works is something like this:

Most obscure, tiny possibility, no matter how remote ---> It's possible, therefore it is not 100% safe ---> Possible means probable ---> Probable means likely ---> Likely means almost certainly ---> Almost certainly means the risk here is about 99% ---> BAM! PWNED by OCD

I wanted more than anything to throw that meat away. I didn't. I put it in the cooker, added all of the veggies and seasonings, and moved on. I didn't change clothes, I just washed my hands for about 2 minutes. And because I already felt pretty freaked out, I went ahead and got some things done that I'd been procrastinating about touching.

Earlier this morning when I washed my hands, I had a ton of dead skin come off. This happens occasionally, being the massive user of soap that I am; every week or so, the skin on my hands all sheds like a snake. I rubbed off the extra bits which remained after I dried them, and didn't think anything of it...until I returned later and found pieces of skin all over the sink. And of course my mind starts running races around the potential disasters this could bring about. I mean, sure, I saw a ton of dead, dried up skin come off of my hands - but what if it wasn't from me!? You know, because that makes all the damn sense in the world.

I'm really getting tired of ocd living rent-free in my headspace.

Ignoring The Lion

My ocd evolved quite rapidly from one very specific concern to a spiderweb of relationships to other illnesses, people, places, objects, and experiences. While I wasn't relieving myself in bottles in a dark room like Howard Hughes at my worst, I'd still call it severe. Being housebound for six months qualifies, and I was.

Even eating got to be too challenging; there is always the risk for an unexpected exposure if something doesn't look right or appears to have been tampered with in some manner. For a period of time, I was sleeping on the floor with no blanket or pillow, eating nothing but bottled water, coffee, and snack crackers, and not even stepping out my front door to retrieve packages or mail. The wake-up call came when the "diet" ocd had imposed on me started making me retain fluid in my ankles and my kidneys started hurting all the time from constant dehydration. While I drank the bottled water, it wasn't much. Opening the caps was an exposure for me, and I avoided it until my thirst was so intense it was almost unbearable.

I utilized a broom to reach items placed on the wrong side of the door when mail packages arrived. Literally every single moment of my day consisted of cleaning and washing rituals, and even my sleep was invaded by contamination nightmares. If I came into contact with anything on myself which I believed to be an infection of any sort, a minimum of 4-8 hours of ritual body cleaning and disinfection of the area around me and the area around that would follow.

At my worst, I truly believed suicide was the only way out. I thought my life was over and I was left with an existence of suffering and watching like a ghost as my life, he one I once enjoyed so much, kept going on without me. This was before I experienced the results of response prevention.

If someone had told me five years ago that I'd be living that way, I would have laughed and said, "There's no way in hell I'd ever do that to myself." I completely understand why people have such difficulty imagining why we do the things ocd tells us to do. The worst of it, I think, it the fact that lessening the grip ocd has on me involves reacting to and doing things in such a way that it feels wildly counterintuitive. Common sense says wash if you feel dirty, and our biology has us programmed to react to fear in a certain way. I always say that reducing the ocd's power involves something akin to having a hungry, roaring lion in your living room and knowing that the only way to avoid being consumed is to ignore any urge to respond to the lion or fear the situation causes. Doing anything to placate the lion will only cause it to grow and become angrier. Mindf_ck.

But it is what it is.

I went to sleep last night without washing my hands at all. I didn't plan it that way, but I sat in the recliner feeling like I just needed a break for a moment, then I woke up hours later. I decided to skip the rituals I knew I'd need to go to my bed and sit with the fact that I hadn't washed my hands because it was still a step in the right direction. In all, I slept over 10 hours in the chair. After being awake for two straight days, I guess I needed it. I washed my hands when I got up, but for less than 5 minutes. Feelin' good. In the past, falling asleep with dirty hands might have worked briefly, but it would have been on the floor only and I would have had to spray the floor with disinfectant, change my clothes, and wash any uncovered part of my body as I cannot know what I touched in my sleep. None of that happened, and I don't really feel the need.

The Cold Pool of OCD

Why can't I just stop?

Can I just stop?

How do I stop?

I've come to a few realizations. One is that you can't just stop having ocd. The other is that you must just stop doing ocd. Habituation is jumping into a cold pool; at first, the shock to your body from the cold water is unpleasant. You might have the urge to jump right out of the chilly water and back into the warm air. However, you also probably want to swim and enjoy being in the pool. To get there, you have to wait. You have to allow habituation to occur. If you wait, you'll eventually realize that the water no longer feels uncomfortable. After a few minutes, the water will feel quite comfortable. You will no longer experience the urge to leap out of the pool for the sake of escaping the unpleasantness of the chill.

Now, the water temperature has not changed; the only difference is that habituation has occurred. The unpleasantness, the cues from your brain telling you, "Holy crap, this water is COLD!" have stopped coming. Again, nothing has changed about the situation, the water, or your physical self, per se. Nothing, that is, except habituation. You've "gotten used to" the pool water and you are now free to enjoy whatever activity you jumped into the pool for in the first place. Even if you get out of the pool, say to use the diving board, you will still feel acclimated to the water temperature. Unless you stay out of a few minutes, in which case you will habituate to the air temperature around you. Which is why it is important to keep going back into the pool.

Which is why it is important to keep going back into the places that scare you or make you feel uncomfortable. Avoiding jumping into the pool will not make the water any warmer, and avoiding contamination will not make something any less contaminated.

Habituation also happens much faster if you just jump right the hell into the pool. Easing your way in a little at a time just allows the process to last longer, your mind to consider the coolness of the water longer, your body to experience the unpleasantness longer. The person who jumped in at the same time you started tiptoeing in is already having fun and enjoying the water, while you're still standing there thigh-deep, re-experiencing the shock of the chilly water one step at a time. Whose experience of getting used to the water is likely to be more negative? Who is more likely to avoid the unpleasantness in the future? The tiptoer, of course.

And OCD is the same.

I have the power to either strengthen or take the wind right out of the sails of ocd. Every time I react to an obsessive or frightening thought (i.e. OMG, that red dot is blood!) by washing or performing some compulsion or ritual, I am telling my brain that it was correct in its assessment of the risk. In doing this, my brain takes my action as confirmation, and the compulsion is deemed "necessary" in the future. An unrelated pair of things becomes related, and OCD gains strength and validity. Now all red spots are dangerous and require a decontamination ritual - even if they're easily recognizable as simple polkadots in a pattern on a dress.

I went to sleep two nights in a row with no soap & water handwashing. None. I did briefly wipe my hands with a cloth, but that was it. Will this continue? Likely not quite yet. But I am hoping it will help me break the 4-hour handwashing ritual that nightmares are made of. Time will tell. And meanwhile, I will keep reminding myself of the cold pool.

Band-Aid Success

My kitchen is clean. Boxes are dealt with as they arrive.

And today I removed a band-aid which has been in place since 2009. I cried the tears of a person being released from prison. Because, in a way, I was.

My progress hasn't been without difficult days, nor has it been particularly fast, but it continues to move forward.

Oh how my brain craves certainty. But nothing in life is certain, except possibly that one can drive oneself mad seeking it.

Some Big Stuff

Typically, when groceries come into the house, it is mandatory that they (the containers) are cleaned with bleach. This results in a nasty bleach odor, runny nose, and raw or even bleeding hands and fingers. But even soap was not acceptable. Well, no more. I started with washing just half of the groceries with soap, the other half with bleach. Now, I am washing pretty much everything with regular soap. Eventually, I would like not to wash my groceries at all, but this is huge progress.

In addition, I am now no longer using gloves to handle the laundry. At all. And while that went easier than I expected, I had a really difficult step backwards immediately after. I found something on my daughter's pants that I was sure was something awful. I went on a massive cleaning spree after that, including discarding the pants. Not proud of that. And it totally took the joy right out of my accomplishment (I have not handled all of the laundry glove-free in approximately a year and a half).

I am beginning to feel present again in my life. I'm not where I want to be, but I am feeling happier. I am beginning to enjoy things I used to enjoy before I hit rock bottom. I spent hours today listening to music and singing, and even dancing with my son. It was great. Smiling genuinely feels so good!

There is still the matter of my not leaving the house in quite some time. Oh, I have plenty of excuses, but none of them really justify it. The difference now is that I really would like to go out, and I am nowhere near as fearful as I was before. The weather just really sucks.

Oh, and I don't have nail fungus. I have nail psoriasis. Heh. Either way, my nails look like shit. One of these days I will polish them and take yet another step toward feeling like my former self. Not there yet, but working on it.

Out With The Old Obsession, In With The New

An interesting thing I have noticed about OCD, through my efforts toward recovering my personal control, is that my mind quickly finds something else once a compulsion or obsession is calmed or eliminated. My mind will literally scream at me (well, not literally, just in the sense of a very intense stream of worried thoughts bombarding my consciousness) new, random things to worry about. For example, if the price total of several things I am buying doesn't feel right, or if something about one or more of the items feels wrong, I will be afraid that something bad will happen. I have struggled with that one before, but it mostly vanished when replaced by the more severe contamination fears. It is attempting to return, which I take to mean that the contamination obsessions are loosening their grip on my brain. At least with the magical thinking variation of OCD, I was functional and happy.

ERP Works

I think I am still in shock. Yes, all of the experts will tell you that ERP is the gold standard for OCD treatment, but when you are staring into the hopeless abyss that is the reality that becomes of a life turned living ritual hell, it is really difficult to believe that anything can set you free.

I am not free yet. In fact, I have a lot of work ahead of me. But doing ERP the way I am supposed to has restored something that OCD stole from me: hope. I have been able, through doing ERP, to do things I have not done in two years. I am stunned that this works, mostly because it feels so counter-intuitive at first. I mean, come on, forcing myself to do things that my brain is screaming at me to avoid? Things that the mere thought of result in my heart racing, my palms sweating and feelings of near panic? How can making myself suffer heal me? But it does.

Today, I was able to confront one of my biggest fears. Two of them, actually. Not only was I able to proceed with what I needed to do without getting into major rituals, I tackled both of these things with minimal anxiety symptoms. Typically, even after my rituals, these two things leave my pulse pounding and my breathing shallow and quick. Not today. And, at least two or three times, something happened that absolutely, unequivocally would have sent me back to do things over again. A couple of months ago, nothing would have gotten done tonight. This time, I completed the task.

Despite the fact that I am still in the thick of this and anticipate my share of difficult days and mistakes, I feel...hope.

Consistency is Key

If anyone reading this is suffering through the nightmare that is OCD, and you are wondering what the trick is to ERP, I can tell you: consistency and ritual prevention.

For a few months, I did what I thought was ERP. I would force myself to do exposures, then I would either ritualize for hours afterward or I would take days off between ERP exercises to "recover". The only thing that recovered was OCD; I was getting worse for my efforts. The experience reminds me of a quote that really stuck with me, though I can't for the world recall where I found it. It basically stated that you cannot recover from OCD within the parameters of OCD. It is such an important thing to remember, because it is 100% true.

I have been feeling better lately, but not without hitting a new rock bottom first. One day, completely undone by my own anxiety, kneeling on the floor as bleach dissolved the skin on my hands and knees, I was howling in agony...and still could not stop the ritual. In fact, the pain was so severe (my chemical burns were so bad that I was bleeding) that I kept becoming distracted and having to start over. I was pleading for it to end, and I no longer cared how.

Over the days that followed, I knew I had two options; I either had to take control of my life back, or the self that had existed for more than 30 years would cease to be forever. I asked myself a very critical question; Is anything worth this? Anything? And I thought about that for a while. I examined the question, every terrible possibility, allowing myself to become immersed in the fears that had spawned this demon OCD. And the answer, unequivocally, was no. Even my very worst case scenario was almost laughable by comparison to the hell I had inflicted upon myself for two years.

Now, just having this realization is not a cure, and the feelings don't go away. However, it has served as a catalyst for me to begin doing the real, hard work of ERP. And, much to my astonishment, ERP does work. It really does. I know this because there are things I am doing now with a fair amount of ease which would have crippled me with fear to even think about a few months ago. Often, I find myself smiling because the work is becoming less like work and more automatic.

I faced a fear today that would have sent me into days of compulsion hell. I still did some precautionary measures, but it was not a full-on ritual disaster and I am not overcome with stress and anxiety. That alone is amazing. I don't think I'm out of the woods yet; I will never underestimate the power of OCD. But ERP, well, it's pretty powerful, too.

Three Steps Forward, One Step Back

I assume this is positive progress.

I washed my hair today for the first time in a month. That sounds more disgusting than it is, since my hair is usually very, very dry and washing it daily is not even an option. Still, not pleasant or pretty to go a month. I had just stopped caring about everything, though, and that is most definitely not like me at all.

I called two people who I have not spoken to since May, and had promised to call. The conversations were positive and uplifting. Though I was reminded how far from my former self I am, I was also reminded that I am heading back that direction now.

I tackled a part of my kitchen that had needed organizing really bad. It was an exposure issue, as is anything I don't deal with regularly. I got it done and it feels great. I also organized my cupboards and cleaned and organized my fridge. These are also exposures, since they contain groceries. And groceries really freak me out due to the number of people who touch them before I do.

So that is all good stuff. I did have a bit of a meltdown this evening when the groceries came home, however, and cried for about a solid hour. While wiping down the milk container, I found something on my towel that looked exactly like a piece of dead skin. Skin and skin diseases are the things that freak me out most of all, so this did not sit well. After asking no one in particular, about fifty times, what am I going to do!? I ended up crying and doing a massive cleaning of the kitchen and every grocery item than came home. And, of course, the floor. Sigh. So that didn't go as I might have hoped. Later on, I discovered a similar piece of something on my son's dinner plate. I suspect it was actually a dried up piece of fish fillet. I sealed it in a plastic bag, and when I moved it around in there, it left greasy marks on the bag. Dead skin wouldn't, unless there was something on the skin.

I touched my hair, my freshly washed hair, after touching the scary object in question. I desperately need to highlight, so I am using that as an excuse to re-wash. Oh well. At least I can identify and admit that I am using it as an excuse. Honestly, I'm just kind of relieved that I have the motivation to bother. I was really lost for a while.

Slow and Steady

I seem to be emerging slowly from the latest fear tsunami. It's funny, because after most incidents where I feel out of control or afraid, the waters seem to recede from the shore and all looks deceptively calm. And then, the huge wave comes. I had a nightmare about it last night, actually.

It's easing. My mind is clearing. My hands feel less raw. I washed them only twice today, though the second washing was 15 minutes long and felt all wrong the whole time. The big, thick patches of injured, thickened skin on my palms have given way almost completely to normal, soft skin again - even with the recent washing injuries. My left hand looks completely normal, though my right hand is still dry and peeling a bit. I am actually surprised the scabs are minor and already healing. I guess having some healing already helped save them a bit from my recent setback.

My thoughts are healing. My actions are slow to follow, but the things I am thinking are healthier. I am trying to focus on healing and separating myself from the negativity. None of this is easy, particularly given that my OCD is highly related to the amount of stress I am experiencing and I am under a load of stress. I hate the idea that this is all taking much longer than I hoped, but I keep telling myself that - while this form of OCD is new to me - my experience with OCD has been going on for half my life. Now that it is identified as such, the real work is taking place.

But still, it is trying my patience.

Sticking With It

Some goals are too embarrassing to bother posting. However, since I have made some progress, I will fess up now. A few challenges - some new, some old, dealt with in the past several days:

My children have a new swing set. Things not within my home are not within my control. Thus, the thing feels like a source of possible contamination to me. I am afraid of it. They, however, are not. And the thing is awesome. The mere thought of having such a something in my backyard at their age nearly gives me butterflies just thinking of it. They must play on it. Though my 0 - 100 anxiety level was a 90 when it arrived, I am now at about a 30.

My kitchen has been relatively clean. Back in the day, before this contamination OCD took over my life, my home used to be the envy of others. It's not big, it's not fancy, and it's not even new. But it was nice and tidy all of the time, even when my children were babies. Funny how fear of touching everything makes keeping a tidy home impossible. Dust accumulates, dishes pile up, crumbs sneak up on the kitchen table and seem to multiply while there. But my kitchen is currently, aside from a few dishes in the "soaking side" of the sink, clean. And it has been all week. I have been touching the dirty dishes, loading the dishwasher, putting clean dishes away, all like clockwork. Easy? No. But it is getting easier. I am really proud of myself for sticking with it.

I have gone full 24 hour days without washing my hands, 3 times this month. Now, I am not going out of the house on these days, nor am I doing laundry, but I am doing other typical household necessities. The episode of The OCD Project where everyone had to give up their rituals inspired me. These exposures, I think, have led to massive progress elsewhere. A couple of months ago, this would have been unthinkable.

I cleaned the kitchen floor. There was a semi-permanent layer of film over the floor from accumulated floor soap. It took me all day today, but I did it. And I did a load of laundry - after messing with the nasty floor all day. And I cleaned my kids' summer sandals and shoes and they are ready for wearing, also after the floor. Exposures, exposures, exposures.

And I am really feeling good.

Habituation Happened!

If there is a time of day when my rituals are at their worst, I would have to say right before I go to sleep. The thought of contaminating my bed is more than I can handle. Typically, my pre-bed handwashing ritual alone takes 25 minutes and half a roll of paper towels, and that isn't even considering the clothing change - the duration of which largely depends upon whether I do it correctly, and in the correct order. Being so preoccupied with those details, it is often that I make a mistake and touch something I "shouldn't" and have to start over from scratch.

The other night, I encountered a cashier at a convenience store with a very obvious infection on her hand. I was horrified, put down my items and immediately left the store. I now feel like that set of clothing, my car, my seatbelt, my purse, and anything I touched before I scoured my hands is contaminated. Last night, as I was about to head off to bed (all clean and ready), I touched a door with my bare hand - a door that I felt was contaminated. Initially, my anxiety was a 95 of 100. I felt that I had to change clothes and go through my handwashing ritual immediately. But I didn't. I sat with it. I kept reminding myself of all the times I have heard and read that the rituals are not necessary to reduce the anxiety, and eventually habituation will occur - and that is the key to freedom from this crap!

It took nearly an hour for me to even consider not washing before going to bed, but I began considering it. I calculated my stress level in my mind and figured it had come down to around 60. Impressed with the drop, I forced myself to wait longer. Not long after, maybe 20 minutes or so, I realized that I was comfortable going to bed without doing anything! Well, I did wipe my hand on my PJ pants, but clearly, that wasn't washing or changing so I will let it go for now. By the time I put my head on my pillow, my anxiety was about a 10. I am still kind of amazed about that. Equally interesting is how empowered I feel today, and how much quieter that bully is than usual.

Habituation

It seems that getting out of the house and being around people helps. I find myself much less compulsive and, for that matter, much less obsessive when not behaving like a social hermit. And even the obsessive parts have less power when I have been out and about. It's odd, because while I am at home, going out and facing a plethora of contamination possibilities kind of makes me want to bar the doors and windows and never emerge from my safe zone again. Meanwhile, I fully realize that avoidance only breeds fear, and is basically like feeding OCD a giant bowl of crack.

I visited with my dad again recently, and it was really cool. I was in town where he lives and called to see if he wanted to meet me for dinner. He did, and another family member was at the restaurant we went to, so we all sat and talked two hours away. It was great, hugs and all.

My laundry pile is finally diminishing, and it is so satisfying to watch that pile get smaller. Also satisfying is opening closets and drawers and finding them full, instead of completely (or damn near) empty. It hasn't been easy, standing there with my heart pounding and my hands shaking until my mind accepts that I am just going to do it despite my fear. Get used to the cold pool water, your body will habituate, I tell myself. Years of spending entire summers swimming in pools and the lake have afforded me this metaphor. Jumping in always sucks, but pretty soon you're just swimming and going about your business without a thought in the world to the water temperature. That is precisely the goal of habituation in OCD. And, perhaps not surprisingly, it often works if I make myself stick with it.

I am getting better with public. I still cannot bring myself to touch shopping carts, even if I wipe them down with those sani wipe things. That is a goal for me. For now, I carry plastic bags with me or use produce bags in the store to wrap the cart handles with. Shopping carts just freak me right out. Gah!

Today Was Good

No. Today was great. I actually felt more like my old self today than I have in the better part of a year.

I had a bunch of purchased things to return, which meant a horrendous amount of exposures. It was a grand total of four retail stores and a trip to the postal store to ship and/or return other items. I also stopped at two secondhand clothing stores to sell some used clothing, and then I went shopping at a mall. In addition, I saw (and hugged!) my dad for the first time in more than a year. This, all of this, was huge.

I stopped being able to be around my dad, who I love dearly, because he became "contaminated". I have a thing about skin diseases, and he mentioned about a year ago that he thought he had a fairly benign skin disease. Even if he did, which he probably didn't, it should be long gone by now. But did the OCD Bully care? No. And subsequently, I have not been able to visit my own father for more than a year. I cannot adequately express how much that hurt me.

When I saw him pull up in front of my grandmother's house today, I thought I would feel panic and fear. I didn't. Aside from some momentary discomfort at the thought of a possible contamination, my happiness won out and I ran and gave my dad a huge hug. Nothing else mattered. For once in a long time, OCD didn't completely eff something up for me.

After a really nice visit with dad and grandma, I went to the postal store and handed contaminated items to a contaminated cashier, used a contaminated pen to sign my name to a contaminated piece of paper, touched a contaminated door to get in and out, and...well, you get the idea. So I was then contaminated, and so were my keys and car door and steering wheel and cell phone and so on. But I was mostly cool with it. And that surprised me.

I stopped at all of the other places, handed my debit card over to be swiped by multiple people to process my returns (I have to buy online a lot because of how far from malls we live), visited a secondhand clothing store (two, actually) - a huge exposure for me, and handled more potentially contaminated things than I could even keep track of. By the time I got to my reward store, where I just shopped for fun, I was almost feeling like a normal person (read: me, without OCD)! Almost.

This likely goes back to my previous post about habituation. Getting out is certainly good for me, and I should probably make an effort to do it more often. I really enjoyed my day, and being able to visit with my dad really, really made me happy.

Screw you, OCD. Today was mine.