Is this OCD?

[confusedanddazed99]

I'm a 39 year old male, happily married with two great children, a good job, no real money worries - life is really good in general and I have no real grounds for complaint.

I've always been a resilient person - at work or in my personal life, it's one of the traits people really recognise in me. I don't let stressful situations get to me, I can just shrug and get on with things and have normally been generally good at living the 'if you can't change it, don't worry about it' philosophy.

However, I've noticed in the last few years, maybe since the pandemic, I find myself fixating on minor things. These things play over in my head and occupy way too much of my headspace. For example:

We had an extension built a couple of years ago (I know, another reason we're incredibly lucky!) and there was a slight slope in the floor. I don't think anyone else noticed it, but I couldn't stop being bothered by it for about a year. Every now and then it still bothers me a bit.

There's a couple of minor scratches on my car windscreen. They don't impede my vision particularly, they are only noticeable in certain lights, and it's really not a big thing, but it is irritating me way more than it should, and playing on my mind.

There's other examples of little things that are less than perfect, but don't impact life in a meaningful way, don't really get noticed by anyone else and shouldn't be anything more than a mild irritant at best, but they stick with me for weeks and weeks.

Weirdly, things like my father having dementia I can take in my stride and deal with. Or maybe it's the bigger stuff manifesting itself in a different way?

Anyway, I wondered from the experience of others, does this sound like some kind of OCD or intrusive thoughts type behaviour?

Sorry if that's just a ramble!

I'm not sure. Far from being an expert here but it's not the type of ocd I'm accustomed to ( a family member has had it for years).

You seem to possibly have instrusive thoughts but you haven't described any compulsions. I do know there's a type of ocd called pure O though.

Maybe it depends on how much it's affecting your life too? My relative is affected by thoughts and compulsions multiple times a day, even hour. He has it severely, his life is built around it. It can be a very debilitating condition.

Was your Mum or Dad a perfectionist?

It could well be that you're focussing on small imperfections because they disproportionately demonstrate how little control you (and any of us have) over our environments - the big proof of this is your Dad's condition.

You sound similar to my DP, he does have OCD, he has obsession like yourself but also rituals. Id say yours is more of an obsessive thought than compulsions. It’s good you can take big things in your stride but likely these little things will mount up to a big issues. Maybe seek some advice with a MH talking service or your GP?

This doesn't sound like OCD to me. Most people have unwanted, intrusive thoughts at times. But if you have diagnosable OCD, these thoughts have a disruptive impact on your everyday life. People with OCD are more upset than usual by these intrusive thoughts and often (not always) use ritualistic behaviour (compulsions) to try and expunge them.

(I'm not an expert, but I am the mother of an adult son with severe OCD).

That's not to say that your intrusive thoughts don't mean anything. It might be useful to talk this over with a therapist, if you can, to find out why these things are bugging you.

I have diagnosed OCD but primarily "pure O" which is more of the obsessions and intensive thoughts more than the compulsions.. I would say this does sound similar to me. I obsess over small things and my thoughts of things not being right etc I would say maybe you do have some kind of OCD or even just intrusive thought. I occasionally have compulsion or ritual but not much. So you can have a very mild from of OCD. Or even just perfectionism which is a trait of OCD. I don't know where you are in the world or country but where I live you can self refer to talking therpaies on the NHS. The wait list can be long but they will assign you a therapist and help you figure out things and give you some strategies to cope if it is really affecting your life. It doesnt work for everyone but it does for some.