I think i need help…..

@Anonymous Thanks for responding 🙏🏼. For me, it’s about the fear of getting food poisoning.

@izzyrey Ah totally understandable. And I know it won’t matter that I say it’s very rare and everything. Or that it’s not that awful to get it because I had E. coli pretty recently and it wasn’t great but not nearly as bad as the stomach flu I had a couple months later. Are there safe foods you can have? That don’t feel like a threat? Like if food comes directly out of a package? There are lots of processed foods that aren’t very healthy for you long-term but that would be packaged and might feel safer to eat now and would also help you gain weight. Candy bars, protein bars, chips, crackers, fruit snacks, granola bars, snack cakes, pre-packaged oatmeal, individual servings of milk or yogurt, stuff like that. Just trying to think of a way to work with your ocd and accommodate it rather than trying to jump in the deep end and getting overwhelmed and giving up.

@Anonymous Its interesting you bring this up b/c processed foods, some on the go snacks, leftovers, restaurants and anything in sitting in containers for more than a few days are my triggers. I feel safest eating home-made food and only a select few fast food places, but yes i understand what you are trying to say. I do have “safe foods” i tend to stick to.

@izzyrey I am not a doctor so can’t advise fully but I would think it’s okay to lean more heavily into your safe foods and homemade foods for now while you are in between therapists and focus on just eating enough calories each day through those foods to keep your weight in a healthy range. Even if processed foods are a trigger you can lean into your safer foods. I would think processed foods would be a much lower risk of food poisoning because they are individually wrapped and if anything goes wrong there is a big recall and everyone knows right away. But just do what is comfortable as long as you are getting enough calories the nutrition content can be put on hold for a couple weeks, especially if you are taking a multivitamin. Remember that OCD is a desire for certainty in a world where things are not certain. You don’t know 100% that the things you are eating will not give you food poisoning even if you do everything you can to avoid it. And every time you avoid a food you get a little sense of relief but it’s temporary and only makes the OCD worse. So the cycle will eventually need to be helped through therapy.