I'm a Crazy Little Tea Pot -- Short and Stout -- Throw away my receipts and hear me shout!

[keiramarcos]

  So, I have OCD. Full diagnosis sort of thing in my 20s. I medicate for it to keep from going completely off the deep end but even with medication I have a minor issues for instance:

• I like to sit in certain places in the places I go often (especially the library or the cafe)


• I park my car in certain areas of parking lots and have been known to wait for a spot to open up.


• I write with a certain kind of pen and changing that pen can be stressful (like when a company changes a design or stops making my pen altogether)


• I do certain things in certain places -- write there, read in the chair, do work at my main computer, don't do work on my laptop.


• I have a few minor hoarding issues -- that I work very hard to keep under control so I don't end up on an episode of Hoarders. I allow myself to keep notebooks, pens, bags, purses but nothing else.

Sometimes forcing myself to throw things away can be traumatic as fuck. Today, I made myself throw some things away that I'd been keeping for no real reason (receipts, old magazines, catalogs--I wish I was kidding) and I thought I was okay with it. I mean there was no panic before hand and my husband came upstairs. He asked me a question about something and I just had a complete and utter meltdown. I burst into tears and cried for twenty minutes solid.

I have this deep sense of shame attached to my OCD and often it drives me crazy that throwing away a fucking receipt can lead to such a loss of control. It's embarrassing -- this attachment I have to old mail and receipts. It makes no sense but then I guess if it made sense I wouldn't keep it for months at a time in a basket until I force myself to go through it and throw it away.

My husband is a real trooper though and that's the truth of it. He just made me some tea and put me on the couch and let me cry until I was done.

I can't remember his question and I'm a thousand percent sure I did't answer it.

Comments

[mass-hipgnosis.livejournal.com]

&hugs

I feel your pain. I have an entire filing cabinet full of bank statements and pay stubs; some of them are 20 years old! Just the thought of shredding them gives me anxiety.

Boyfriend: "Soooo....you know you don't need to keep all of those, right?"

Me: *clutches filing cabinet and growls*

BF: "You're not going to get audited. And even if you do, you only have to keep things like that for five years."

Me: *hiss* "My pressshus, we wants it, we needs it!"

I guess stuff like that is the trade-off for him never having to to laundry (he folds it wrong!).

[keiramarcos]

I'v never known a man to fold a towel to my specifications.

[mass-hipgnosis.livejournal.com]

Right? His mother folds them correctly, so I know he knows better.

[justalurkr.livejournal.com]

There are...specifications? (Ducks, flees)

[keiramarcos]

Yes.
*stares*

[justalurkr.livejournal.com]

Well, mine all fit on a shelf and a half in the linen closet?

At the moment, post-mom, they're all neatly c-folded in half with the tags tucked in. I can have that fixed in another week or two, though.

I *am* a stickler about all the same colrs going together, though.

[otrame.livejournal.com]

When my son's family of 5 moved in with me for a while, we distributed chores. My son did most of the cooking, The kids cleaned various rooms, etc. (His wife was the only one with a job at the time and we all said she was exempt from chores except she had to cook now and then because she is good at it.)

I had laundry. For 7 people. I insisted. I can't STAND for people to fold clothes the wrong way. I get them out of the drier still hot and if they aren't still hot I reheat them.

I am, in general, a bit of a slob. I can tolerate a lot of crap laying around. I cannot tolerate dishes, pots, etc. not being in specific places in the kitchen. Drives me up the wall. This is one of the reasons my son did the cooking. I had to stay out of the kitchen because all the dishwashers in the house had different ideas about where to put stuff. No one else seemed to mind.

[inu-spockya.livejournal.com]

*joins in the fleeing*

my sister has OCD real bad, so does my dad, I just have a touch of it but I do have the hoarding thing so hey, mad propz for throwing shit away! it ain't easy.

I get away with a lot in the house I think cos neither of us cares about a lot of stuff, just, is it clean, we're good. my OCD is more having set routines and getting pissed off/freaked if they get broken.

thrown a bunch of shit away lately, every now and then my brain will let me do that, and jfc I got no idea why I kept half that shit, maybe more than half. eesh. lucky enuff like you to have a great partner.

mazel tov, my dear!!