CW for food-related OCD Hi there everyone! I’m very new here and it’s nice to meet you too all! Please excuse the block of text asking for advice but I really hope it’s helpful to at least one other person. Has anyone ever had problems with food and contamination? When OCD gets bad for me, I cannot eat anything meat/dairy because the idea that they’ve been contaminated is just overwhelming. This is weird because typically I have checking and hoarding tendencies, rarely anything related to contamination. The first time it hit, I was eating ice cream and I was grossed out to the point I got physically sick. Now it’s back and it hasn’t dissipated in two months :/ I try to keep it to myself but don’t want to make everyone in my life miserable by needing veggie foods all the time/being skeeved out around meats. Has anyone else had this happen with types of food specifically? I’ve never tried exposure therapy, but are there any steps that have worked for folks to get back to eating normally? I don’t need meat, but I would love to be able to eat ice cream and cheese again. Thanks so much for reading to this point! -Kelly

Yes. My dad made a comment about a hash-brown tasting fishy (I’m pretty sure he has OCD too and the rest of the fam said it tasted normal) and the moment he said that, all I could think about was how my entire breakfast has to go in the trash and fried potatoes have to be heavily seasoned or I will be convinced it tastes spoiled or rotten. I have a fear of spoiled milk. Even if I drink a glass of milk from a new carton, I can almost imagine a sour taste and have to throw it out. Soda cans are disgusting to me. Meat is alright but I always think about how it might have grown bacteria. The worst is raw poultry, I love cooking but I want to gag and shower when I touch a raw chicken or turkey. Even if the bird is in a package, if the package touches the counter, I have to disinfect but then I get scared my spray got on some food. Then I worry that I’ll get poisoned so I throw the food away and so I did all of that for nothing because now my meal is in the trash. Wow. Writing all that out felt great because I don’t talk about my ocd with anyone.

The only thing that helps me is cannabis because it gives me the munchies and makes me either too lazy to do my compulsions or I completely forget about my compulsions altogether and at that point, everything tastes good. I have a doctors recommendation though.

Thank you so much for the honesty and for sharing, I struggle with soda cans too! Anything where I can’t see the bottom has always freaked me out. I know I can’t try cannabis because I am bipolar as well, but maybe the right medicine combo would help. I just actually switched to something that’s supposed to help with both- hopefully it does ?I’m really happy that works for you though, that’s awesome and makes me more optimistic about meds.

Yes I know how you feel about seeing the bottom! I always inspect my drinks in case there’s little particles of something. I hope your new meds work for you!! <3

Exactly!!! And thank you so much! I hope things are much better for you at this point ❤️