Rainy day. Great for wearing contaminated coats...Hey, maybe i should have just stood outside while it was pouring and gotten a free coat wash! ... Oh well, too late now.
I wish I could say that I just put on my coat without remembering it was contaminated, walked out the door and into the van without a second thought. But I can't. I silently noted that the door handle 'might' now be needing a wash as well as the mail I touched.
Somewhere between my house and home depot everything got magically uncontaminated though. I think I helped it along the way by deliberately sticking my finger in my mouth. I wouldn't do that if I REALLY believed there was something stuck to my coat. Then I actually LOOKED closely at my purple coat. Nope, nothing dirty on it and invisible contaminated dirt just doesn't count anymore. So that meant that when I got home I did not have to wash my hands (altho, I admit, I thought about it but knew that if I did that, I would be back where I started.) I just grabbed some nuts and had a snack.
And the mail is clean, the door handle is clean and so is the van. The coat ('can I wash it NOW?' wails ocd) is clean but there's a good chance that I will have a bit of a hesitation the next time I want to wear it.
And when I finally do get to wash it, ( winter time ) there will be a quiet sight of relief from ocd that I obeyed at last. And I will let it think so, even though I know that I always wash seasonal coats before they get put away.
Thanks, Sunny & Tina for giving me a little push in the right direction this week!
Good for you!! I think it's great that the feeling of contamination left en route to the store. And I love your conversations with OCD. The OCD has nothing on you! :-)
ReplyDeleteOh, I like that your coat is purple--my favorite color!
It's my daughter's fav. colour also. I did buy it long ago before she was born, before i knew she'd love that colour :). I was looking for something bright & cheery & purple was it.
DeleteHooray, hooray, hooray for you!!!!! So incredibly proud of you. I KNOW how tough that was but you did it. Yahoo! I think that every time you look at that coat you should make a point of reminding yourself how you beat OCD on that one! You can wear it like a coat of victory. : )
ReplyDeleteHey, purple is my favorite color too! I just recently found out that there is a place called The Purple Store and they sell stuff on Amazon. This could get expensive for me.
I love it... yes, wear your coat of victory!
ReplyDeleteIt took a bit of a push, but i did wear my 'victory coat' today again. I like that idea, calling it my victory coat.
ReplyDeleteYou put your finger in your mouth ... wow ... just ... wow. I am in awe. It's also great that you broke the chain of contamination from coat to door to mail. Good for you!
ReplyDeleteAdventures in Anxiety Land
Thank you so much for your comments on my blog and for telling me about the thought records and providing the names of the books. I am going to try to get the workbook/book on amazon because I think it would be helpful for me. I don't have a therapist, not out of not wanting one, where I live right now limits me to the availability and when I did call, they were honest and said, in fairness to me, OCD was not their specialty. Educating myself has been helpful to me and thank goodness for the resources out there on OCD these days.
ReplyDeleteOne thing you wrote struck me. I did not have OCD until I had my first baby..I practically came home from the hospital with it. (I did have anxiety as a child but not OCD)
It always makes me smile when I read someone has had success and so you wearing the Victory coat makes me so happy for you.
I think it is great that you were able to overcome the fact that you wanted to wash your coat. It is little victories like this that make it seem like OCD is conquerable. I have found ways to take steps like this from http://onlineceucredit.com/edu/social-work-ceus-ocd. I hope you find some great information from this site. Keep up the great blogging!
ReplyDelete