To scream at the next person..

[user1471559761]

Who says "oh I'm a bit OCD".
Keep hearing it and seeing it all over the place. I have horrendous OCD and spend hours every day checking things over and over and over until anxiety washes over me and I start shaking and sometimes crying with frustration and guilt. Every day.
OCD is not putting always putting your socks on before your jeans or always washing your hands after touching something dirty. It's something most people wouldn't even understand unless they lived with it every day. It destroys relationships and totally takes over the sufferers life. Rant over but I just hate hearing something that upsets me so much being trivialised as some kind of cool quirky illness!

People I know are always taking the piss out of my OCD, I think they try to make light of it.
Saying things like "I'll hide the hoover" etc,
I can not rest if I see a crumb on the floor,if there is a cushion out of place.
I don't invite people round because I know I will panic if they make mess.
I wash my hands until they bleed sometimes, check the children while they sleep 100s of times a Night.
It's exhausting.
I am trying so hard to beat this and I am believe it a lot better then I was.
I don't think they realise how it effects mine,my children or husbands life's.

now i really dont mean to trivialise the condition in any way at all, but is it something that can be in different degrees? Like you can be a little bit fat, but you cant be a little bit pregnant?

It can be, but that's like saying Stage 1 cancer means you just have a little bit of cancer. OCD is just what it says--it's obsessive, it's compulsive, and it's a disorder. It will bother you, probably bother others, and take over your life. Your desire to hang things straight on the wall is not OCD. Neither is your morning coffee habit, or desire to always wash and hang your mug when you're done. That's just human nature and a tidy bent.