Contamination OCD sufferer here. It bothers me to no end that almost everywhere in the world they have normalized bidets except here in the US. I can keep our home bathroom stocked with flushable wipes but my husband says a lot of the time he goes while at work. I want to give him some wipes to bring to work but I know he won't carry a package of wipes into the bathroom with him because someone will see! Lol. This is bothering me maybe more than it should. If you had s**t on your arm you would use water to clean it, not a flimsy bit of paper! It's really upsetting me to think about the germs. We need to catch up to the rest of the world

I wouldn't think I would need peer reviewed evidence for that- it seems like common sense

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh It SEEMS like common sense but that’s likely your aversion to things you feel are dirty making you feel that way.

@Sunrise22 But you can't deny that wet wipes work better. And he outright refused to use them. He says he doesn't like them. I am really upset

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh It’s hard to know if they work better - if you get everything wiped away that’s the main goal. The wetness of the wipes may only be making you feel that you’re cleaner than the dry toilet paper. Maybe accepting that your husband isn’t using the wipes can be a good first step in working toward the uncertainty of the cleanliness of your space

And it’s super hard to not have that feeling of certainty, I TOTALLY get it. It’s difficult to know that the only way we untimately get better is through being SUPER uncomfortable

I feel like its stressful for us either way because he knows if something is bothering me

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh @RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh You’re probably right - but would you rather have the temporary stress until you accept that he isn’t going to use the wipes or the long-term stress of discord in your marriage when your husband is forced into accommodating you?

@Sunrise22 Idk why this trigger is so bad for me right now. The past few weeks I've had a huge spike in my germ fears. Maybe months. But before that I was doing so much better

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh Have you had any recent stressors? I know my OCD has been more pronounced the last month or so because of the weather, since I have seasonal affective issues

@Sunrise22 Today I saw someone on twitter saying why dont more people wash after pooping and people were saying it was a white people thing and I feel ashamed and dont want it to be a thing like I feel like I am probably stinky and gross or that people I care about are, and I'm afraid if maybe people talk about them behind their backs

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh What does it feel like if you accept that maybe people do think those things or maybe they don’t?

@Sunrise22 Gross! And idk about recent stressors. Maybe things were just going too well and it made my brain try to create problems

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh That’s a possibility! I know my brain does that. Like, “things are going well...too well...”

@Sunrise22 I hate ocd. I've had almost every theme imaginable. But the germ one is the one that never truly goes away. The others are in cycles

@RíonaNíhAilbheartaigh It sounds like you’re in an exacerbation. I know it feels hard but try to avoid the compulsions as much as you can. Have you created a hierarchy of your currently compulsions according to how much anxiety not doing it causes you?

@Sunrise22 No, what do you mean? Most are about hand washing or sanitizisanitizing things in the house