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EXAMPLES OF SYMPTOMS OF OCD
My daughter can’t stop washing her hands because she is worried that they are contaminated. Last
night she was up several times washing. This morning she has been in the bathroom for over an hour
and her hands are very chapped. She has been crying a lot too because she doesn’t want to keep
washing and it’s frustrating to her.
In order for my son to go into another room he has to walk through the doorway 14 times. He has
numbers that feel "bad" to him. The numbers 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 11, and 13 are all bad numbers. He has to
“get past” the number 13 before he can "finish." If he doesn’t do this ritual, he is worried that his family
could die. His compulsions are so anxiety provoking that he tries to avoid doorways.
This evening my son came out of the bathroom shivering and shouting at me, telling me that he didn’t
want to take cold baths anymore. He felt the need to turn the faucet to the right side because the left
side was "bad" and the left side of the faucet was painted red, which was a "bad" color. The right side
and the color blue were “good.” Turning the faucet to the right made cold water flow from the tap.
My daughter was dribbling a basketball when she felt the ball hit something on the blacktop. She was
afraid that she squashed a frog and got down on her hands and knees to check for the injured reptile.
Over the course of the afternoon, my daughter had to interrupt her play several times to check to see if
there was a hurt frog in our front yard.
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