Tired of being afraid of getting sick

As we know the pandemic really hit all of us hard and for me it was what started my ocd. At the time I didn’t think of it as such, I just thought I was being safe and precautious. Fast forward here, and I still find myself washing my hands frequently and obsessively, being afraid to shake hands or touch normal daily objects because other people have touched, and afraid to even go to my public gym afraid of being contaminated. Now don’t get me wrong I am able to go out and have a good time but I always have to know where the bathroom is to make sure my hands are clean after I touch something. I freak out over if I hear someone cough at work or in the gym and when I have to eat something without washing my hands or let’s say I touched a spoon with an unwashed hand I start to overthink. It’s gotten to a point where it’s more than just contamination, I find myself being over complicating so many aspects of life, I wake up and have this anxious period right away for no reason at all. Have any of you guys experienced what I’m doing through ? What can I do to better myself and go back to being myself pre pandemic?

777Q

Date posted: 48w

All this type of stuff is challenging to do deal with in a appropriate manner. The reality is for me I am taking proper reasonable precautions as we are going into cold and flu season along with Covid coming around again . I am scheduled to receive my vaccine for influenza and the updated Covid vaccine also both are reasonable precautions I feel for myself. Also frequent hand washing is good hygiene within reason. I think I will break out my face masks and have one on hand as there are many people that are sick . You have to find the right balance in taking good care of yourself personally and all aspects of your health: mind , body and emotional , spiritual. I can only regulate myself for example if a inconsiderate person that is out there in public and they know they are sick with contagious diseases , the only thing I can do is take the proper precautions on my end , there is ZERO I can legitimately do with the other person except to the extent possible of avoiding them .

Anonymous

Date posted: 48w

I understand the need to know if there is a restroom where I can wash NY hands. However, sometimes now I dint wash NY hands of I see that SONEONE who is sick or something goes into the public bathroom before me. I feel like I didn't wash NY hands that were not dirty so that is a good thing....butbsometimes when I dint wash them and it is cuz I am avoiding the bathroom.cuz of someone who went in there before me....then I am avoiding something and that is not good! I literally could not worry ANOUT not washing my hands going into a restaurant even if my hands had a little dirt or even sand on them but if I see a person who is sick, ETC....I want to wash them.......but if they "sick petson" used the sink before me.....I font want to use that sink. I feel awful cuz they can't help it. I didn't even freak out when COVID was so prominent. I worked in a very public store and white my mask, and we had to wash everything at first but I was not doing it cuz of ocd. If was just common sense you wash commonly TOUCHED things in the store. However, things that I had touched that I felt were related to someone dick made me wash the counters more often and I changed my gloves more often...or even just sprayed the cleaner in mynglives SIBCE there was not much time to change gloves after every customer or anything. Snd then gloves were so sweaty that it took forever to out now one on! If you but myd on the COUBTER I would not have card. It was the thought of sickness that bothered me....but for some reason....Covid fid not bother me so much. Go figure!!!

Figuring it ...

Date posted: 25w

Newly diagnosed and Curious.

Hi, I’m new to this app and newly diagnosed. Question for you all, What things did you normalize and do without a second thought that when diagnosed, you realized was actually your OCD? Mine was how concerned with germs I am. I hold my breath when I open a door so the rush of wind doesn’t infect my lungs from whatever is in the room. I thought everyone was really careful and concerned like me. But Ive learned it’s not normal the lengths I go to. What was yours?

ynnej

Date posted: 25w

What do I do?

For the past couple of months, I’ve had a really big fear of like my hand basically going down there or objects going down there and like being contaminated. This basically leads me to be scared of being on my own and doing things without people near (because if I do everything in front of someone they would tell me if I did something), also tucking my shirt. This started last October too and I remember crying for like hours everyday. Now I’m better but I do compulsions like tucking my shirt in a specific way so I know my hand couldn’t reach there. I’m scared to even get ready for the day, brush my teeth, etc with my shirt untucked because I’m scared those objects will be contaminated or I’ll do something to contaminate them. I’ve been trying to stop this compulsion of tucking my shirt in for a while but I’m not really going anywhere.

bun <3

Date posted: 15w

everything around me feels contaminated :((

sorry this is super long i just wanna know if anyone else has been thru something similar bc i feel super alone 🩷 i have super bad contamination ocd. it was bad already but my house was like my safe space until a few months ago someone brought something into my house that i considered ‘contaminated’. and so then i felt like that part of the house was contaminated, then it spread to everything outside my room (since family is moving around touching stuff) and then somehow i got convinced everything in my room except my bed is contaminated and i need to wash my hands after touching it. in my mind its like the contamination just infinitely spreads to things after the tiniest bit of touch. idek what im afraid of anymore or even what the original thing was but i can’t let it go. when i have to wash off contamination i have to wash at least 4 times or until it feels right, or sometimes take rlly long showers and wipe down all my stuff. i even throw away food and clothes or just whole items sometimes because they feel so contaminated i don’t want them in my space. i can’t be super near people or have anyone touch me, and i also can’t bring anything new into my room since it had to go through the entry of my house which feels contaminated. i feel like all i do is lay in bed and then wash my hands and do compulsions so i can go eat or do other stuff around the house. also i never go out because i’m bc people outside make me feel dirty, and i hate thinking about how many people have touched stuff in stores or in public and stuff. so im just in my room worrying all day. i feel so trapped and the contamination/avoiding it is all i think about anymore i barely have time for anything else and im never present when i talk to people because im worrying about if i accidentally got contaminated. im starting erp next week and knowing that im going to have to expose myself to things is really freaking me out. does anyone else have this kind of ocd ? im exhaustedddd 🥲🥲💔

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Tired of being afraid of getting sick

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