Don't like odd numbers?

One of my first memories of OCD was from when I was about 8-12 years old. I’ve always struggled with sleeping and prone to twisting and turning due to my brain going like 🧠 🗣️🗣️🗣️ Anyways once I couldn’t sleep and got out of bed one of my parents said, with compassion, ”oh it’s so late, why are you awake it’s school tomorrow” and when they followed me to my room I saw that the time was 22:22 and I felt a really scary feeling in my chest (today I know it was anxiety) and from that day on the time 22:22 🕰️ followed me for years. I was twisting and turning and feeling anxious about my digital clock (I’m a 90s girly) turning 22:22. I could get issues taking deep breaths, being sweaty, uncomfortable and scared and feeling like ”ITS SOON 22:22 AND WHEN THE TIME PASSES IT WILL BE TOO LATE”. I never really understood exactly what was going to be ”too late” but I’m guessing it was getting too little sleep absolutely blown out of proportion. As soon it passed 22:22 it was all good and I could fall asleep 😴 I don’t struggle with those numbers today instead I smile and feel compassionate towards little me. Still OCD sucks, I still struggle with sleep times to times and do have some magical thinking but the big difference is that I logically know that it’s not real even if it emotionally sometimes feel that way. Take care out there. If this made you feel less lonely, wanna share your first memories of OCD? ❤️

does anyone else just count for no reason? like their steps or how many times they move. just a few minutes ago i was scratching an itch on my leg and and caught myself counting how many times i scratched😂😂 and recently i’ve just been counting to ten randomly just in my head it’s so random or if i catch myself tapping on something i tap ten times. i got rid of it kind of like i used to do things 37 times or 3 times or 7 times 😂 3 and 7 or just the number 37 was the number for about like 10 months it was BAD. and i also have to turn on a light switch the right way but i don’t know what the right way is tho and it never feels right so i have to literally stop myself and walk away but i usually end up coming back cs ill think about like an hour from then and how ill have this weight on me because i didn’t turn the light switch the right way or the right amount of times but then i literally usually always forget about it so like idk am i weird orrrr does anyone else do thissss 😬😬😬😬

I wrote these two poems for an open mike poetry night at my college a few years ago. Freshman year of college my anxiety ate me alive. I chickened out last minute and never performed, but I recently found the notebook I wrote these in and thought I’d share. i’m sO sCareD You say, "Oh my god, I’m so OCD about my notes," while I am drowning in the undertow of thoughts that refuse to let me go. You say, "I just like things neat, you know?" while I check the lock again and again, wondering if this time will be the time my brain believes me— but it never does. It's the monster under the bed except it lives in my head, whispers masquerading as instincts, warnings dressed as logic, fear that wears me like a second skin. And oh, how easy it is to laugh it off, call it a quirk, a habit, a punchline, while I stand at the brink of a thought so loud I can feel it crack my ribs. You say, "I’m so OCD about my computer icons." I say, I can’t hold my mother’s hand without tracing the veins, make sure she’s alive, still beating and bleeding, rewinding, replaying, repeating, repeating, until I become the pattern itself. I say, I live on a hill. And if the picture frames aren’t straight, the ground will shift, the walls will give way, my home will collapse beneath me. And I can’t let it go? I say, I step in threes, three, three, three, reset, three, three— reset. Because if I do it wrong, something worse will happen, though I don’t know what, only that the terror knows it for me. I am not particular. I am prisoner. So when you say OCD, I hope you mean the way it steals— the way it clings, the way it suffocates, because it is not about preference. It is about survival. hallway girl. Why can’t I have the helpful OCD? The organized one, the productive one, the one people praise instead of whisper about? Why can’t my compulsions make me a genius instead of a joke? Why do they make me the hallway girl— “she’s still walking the hallway” as if it’s a comedy show. As if it’s funny to be trapped in my own head. You see it in sitcoms— the guy who can’t handle an uneven stack of papers, the woman who scrubs the counters too much, laugh track ringing loud— but no one laughs at the panic that coils in my lungs no one sees the terror when the stairs don’t add up and suddenly the earth is shaking and I can’t move No one shows the moments I cry over a step miscounted, staring at the hallway, knowing I have to start over, but already too exhausted to move. No one shows the shame, the whispered apologies, the effort of convincing myself this time, maybe, I’ll be strong enough to resist— but I never am. And no one shows the shoes. How I would run, sprint, chase time through our fifteen-minute break, Back to my room, because if they moved— if they weren’t exactly right— my dad would have a heart attack. And it would be my fault. So I checked. And checked. And checked again. Until I was breathless, But still had to sprint back to class and pretend I didn’t leave my mind behind with my shoes. So when they call me hallway girl, I bite my tongue so they don’t see how hard it takes Because if OCD is a joke, why am I the only one who isn’t laughing?