- Username
- Spudz11
- Date posted
- 1y ago
Yeah
Took me 20 minutes to brush my teeth today 2 hours in the shower and i still feel dirty. Any tips?
Took me 20 minutes to brush my teeth today 2 hours in the shower and i still feel dirty. Any tips?
Allow that feeling to be there. You need that unclean feeling to get better. Don’t engage with it in any way. Engage with your life, what you have to do today. Every time the thought pops in your mind, label it “OCD thought- moving on”. Don’t rationalize with the thought in any way, don’t try to remember what you did. Just “nope- moving on”. It’s not going to feel good☹️. It’s going to feel so hard, irresponsible etc. that ok, you need to feel those feelings (and do nothing about them). That’s how you get your life back. I’m here to tell you, if you do this( and it takes practice) you will start to feel better. The trick is doing this hard work has to come first. All the best! You are stronger than you know and there are lots of people on here rooting for you!
I think the best route would be to go the rest of the day feeling dirty without showering again.
I agree! No matter what your mind tells you. Tell yourself. I showered. I’m clean! Because you truly are! You showered for 20 mins that’s plenty of time- and you are clean.
Yes, no matter what the theme, it is ultimately about uncertainty. That was/is my theme (health). I used to think, oh I can’t take a risk with my health, I needed to know “for sure”. The truth is, to get better we have to be willing to take a risk, allow uncertainty. My NOCD therapist gave me the tools, after a lifetime of compulsions around health anxiety. Also “Needing to Know for Sure” Seif &Winston helped. As did this https://youtu.be/RPH27Z3IzNY. Take care!
Even with health OCD? ^ that’s what I’m struggling with so much right now.
Possibly tmi but one thing i’ve been really struggling with lately is using the bathroom and I mean #2. It seems like one of the worst germs to me. First of all I wipe and wipe and wipe more than I assume a person without contamination ocd does but I feel like I must know that its completely clean. Also, I then feel that when I shower and wash down there that my hands are contaminated and I need to wash them multiple times and I spend way too much time doing so. I know this is abnormal but I have trouble understanding how someone without contamination ocd would deal with this situation. I wish I could watch the process of how I should wipe and then how to wash that area in the shower. If anyone else has struggled with this, what did you do to improve? I feel like I don’t know what a “normal” routine would be that is considered clean enough.
for the past 12 days i’ve really been struggling with feeling contaminated, over washing my hands yet they never feel clean, washing them so hard that i start to sweat and my arms give out. i feel like parts of my body are contaminated from being outside. instead of showering and washing my face like a normal person im avoiding myself because im afraid. im afraid that my hands will get contaminated and i wont stop washing my hands. (i know it doesn’t make sense but im experiencing a lot of stress that’s causing my bladder muscles to tighten and i can’t hold in my pee, i need my hands to be clean to even lower my pants) if i get stuck in a handwashing cycle ill pee myself and i never feel brave enough to start. this week has been very hard for me, struggling to eat, sleep, and bathe. i feel i have to move very carefully just to navigate life in a way that won’t stress me out. the fear of touching these areas and my brain constantly convincing me i did had been very hard on me. i know the answer is obvious but i don’t know how to build up the confidence to do these things. i’ve been in a very stressed out and suicidal state for the past month i really dont want to trigger any negative feelings but this isn’t any better. what can i do to just… i guess not be afraid and go for it?
i’ve reduced the amount of times i wash my hands per day but i still find that i wash for a while. i’ve have up’s and downs. it can range from 3 minutes to as long as 20 minutes, it just depends on how dirty i feel the task was or if i get stuck in a loop. how would a person without these tendencies wash their hands under 2 minutes? also is it not necessary to wash under the nails every handwash? any help would be appreciated on how to stop with the counting.
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