Last week, I started a new series on my mental health journey with a post titled, “The Mind I Was Given”. I discussed mental preferences, our comfort zones, and the patterns of behavior that led to me being classified as a “classic perfectionist”; a label I don’t disagree with. At length, I spoke to how our preferences, behaviors, and abilities are what make us who we are and that our minds are ours to understand, accept, and protect. The crux of my message was that who we are should not be confused with mental health issues such as anxiety and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). This week, I’d like to discuss how my fight with OCD began, and what I’ve identified as my “fear”. Additionally, I’d like to begin talking about mental balance.
As always, please know that I have no medical or psychological training. I am just a person on the internet sharing their experience in hopes that someone will find my content relatable and helpful. If you are suffering with mental health issues, you should always seek professional help in addition to finding solace amongst those who’ve had to deal with similar circumstances.
It was a morning like any other; I woke up when the sun came through the shades. I didn’t have anywhere to be, so I stretched and laid still for a moment. I don’t recall what I was thinking about, but it had to be something as I was awake and that’s just the way my mind works. For whatever reason, I looked over at the light switch. I don’t know why I did this; I never turn the lights on in the morning. My eyes and mind lingered on the switch. I started thinking about the night before and the actions I had taken prior to turning off the lights and laying down to sleep. I thought about my bedtime routine. I thought about the hamper and its location in the house. I thought about the pants I had deemed “clean enough” to wear a second time. I thought about my cell phone sitting on the pony wall overlooking our stairwell. My phone… it goes everywhere; how can it just be sat in the most private part of our home after being used in the office, at restaurants, or at the gas station? Our home, at the time, was a three story townhouse. I thought about bringing groceries up to the second floor through the living room, over the carpet, past our couch. I panicked and woke my wife up because I realized “we were living in filth”.
I started cleaning and haven’t stopped for nearly 6 years now. This, in and of itself, is not OCD. Having your home kept a certain way is just a preference. The issue is that I can’t stop thinking about how my body, items, and surfaces interact. I have to keep myself clean. I have to keep my home clean. I have to protect what I’ve cleaned. Contamination OCD is defined as an intense fear of being contaminated by germs, dirt, bodily fluids, or other substances. I mentioned in my last post that I’ve always been particular. This isn’t that. My cars, my guitars… I used to keep them spotless. Today, my car is a safe haven away from compulsive cleaning. I have come to accept it as a tool to be used when going out and that, by definition, it will always be “dirty”. As for guitars… I no longer own any; I couldn’t play them because the strings themselves could not be cleaned to a degree that I could accept. Certain individuals accused me of caring too much about “things”. Again, this isn’t that.
I have been asked by family and by medical professionals, “What are you afraid of?” I used to say, “nothing”. This was my answer because, logically, this is not scary stuff and I know and fully get that. But what I’ve come to understand is that I suffer with a fear of one thing contaminating another. Why? Because I am afraid of the cycle of contamination and cleaning itself. I am afraid that if I don’t keep up with the compulsions, then contaminants will spread throughout my home uncontrollably from one space to another; this will take away my peace. Lack of peace simply means having my mind focused on and agitated by what I think is contaminated. My propensity, then, is to avoid things becoming contaminated in order to avoid the cycle of contamination and cleaning in an attempt to maintain peace. If I can protect myself and my environment, I can escape the cycle. For what it’s worth, this is a behavior that professionals advise against; my goal being to avoid my fear rather than face it through exposure.
Moving around in space is very hard for me. The floor, the walls, especially doors and door jams, these are all areas of deep concern. Because of this, bringing things in and out of the house is extremely difficult. I have been told it’s just life. I have been told nothing is happening. Again, I am a very logical person and I get it. In fact, most of those suffering with OCD understand that their fears are irrational from an intellectual perspective. This is part of what makes it so frustrating when someone tells you that there’s nothing to worry about and that you should just learn to live with it. But, being extremely logical, I also understand that something IS happening. For instance, items taken off of shelves in the store are frequently sat on the floor prior to being placed on the shelves by the stock clerk; I see it all the time. The stock clerk and the customers visiting that isle wore the same shoes to a public restroom earlier in the day… Our potato chips are “filthy”.
“Filthy” potato chips are just an example. But I seemingly can’t stop my mind from making these connections about every single item I touch inside or outside of my home. Worse yet, what goes through my head as I move through the house carrying such items is that debris is blowing off of these items as I move them around. So, then, the notion of protecting my environment in order to escape the cycle of cleaning is an impossible task; I know this. This is the problem with OCD. You have the intrusive thought, you perform the compulsion to put your mind at ease. The issue is that these compulsions will never lead to satisfaction and by ingraining them into our lifestyle, we lose balance and endless amounts of time.
What do I mean by balance? Simply put, balance, to me, means mental health stability where you can handle the ups and downs of life without going too high or too low with your emotions, where you don’t fall into unhealthy patterns in response to stimuli, and where you feel at peace and comfortable in your own home. There are a lot of things that can disrupt my definition of balance. Admittedly, I have not felt what I call balance for quite some time.
Note that I’ve put words like “filthy” and “dirty” in quotes in the prior paragraphs. I’ve done this because I get that the level of cleanliness described for these items and situations is normal and that it’s my sensitivity to the subject matter that is not. It really needs to be understood that I, and many of those dealing with OCD, do not disagree with those who would make such claims. So, then, when I say I’m worried about “contamination”, what do I really mean? I actually don’t know. I’m not talking about visible debris. It’s an irrational disorder. Something is out of balance.
So far, I have been giving high level examples of what I’ve been experiencing over the last few years. In my next post in this series, I want to get more granular with some situations that really recount what life has been like. I want to describe some compulsions and what I’ve done in response. I’ve already started to lean into the fact that I don’t like the clinical approach to dealing with OCD; meaning exposure therapy. Every minute of my life is exposure and I just need reprieve. I am not trying to discredit exposure therapy, and I do practice it, but my primary means of coping has been through the elimination of variables and a reduction of exposure opportunity. From my perspective, and for my specific situation, my approach could be viewed as treating potential causes rather than the symptoms.
Thanks for reading, Matt
If you’ve enjoyed this content, please consider commenting, liking, and subscribing. You can also follow on Instagram and Patreon.
The Bean & Seed 
Leave a comment