Damn, wasn't expecting actual OCD.
this post was submitted on 16 Nov 2023
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I wish people would stop saying OCD to mean they like to sort things.
This sounds like actual OCD, or am I missing a joke you’re making? Or you jus’ sayin’?
Liking to sort things is not OCD, OCD is having to sort things otherwise you can't function as a human being.
The post is not talking about that “likes to sort things”
OP is saying, "Stop calling everything OCD because this kinda behavior is the real thing."
People use OCD to describe being overly organized, anal about cleaning or hyper-focused on a hobby or whatever.
The behaviors described in the 4chan post are actual OCD behaviors, sooooo
Yes. The parent comment stated "I didn't expect actual OCD". This was a comment on the fact that the term OCD is diluted due to misuse of it to just mean "I like to be tidy", which is why they weren't expecting actual OCD.
Then the person you're replying to was voicing their own frustration that the term is misused a lot. They were agreeing with the parent comment. They weren't commenting on the content of the 4chan greentext, which indeed very clearly describes actual OCD.
I don't know why I felt like being your lemmy comments tour guide today, but I thought I'd clear up the misunderstanding for no reason at all (I guess I'm just OCD like that).
But the internet told me that OCD is just a quirk that makes a person align objects on a table! /s
I had OCD, fortunately mostly gone. I always had to step on every distinct surface no more than five times, or something horrible would happen. The overwhelming sense of dread was not pleasant.
My wife is OCD cleaner, I tell people and they're like lol mine too.. no brah. If she is stressed we have to change the bedsheets daily. Toilets and sinks are cleaned minimum once per day but more like 3 times. Vacuums the house 2 to 3 times, mops the whole fucking house 2 times and then like mops random spots 10 times a day. I do all this shit too on my day off while she is at work because I love her and don't want her to do it all when she gets home and then if I forget one thing it's an argument.. and she will just redo it all anyways so I didn't have to actually do it. Hours upon hours are spent cleaning. Sometime she is up in the middle of the night like 1am putting on a load of washing or unpacking the dishwasher
Bro you're not alone. I could have wrote this.
And here I see once again that most of the categories we use to characterize people in reality resemble more of a spectrum. Everybody probably knows these type of things, but they don't count as an illness as long as they don't exceed a critical threshold.
Could you tell us more about how you overcame this?
Not really. It just faded over the years.
I have a SO like this. 8 Years now, it gets more easy over time, a bit at least. Real OCD is no joke, its like being insane while knowing. One knows on a logical level that it makes no sense to do this repetive actions, but has to do it anyway. Its often not only external stuff like washing hands, rotating objects till "they feel right"....a lot of ODC action are internal. Like saying certein sentences internal for X number of times.
As a Partner that can be frustrating causd you want to help the person u love but there is nothing u can do. You just have to accept it is like it is.
The internal permanent tention can be very exhaustig. Most people can have 'empty head' moments where you just chill and think nothing to relex for a moment. When u have strong OCD that dosent exists, every second your head is rotating, doing loops of things in your mind. Even simple things like catching a bus at a certein time can become extreme hard tasks cause you 'cant just go' no. U have to do all the internal and external OCD tasks before u can walk out the door.
All u can do as a partner is having patience, lots of it, and understandinf that the pressure to do this OCD tasks is as real to there brains as the need to breathe to us.
I kinda totally understand OCD, because my adhd prevents me from doing certain things and it's really hard to explain to people. I can do them, i just can't(?). It's obviously not as bad as what OP described and your wife goes through. But my question is, what happens if let's say your wife needs to use the light switch 50 times because... And you just grab her hand and take her away. She left the room without the clickedy clack and the world didn't end. Does she get like a nervous breakdown or resist? I've always wodered but never dared to ask anyone with actual ocd. Most people i know have the funny ocd that they know from monk.
If i interrupt a external OCD task (lightswitch example) then SO compensates by doing more internal tasks, it just shifts to something that is not external and thereby not stopable by anyone.
This all is allready with meds, without meds a 'normal' life would not be possible.
On a logical level they understand that the world dosent end if the task isnt finished, but to deeper parts of the Brain it still feels real, and the stress created by the fear of it is real, as real as it gets.
The brain is such a beautiful and fucked up thing.
Not the person you replied to, but one of my partners is mildly OCD and has to check all sorts of things before leaving, and she stresses tf out if I don't let her do her thing on the way out.
Meds help. Without them it would be way more extreme to a degree where it isnt managable by non healthcare professionals.
The only thing that shuts it down 100% are benzodiazepines but those are not a valid long therm solution, and are for emergency situation (heavy panic attacks) only. Benzos are allready very addictive to normal people, now imagen how addictive they are when they allow you do be free from your 24/7 OCD stress.
Yeah, I wouldn't want to play with benzos at the best of times, but I know they have their place. It's just unfortunate how zombified they get when they have to take one when a panic attack truly sets in...
Does meditation help at all?
For non-OCD folk, it really helps keep the brain from running around in circles. It can de-rail the temporary insanity train.
Can't speak for OCD, but I have ADHD and can relate to the incessant mental chatter and yes meditation did help. But it's also extremely difficult and I have never been able to maintain a habit. It comes and goes.
My suggestion is to try other mindful activities, for example I got really into whittling. It's a hands on activity and you have something to show afterwards, it's good to lock on your mind/focus.
Like someone else in the thread suggested crochet
It's a really difficult illness to treat. Unfortunately there is no silver bullet.
I was expecting this to devolve into a joke about getting too many HJs or something
Me too. Something something fifty extra strokes to make sure he finished.
Relatable. I love a girl like this. It's exhausting and it's slowly impacted my own sanity, but it's not her fault. It's mainly about germs with her. She gets really upset if we don't wash our hands every 15 minutes or so. But at the same time, she's afraid of antibiotics.
I mean the incorrect/over use of antibiotics leads to antibiotic resistant germs which are basically super germs. Strangely logical.
Sorry to hear it's impacting you though. It's tough when someone you're with is dealing with mental health issues.
The only reason antibiotic resistant germs are different than regular germs is that antibiotics don't work on them, which doesn't matter if you don't use antibiotics! 😆
Her reasons are more vague and appeal-to-nature-y. But you do raise a good point.
The only reason antibiotic resistant germs are different than regular germs is that antibiotics don't work on them, which doesn't matter if you don't use antibiotics!
What? Where do you think antibiotic-resistant bacteria come from?
No I think they mean that germs are germs, if you don’t use antibiotics, they make you sick either way.
Resistant bacteria are only a concern of people wiling to take antibiotics, as those are the only ones the antibiotics don’t work on.
Does she understand that being over-hygenic obviously has some negative impacts? Sure it is definitely better at preventing infection, but she's also reducing her exposure to good microbes which is what we rely on to not form allergies, asthma, and even some diseases.
This article summarises it well, but here's a topic-specific part.
But not all of our body has to be washed so stringently. Overall obsessive washing “disrupts the normal flora which keep you healthy by competing with harmful organisms”, says Ruebush. “Operating your immune system in an environment of sterility is like a sensory deprivation for the brain. Eventually, it goes insane, thus the increased amount of allergy and autoimmunity associated with persons who try too hard to avoid all exposure to anything in their environment,” she says.
Around the house, the solution for fighting the wrong kind of bacteria is not excessive cleaning, but timely cleaning.
You should at least being making your own stand for your own health and don't let her ways permanently compromise you down the track.
You can't really debate a mental illness away
Not with that attitude!
Exactly right, Joe.
I don't know, I don't wanna sound dismissive of things, but it can probably help in some situations. OP probably knows the situation better and isn't giving all the details (because it just isn't relevant). It's possible their partner actually didn't know that though and it might help them cut back some.
My fiancee has mental issues and using logic will get you nowhere. It is fine to say it and remind them of it but not start arguing or anything. It is not like they have much of a choice, or they do but it is fucking difficult.
Yeah, that's what I'm trying to say. I don't think I made it clear. A good example of the sort of thing I'm trying to talk about is setting up a camera to look at the stove if someone is obsessive about making sure it is turned off. I suggested this to someone before and it seemed like it helped them, or at least it was a novel idea they hadn't considered. I know you can't magically "logic" away problems like this.
I know two people with OCD. Living with it is a fucking nightmare. Recommend this interview:
I can easily imagine how hopeless such a situation is.
Even more so when medication and therapy is being used already and the situation still exists to be this difficult.
It would leave me stumped.
.
One rule of thumb is to think, do you get more good than bad out of a relationship.
If you get more bad, consider making changes.
In this case - you cannot help a person like this if you're burned about the situation yourself.
Just get her into something repetitive but productive. Like knitting or cross stitch. Same motion, over and over. But something comes out of it.
Or speedrunning. Get them twitch bux. Infinite hole to consume someone's mind rather than body
OCD is task/subject specific, they can't just switch their obsessive behavior from one thing to another.
Yes, but weirdly if you get rid of one ocd thing then another one pops up to take its place.
hands feel even
Strangely enough I know exactly what she meant by that. Over a decade ago I used to do this thing with words and sentences. Take the word "word", for example. W goes to the left. O goes to the right. R goes to the left and so D goes to the right. We ended on the right, so it's fine. But if we ended on the left, then I had to add another word and turn this little mental exercise into a decent sentence.
Sentences were kind of cheating, though, because even if I ended on the left then I just added a dot, which would fill a single "spot" and so make me "end on the right."
Yep. Convoluted, I know. It used to keep me up at night.
My brain does something similar when I'm having high fever and it keeps me from having good sleep. Must suck being stuck there.
Bro is dating Adrian Monk
Or worse, Lady Macbeth
"Hands feel even" That is exactly how I feel when I rub my hand by accident and have the urge to do it symmetrically, and I recently found out it wasn't some normal thing other people do too because of animal brains.
Don't think I have OCD since it's the only symptom though.
I had something similar, when I was still going to kindergarten, I had a weird habit of repeating a word over and over for like 20 or 30 times before I no longer do it. It went away with age though.
Copium!