What’s the youngest you remember having obsessions? The youngest I can remember was when I was 3 and I threw a hissy fit every morning because I needed my shoes tied so tight that it hurt and my mom never tied them tight enough (in my ocd opinion) because she didn’t want to hurt me but yeah literally every morning before preschool I stomped my feet and cried because my shoes didn’t feel tight enough. That has always been a big part of my ocd, is things not feeling right but specifically not being tight enough. I used to wear my jeans so tight with a belt that it left permanent scarring on my stomach area and honestly probably damaged my insides in one way or another. Anyone relate?

I would change multiple times a day because I would get itchy and throw a fit

I used to not be able to leave the house unless my socks were on ‘just right’ or my pants were tucked into my boots ‘just right’. As early as I can remember, I also used to say “what?” to people because I needed to hear them repeat the sentence until it felt ‘right’.

I definitely had the same thing with needing my shoes to be insanely tight. It drove my mom mad, and since all my shoes were buckles (too young to tie laces) she to punch a new hole to make them tighter. I also had a stint where I screamed every time I had a shirt pulled over my head; my grandma spent so much on button-downs to get me to stop. My need for tight clothing peaked in middle school, when I wore a shaper under everything. It certainly has calmed down, but when I’m stressed, I still crave that snugness of just a size too small.

i was 5 and chewing food on both sides of my mouth and had a temper tantrum if my tooth hurt so i had to chew on one side.

I've had obsessions since I was a little kid

I had the SAME exact situations @Olivia J and same with the t-shirt being pulled over my head @RooBoo. It always made me feel like I was going to suffocate and die. I also would walk around breathing very very deeply because I never felt like I could get a deep enough breath. So it always looked like I was gasping for air or something.

There were so many that I don’t even know where to start. Let’s see, I was a lock checker afraid of a robber or break in, I had to say bye a certain way to my family whenever they left for work out of fear that they wouldn’t come home (from a car crash or something), I would have this pattern stuck in my head all the time, I would need reassurance whenever I did something I was unsure about (which was a lot), I felt guilt over things I probably shouldn’t have, and one kinda gross thing where right after I learned how to use a toilet I thought if I did I would fall in (and die? Idk exactly about what would happen after I fall into the toilet), and I was so afraid that I would instead bite the bullet and poop my pants, which led to extreme guilt and reassurance seeking that my dad still loved me (since I knew he would be mad once he found out I pooped my pants).... my parents thought I just didn’t know how to use a toilet but that wasn’t the case at all. Also I had extreme social anxiety to the point that I was just afraid of everyone I didn’t know and would actually hide behind my mom when she talked to strangers, and (to me at least) social anxiety and ocd are essentially the same thing if you know you have both. There’s almost certainly more I’m missing and idk which would be the “first” obsession (except the toilet one-that was a little later), but those are ones I can vividly remember. And to think I had no idea I had ocd, my parents even suspected it and never took me to see someone because they thought I would grow out of it. Well look at me now, I went through school oblivious to this illness and it snuck it’s way into many parts of my life until I finally took a step back and went “hey wait a second, I have OCD,” and that’s where it really started to hit me again hard, with different content from when I was a kid, but all too familiar feelings

Omg haha I didn’t even realize, the second I start chewing gum I split it in half so I can chew on both sides too? so it can feel balanced.

I once had an obsession about being scared of buttons and finding them disgusting I was like 6...

I had extreme social anxiety when I was little but diagnosed with OCD much later. I used to avoid coloring (especially at restaurants with the kids menus) because whenever I would color I would freak out about “going outside the lines” and would throw a fit. Even to this day, color makes me more anxious than not. The perfectionism was very apparent at a young age, everyone thought I was just a “goody goody” kid but they didn’t realize the extent. I also had a phobia of public bathrooms, and so I would go at the weirdest hours (right before class got out, at the end of recess, etc) to avoid other people hearing me pee (my phobia)

I started around 2 years ago when I would repeat things over and over, I didn't do it a lot of times, but I always did things like turning the light switch on and off multiple times until it was 'right'

3 as well. Use to make my whole family repeat a sentence and I don't want to say it because it's embarrassing but it was about toilet habits. I also had to touch everything all the time, anything I was close to. And I use to have to have knickers lined up for me to choose. I don't rememeber the thought that made me do all the ocds though.

Yeah same @MissLovely I don’t remember having specific intrusive thoughts about my obsessions when I was young, more like I just needed things to feel right or else I’d be in a bad mood