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By the time it was reported that Coronavirus had hit the United States, I felt the familiar itch familiar anxiety. Worldwide, people grew worried, pulling threatening lattice every time someone cough near them, struggling to open doors with their elbows and store supplies in case of quarantine. But as someone withObsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), every day feels like a scam battle to remain healthy and uncontaminated.

Whenever I wear a metro car near my neighborhood in Brooklyn, I formed its passengers.Does anyone cough? Does anyone seem to have trouble breathing?I position myself strategically in an open space pocket and I pull a clorox wipe in my bag. I grabbed on the metro bar using the wipe as a barrier between my palm and steel stained.

I was officially diagnosed with OCD in 2016 and once I heard it, everything had sudden sense (to my tendency to rewrite a text message in order to integrate a number of lines). Disorder is characterized by uncontrollable, recurrent and undesirable thoughts (obsessions) and behaviors (compulsions) that we feel the urge to repeat. These compulsions enter intoVarious formsincludingaccount,Ritualist behaviors, theNeed symmetry or accuracyand constant verification, among others.

My OCD is mostly materialized by avoiding anything in all three, without taking into account half of the food in my plate because of "bad pieces" and to have explicit rituals that I follow in the morning , at night and browsing Instagram, for example. Much of my obsessive thoughts and actions have become of the same nature as I barely notice when I want to compulsion or having an intrusive thought.

Anyone with OCDE really believes perform their compulsions or resist certain behaviors will prevent their obsessive thoughts from materializing. For example, I would not wear a shirt with a breast cancer awareness ribbon, because my mind convinced me that my mother would be diagnosed with breast cancer.

When I feel calm, my symptoms are less widespread - sometimes absent - but they have spikes for difficult times, like, say, a murderer pandemic. The stakes are higher, so you have to tend to tell you more diligently that you are infected. In the middle of the AIDS epidemic,Fred Penzel, PhD, wrote, "One of the main characteristics of the OCD is that people with determining how risky certain things are likely. Victims often confuse the possibility of probability: if something can happen, This will happen, no matter how unlikely it is. " Many people with OCD will create fervently that their compulsions will save their lives, so when there is aVirus threatening by lifeThese compulsions may feel like a raft of familiar life to settle.

As you can imagine, a New York City packed metro car allows very little personal space. That day, my knees touch those of an elderly woman who is sitting in front of me while I want to grab the bar above. As the train wanks in motion, it touches without covering his mouth and I envisage each particle of air infected with the virus in agut It will finally hit me. I look at her with contempt and confusion.Has not she looked at the news? Has she ever taught ways?My anxiety comes to a boil. My compulsions come in competition. I move to get away from her and, doing so, I hug my knee on his. Now, I have to hit my other knee on his, otherwise. I do so surreptitiously while I go down a few centimeters.

For a fugitive moment, I am relieved because I feel like I had the power over the situation. As the OCDA is intrinsically linked to the desire to take control, it increases during the periods where you can not possibly have this type of power, as during an epidemic. To soothe existential stress, I try to control what I can, as how many times I flashes in a minute or ensuring that one of my shoulders brushes against the door, I brush the other too.

Suddenly, I can practically feel theThe germs crawling on my cheeks. I am surmounted by the need to demos my face. I'm getting my left cheek, then my right to maintain symmetry. I was itching my left again because I'm not satisfied with the first time. I managed the right cheek again so as not to have itch odd time.

Then, it reminds me that the coronavirus can be transferred by touching your face if a contaminated particle has been made on your hand. I have just increased my chances four times more. If people usually affect their facesabout 23 times per hour, I have to touch my face at least 46 times per hour, doubling my chances ofContracting coronavirus. My brain begins to fight, swearing only if I do not touch each side of my face four times more, I will die; But if I touch my face several times, I could die of contagion, an ostensibly more real threat. This internal tug is constant inPeople with OCD-He getting tiring fast enough, your brain jumps from thought to think so fast without rest.

As thoughts compete faster and faster, my breath becomes shorter and more tense, that my rational spirit knows is a sign of aAnxiety attack coming in the opposite directionYet the obsessive part of my brain convinces me is aSymptom of virus.

There are two other stations before we reach my stop. I can not do it. I support short seconds before the subway reaches the next station. I go out of the doors an early shutdown, pushing the impatient people spent on a way in the train car. I rushed to the stairs and emerges above the ground, suck tiny gorgues to stop my lungs from the short circuit.

For a fleeting moment, I would like me to wantcontrack the virus. My worst fear would be realized and I will not worry about my destiny, I would know. If I have the disease, there is nothing more to control; It's out of my hands and that relief sounds sweet. Then I quickly rub this thinking of the grooves of my brain.

I have been in this situation several times before - but neverAt the point of a pandemic In one of the most populous cities on the planet. When there are three people in my Uber, for example, I can just ask the driver to drop me. But now, I can not escape and I start to discern how to maintain any slicit of mental health. While the United StatesThe general surgeon says Do not be afraid, my brain shouts, "panic or you perish!" On the other hand, perhaps years of my brain telling me that every minor decision that I do could be the highlight of my coffin could do so uniquely in a unique way to deal with this virus.

It can be disconcerting for people with OCD to analyze what behavior is useful in relation to harmful, especially during a pandemic. They could have beenwash one's hands Or by ranging an exorbitant amount over the past 40 years for the purpose of performing germs and other diseases. With the CDC recommending that peoplewash one's hands For a fixed time (20 seconds) and in certain situations (when treating with food, when processing a cut, when using the toilets, when the animals are scrolled, etc.), that Can confuse previous obsessional thoughts and compulsions for people with OCD, especially those whose compensation includes counting.

After catching my breath, an additional subway stop away from work, I'm starting to spawn to the office - half a mile. I look at each step, ensuring that my heel lands are exactly at the edge of each crack in the sidewalk. I am vigilant not to walk on triangle-shaped slabs because they are three sides.

When I arrive at work, I have to enter through the average tournament, because the left or right could be considered the third. After reaching my office, I finally feel comfortable knowing that I can fall to work, lose a time track and myexternal anxieties. The worries sneak sometimes and I have to type a three letter twice as it is technically six letters or that I feel an overwhelming thrust to pick up and put the mouse discreetly several times.

As the coronavirus panic roared on In the United States, those who suffer from mental illnesses probably suffer as will never have before. When the coronavirus finally extinguished, the anxiety of the company will light, and everything will come back to the affairs as usual, with the exception of those who live OCD, who live in this state of discomfort and apprehension 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 7 days a week, 365 days. One year, a pandemic or no pandemic.