Comments on: Howie Mandel hasn’t shaken hands with anyone in eight years due to severe OCD

By: Rose

Rose — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 09:25:42 +0000

ugh why does this site screw up my name

By: Rose

Rose — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 09:21:39 +0000

I am pretty sure my sister has OCD and a fear of germs. Honestly, I can’t really feel sorry for people with this problem because it is so annoying and she is completely inconsiderate of other people’s feelings. I have seen people on tv with the disorder who have to go stand in a big trash dumpster or go for like 24 hours without washing or have people contaminate their stuff by touching it when aren’t allowed to look. Sure these people get panic attacks but they pass. It’s instense therapy but honestly I think it works! Besides people shouldn’t have to accomodate all the neurotic demands. Sure I sometimes don’t want to shake hands or hug someone or even be around some people at all. I can kinda understand not wanting to shake hands or be touched and be cool with that but I could NEVER LOVE A PERSON WHO WAS AFRAID OF MY GERMS! I am very hands on in the love department and would rather be alone than be with someone who would make me feel so rejected and be so callous about my feelings. I as far as I am concerned these people are not helpless and they can help it. My sister concsiencely chooses to live in the problem rather than the solution and I have no desire to enable her stupid obsession. As a matter of fact she just got a prescription for Xanax from the doctor and she obsesses so much that she is actually afraid to take it. Also she will vent to me and obsess about the sanitary conditions at different places or talk about how gross it is if someone accidentally drops something in the trash and then digs in to get whatever they dropped and she always says when she is unloading her obsessive crap on me, “Yanno what I mean?” So I don’t know what she means and I am really grateful to God that I don’t know and I never want to know. Mostly I just want her to shut up and get some talk therapy and take her meds. The only thing that has kinda helped her is her Toy Poodle because she thinks everything about him is cute but she gets grossed out by his feet after a walk outside and has to clean them several times a day.

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By: Aspen

Aspen — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 06:05:57 +0000

I see women hovering around their children with padding and a bottle of Purell and I think, “No wonder the country has gone to sh*t.”

I sympathize with irrational fears and acute anxiety. I was diagnosed with a mild form of OCD…”mild” was my therapist’s word…when I was 23 or 24. My obsessions are not germ-related. They are organizational and symmetrical obsessions followed by the other part of OCD…the rituals to “fix” and “quiet” the obsessive thoughts. I alphabetize things, group things, stack things, and–yes–clean things obsessively.

This does not mean that I alphabetize my CDs like a normal anal person. This means that my CD’s are alphabetized, sorted by genre, and cleaned. No one is allowed to touch them after that. Any small shift in even one stack of them will irritate me, and I will obsess over it…to the point that there will be no sleep, no productivity, and no ability to concentrate on ANYTHING else…to the point of full-on panic attack fit-throwing…until that stack is fixed back to perfection.

I have a housekeeper who helps me once every other week. Sometimes, after she dusts, she doesn’t put the pictures back right or rearrange the items on my desk in the correct, symmetrical and perfectly-aligned pattern.

In my early twenties, this would’ve freaked me out to a degree that my cleaning lady would probably never come back to my house.

Through CBT over a period of 3 years (medication did not help my obsessive thought patterns), I have stopped reacting to a glass ring on the table by scrubbing the entire house with a toothbrush and bleach water.

It took a lot of work, though.

Being rude or overly-fastidious about non-existent germ issues is NOT OCD…it’s just petty rudeness.

However. Someone sneezing on you was horrifically rude. I would’ve recoiled in disgust as well, and I don’t have germ issues at all.

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By: fizXgirl314

fizXgirl314 — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 13:27:23 +0000

in fact, i have a friend who’s so annoying with her trite sensitivities…

“oh i can only drink soy milk from a tetra pack, i can only have a certain brand of milk and it has to be coupled with a certain type of food, oh i can’t drink coffee cuz it has too much acid, oh i have a fever, i’m sick i’m this i’m that… ”

it’s like stfu dude… there’s wayyyyyyyy more acid in orange juice than coffee… there’s no reason why one brand of milk should be more “ok” than another and on and on and on… i’m just so tired of all the lame whining in this country… it’s all psychosomatic… just get over it

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By: fizXgirl314

fizXgirl314 — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 12:59:20 +0000

i’ve got like the opposite of ocd… i figure if i’m even in a room with someone, i’ve got their germs… it’s pretty irrational to think you can control the spread of germs since there are millions of them and they are microscopics… i grew up in a poor country so we used to eat food out of the garbage… i guess that helped me get over the fear of other people’s germs… and i’ve never gotten anything worse than the common cold… probably cuz i have developed some sort of tolerance… i dunno… what i do notice is that people who are always obsessing about germs or their trite sensitives sound like they’re not having much fun and seem to generally be more vulnerable to allergies and illnesses…

i dunno, someday i will probably catch something horrendous and eat my words… but until then, at least i don’t live in constant irrational fear…

this is not a comment in regards to ocd, which i understand is on a completely different level than just your run of the mill germ phobia… i’m just saying that people in poor countries can’t afford to have all these trite sensitivities… we’re growing weak as humans it seems with all the bs problems we generated for ourselves… ya know, as long as you use some common sense, wash and clear regularly, you should be fine…

in fact, my roommate who is from china is a prime example of how people in other countries are much more hardy… she doesn’t even usually wash her dishes or pots before reuse and she leaves all her food outside without refridgeration… and she’ll eat it unless it’s obviously gone bad… we just need to grow some balls or something… we can handle much more as humans than we think we can…

ok rant over…

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By: Annabelle

Annabelle — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 22:19:35 +0000

Frank, I was about to say the same thing.
That’s like saying “oh i’m feeling down today… i’ve got depression!” … Yeah, no, you don’t.

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By: agent bedhead

agent bedhead — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 16:16:22 +0000

Jaybird – When someone sneezes on your hand & doesn’t get why that is disgusting, that person is being unreasonable. Just about everyone would agree on that issue, OCD or not.

People with true OCD usually know it by their early 20s, and it’s an absolute nightmare. I speak from experience… and while I don’t know you personally, all the things you’ve said here about germs appear rather rational, especially considering that swine flu is an actual threat. Don’t worry about appearing “OCD” because you’re only taking commonsensical precautions.

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By: Lyla

Lyla — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 11:24:06 +0000

Regarding the guy who sneezed on your hand: you should have fake sneezed in his face! I don’t think you were rude at all, you were reacting to him being completely disgusting and rude to YOU!

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By: somebody

somebody — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 11:00:00 +0000

a strange coincidence : he had a role in “monk” (that detective with severe ocd)

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By: Gymo

Gymo — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 03:51:32 +0000

In the above photo I know what Howie was thinking.
Howie: Don’t touch the skin! Don’t touch the skin! and please don’t breath on me, please!

Wife: I know! I know! we humans are unclean.

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