To ask what your weird secret behaviour is?

[GunpowderGelatine]

You know, the kind of behaviour only you know about which is unusual, and would make people go but you love doing?

For example, I binge on three different Netflix programmes at any one time in what I call a "3-2-1" sequence, which goes like this:

• I will watch a long series (currently Peep Show) 3 episodes at a time
• then I will watch 2 episodes of a shorter series (Santa Clarita Diet at the mo)
• I'll then watch one episode of a weekly-type series after that (Jane the Virgin season 5 at the moment)
• Then it starts with the 3 episodes again, and so on and so forth

I can't deviate from the 3-2-1 sequence, and if for example I've finished the Santa Clarita Diet episodes but the next episode of Jane the Virgin isn't on until 2 day's time, I'll wait to watch anything more until then. I can't just skip it and watch the next 3 Peep Shows, or the world will probably end or something

I don't know why I do this or when it started, but it works for me

Please make me feel normal and tell me your secret weird behaviour

Sleep Warrior I look out for abandoned babies too. Have done ever since a teenager

I undress when doing a poo I don't set out to, or intend to - I just get hot and uncomfortable so kick my clothes off gradually, ending up in just my bra (that always stays on!)

Never thought about it until there was a mumsnet thread about how weird it was to undress to poo... I agreed, until I realised I did it..!

When in the passenger seat of a car I "jump" the lampposts either with my fingers like a horse cantering or my eyes... I have to land on grass though.

I have deep and quite frankly ridiculous conversations with people I've met that day in my head. Usually happened if I've had an argument with someone, I would have said this and they they would have said that, and I would have done this sort of thing.

I need both sides of my body to match. I know it sounds weird but for instance..if one hand gets cold brushing my teeth I need to do the other hand so it's equal. If I step in a dip in the pavement I need to step just as hard with the other foot.

whitetoblerone and *youwillgo
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You are my people! I clench my calf muscles according to whichever side of the road it is, but I clench between lampposts (and parked cars ) and release on the lamppost. I gets quite fast-paced for the fact that each leg depends on what either side of the road is doing. I've been doing it since I was about 8. Why?! Obviously only as a passenger never told anyone that before!

I also grind my teeth to different tunes. Awful habit. And I thought everyone looked at the toilet roll after a poo? How else do you know when it's entirely clean?! I probably use far too much toilet roll...

I also imagine where I would put everything if I lived in the place I’m staying in. Hotel rooms, villas, relatives houses.

I also own an imaginary log cabin which I move into every time I can’t sleep and mentally unpack all the boxes.

I always read the last page of a book before I read it.

I have whole relationships with whichever Sleb I am currently obsessed with.

The thing I do most, it’s more recent, is mentally planning long solo travel trips. RV travelling across America, retreats in India, driving across Europe. It’s all a bit Eat, Pray, Love!!!

I pick my nose.
Browse Rightmove for houses I want and mentally do them up.
Facebook stalk exes and exes of friends.
Eat chocolate in a very excessive fashion.
Google ridiculous things like panic rooms.

Before I go to sleep I have a particular ‘daydream’ that I must follow to drop off. It’s very soothing. After a few months if I’ve overthought the details I change it. My new one involves being on a long train journey or cruise, but alone. Surrounded by people but just enjoying my own company.

I have been known to say "goodbye, toes!" when I put on slippers or Ugg boots, while watching my toes disappear into them. I used to do this as a child when my mum put my slippers on for me.

whenever I see anything a bit suspicious going on, I practise my witness statement, so I can be the star witness when cross examined by a scary barrister

I do this too! Sometimes I also take photos of people or vehicles and then watch the news for a few days ready to provide the vital clue.

strawberry what is an egg mcmuffin with no egg?! That's the scariest thing on here.

In car / train journeys, I imagine myself doing gymnastics along the side of the road eg from the house to the gate to the lamppost etc

I have a sneaky cigarette without my kids knowing... disgusting!!
I fart a lot
When I'm not busy at work I sit behind my screen and read the Mail, Facebook but pretend to look busy and I'm very good at it.

Many of these are familiar to me. I mentally narrate my day/actions. I note down details so I can provide the police with a decent statement. I 'see'all words spoken as if they are written. If I can't picture a word, ie with an unfamiliar name or place, I will not be able to say or remember it.

Whenever I have an earworm I sing a few lines from Deal's kiss from a rose and it wipes my brain clean.

Every night I get into bed and pi k up my current long running daydream. Usually a sexual fantasy. Much of the time about an ex from my teen years. As these fantasies are so long running and often go on months, if i get myself off to them it's often without even having got to a sexual bit so I'm essentially wanking to, i dunno, the perfect route to go for a run (where I might eventually run into this ex) and what I'm wearing.

I also cross my ankles to sleep or to comfort myself and notice my DD does this and has done since she was born.

I also really enjoy using my fingernail to scrape plaque off my teeth at the end of the day and examining it.

Also a maladaptive dreamer. Though I think of it less as "mal" adaptive and more of "therapeutically" adaptive. I work through various made-up scenarios in my mind and every now and again a little glimmer of insight into my real life appears and I think 'Oh. That's why I did that'. I used to think I was the only person in the world who did this and wonder when I was going to grow out of it. 40 now and no sign of it going away...

I count if left with nothing to do. Like drum my fingers on the table and count: 1, 2, 3, 4, 1, 2, 3, 4 over and over.

I become obsessional about topics also. Like, if I wanted a new moisturiser I could spent hours researching the right one to get. I don't even use it that often but will send ages learning all about moisturisers.

I cannot fall asleep without having something on the TV. I turn the picture totally off and the volume down so low I can barely hear anything so don't know what's being said. Basically, I leave the TV on but cut all picture and almost all sound out - so it might as well be off.

p.s. how bloody marvellous are all of you, my people!

I've got more out of this thread than what I've got out of 5 months of CBT!
Fuck my therapist. I going back to fun imagery life!
Don't you all find it exhausting at times though?

I've got more out of this thread than what I've got out of 5 months of CBT!

I have to say this thread has done so much good for my mental health. I'm not bonkers after all or at least I'm not on my own.

In fact I really want to show my therapist this thread and say every single poster is me, this is what's going on in my head. It will be way easier than me telling her. I know you're all not me, I'm not that crazy but you all very well could be. I do everything mentioned here.
I actually dream while I'm awake! So much so I get confused between my dreams and reality. It's not like day dreaming. As in a subconscious dream I don't have much control over it. It's like I'll be doing something, sometimes it's things where my minds a drift like cleaning or watching tv or it can be something I actually need to concentrate on like reading or working and I'll just start dreaming. You know how sometimes your dream comes back to you in the day? Well it just carries on. I feel like I completely zone out of reality, sometimes the dream can be related to real life sinarios sometimes they're totally bizzare, sometimes they're related to what I'm doing like if I'm reading the words actually change and become my dream. I've even missed appointments and gone into work on days I shouldn't because I've dreamed that I've been asked to go in or my appointments been changed, and I think it's real, this adds to my repeated checking anxieties, did I do it or did I dream it?
Anyone eles?

I want to have maladaptive daydreams! They sound marvellous!

My daydreams only go so far as replaying arguments with others and telling them exactly what I think of them. Some of the counting stuff I do occasionally,, but I really want to have an imaginary life but I can't think what it would be about

I have a long-running imaginary scenario that I’ve had since I was 10 about being a different person...the imaginary person has a husband and children and a huge extended family that all have jobs and their own lives...it’s not something I spend ages agonising over, they just pop up naturally in my head (jobs, children’s names, big life events). I’ve only ever told my partner and he thinks I’m utterly insane.
If I’m reading an article I have to read each paragraph in a different accent: Mancunian, scottish, some sort of cockney, American, posh, then Australian (I’m from London but v good at accents).
I count to whatever age I am before I can poo and have done this for as long as I can remember. No idea why. So many more but I can’t even think of them right now!
This thread is very helpful and also hilarious 😂😂😂

I talk to myself, usually walking down the street. Out loud. Often in a different accent to my own depending on the scenario I’m taking about. A southern US drawl seems to be dominating at the moment.
I often do it in front of my 5 year old who finds it incredibly annoying and more than a little embarrassing.

(I’ve subsequently heard her talking to herself in bed at night, often in an American accent. California rather than Deep South, however.)

I look at houses for sale on real estate websites and imagine how I would "live" in them if I owned it. Which bedroom I'd have, ho would I change it around (like not using the dining room as a dining room etc) where the dc would sleep.

I can spend hours doing it.

I also pretend I am in music videos when driving alone in the car

I can’t stop picking.
Spots, dead skin, anything really. It’s awful and I’m embarrassed but can’t stop 🙈