Am I weird? Do you do this?!

[SoreHeadInBed]

I read emails and texts over and over again after I've sent them.

I also write reports as part of my job (about 50 pages per report) and I read them over and over again too! This morning I have a day off after a v long and exhausting 2 weeks of working into the night most days to meet some deadlines, so thought I'd relax with a coffee and easy morning. I spent my morning re-reading all my reports from the last month (🤔🥴)

Weirdly I find it v calming! (occasionally much less calming / v frustrating when I see errors in what I sent or submitted 😠)

Am I really weird!!? I can't imagine other people do this! But do you? Please tell me I'm not alone in my weirdness here!!!

Thanks. If you don't mind me asking, was this part of what constituted your OCD diagnosis? Or is it that you have OCD over something else, and also do this?

I do this too yes. And I have OCD behaviours since a child. I do find it comforting

Oh, maybe I am weird because I can't bear to read back my emails and advice to clients.
I know I will find fault and it's too late once it has gone.
If I am particularly happy with something I have written I save it in my precedent bank in case it can be used again but otherwise I HATE looking back over my work it's like hearing my own voice on a recording. Urgh.

Yes yes yes... Me too. I hate seeing my errors and typos... :( (why couldn't I have seen them on one of the 5 times I read the report/email or whatever BEFORE I pressed send..!!)

Yes, and this will sound odd, but I quite like the way I write so I enjoy reading my clear, concise emails back to myself!

God no! How do you have the time!

Hehe!! Yes I sometimes experience this!! (although it backfires when I think I've sent something really nicely written and then I realise I've actually made a mess of it, or I spot typos!!)

Yes I do read them back sometimes, particularly when I'm having an email sort out.

Sometimes I think "Oh that's quite good - did I really write that?" 😅

I was diagnosed with OCD about 9 years ago. I've always been overly cautious, my mother has schizophrenia so I was a young carer. I obsessively over think most things. Every interaction with someone be it a conversation, text, social media post. I have routines at home with locked doors, is the gas hob turned off I wear a bracelet so when I perform an action I look at my wrist and visualise my bracelet. It's exhausting I have just one friend in real life because I can't deal with the constant worry of human interaction. I do work full time in sales that requires a lot of communication somehow I'm able to put that in a box and not obsess 🤷

Same wondering why or how people have the time for it 🤣

Yes, not as a matter of course but if something reminds me of xx I’ll do so - can be personal or work related

Actually @SoreHeadInBed this is kind of similar but one thing I always do after I send a voice note as I always listen to it myself. I have no idea why because I hate hearing my voice but I’m just interested in hearing what the conversation sounds like from their point of view. 😂😂

I do this but only with really important reports. I have had an email prepped and ready to send in my draft folder for over six months because I have to wait for a certain legal matter to happen before I can send it. It will have huge consequences so I've read it so often I know it by heart now. I've also made many amendments but it's good to go now. Hopefully I will be able to send within the next month.

Same. I don’t think I’d be formally diagnosed and have always thought of myself as being completely NT, but since raising a DS with severe ADHD and having extended family with ASD, I’ve noticed more and more of my behaviours and habits are probably somewhere on the ND spectrum.

I’ve never really thought of them as in any way life-limiting or ‘weird’, but the more I look back retrospectively at my life/career/relationships, the more I can see that I sometimes behave oddly. I often blurt out what’s in my head completely unfiltered; I procrastinate like a champ; am generally a bit chaotic, disorganised and late; I suspect I’d be considered socially extroverted and outgoing by most people who know me, but in reality I find it absolutely exhausting, and I tend to use a lot of displacement activity as a coping mechanism - the compulsive re-reading thing is a big one, and something I find strangely soothing (except when I see a mistake), as the OP mentions.

It’s interesting, and I think a lot of the pushback around “ooh, everybody has a bloody diagnosis these days” is simply because more is being understood about how the human brain works, which inevitably results in more people realising they may actually fall outside of what was previously considered ‘normal’. We’re all a little bit odd in our own way!

I can completely relate to your post. I think that having a parent who had very severe psychotic episodes played down my own symptoms, you can't mask psychosis. I made it my life to appear NT I masked my symptoms from a very young age. Unfortunately for me my life crashed, work, relationship broke down.
I'm only just now really finding out who I am.

@Ohjustalittle So sorry you’ve had such a tough time - wishing you all the best 💐

I do this, I'm late diagnosed dyslexic so firing off a message means I make massive mistakes in langage and tone.

I do exactly this too.

I do this and know my DD does too, we're both autistic so assume it's an ND thing for us.

I do this with anything I've sent. I'll make a post, or send a reply on MN, and I'll reread it before reading the replies.

Yes I’m big on this also.
I found a log regarding a client from 3 years ago earlier in a drawer of my desk and read it through. I then re-read the referenced emails also. It nicely refreshed my annoyance at them and was a great way to procrastinate with a brew.

Oh, I think you are actually me!! 😉

Is it clarifying and securing the thoughts in your mind?

👋 We’re obviously part of a small and exclusive club! Is ‘high-functioning chaotic secret introvert’ a diagnosis do you think? 😂

Haha can I join your club! High functioning, chaotic secret introvert' describes me very well. Although I do think chronic time-waster/procrastinator would also have to be included...