In the literature of mental illness, this one is destined to be a classic: "Just Checking, Scenes from the Life of an Obsessive-Compulsive," by Emily Colas.
Just checking to make sure the cat's not in the dishwasher. Just checking to find out what her deodorant is made of. Just checking to make sure the child she brought home from the hospital is really hers.Just checking to learn what kind of a sore might be under the band-aid on the waiter's hand. Just asking her husband to check, actually. Asking him to do a lot of weird stuff over and over again, which he does. He's accepted it. He's married to an obsessive-compulsive, who, twitty though she may be, is at least aware enough to know she doesn't want to be weird all alone.
Colas wrote this memoir after she started on Prozac, and after the worst of her compulsions were under control. She kind of missed being crazy, even though it was never the romantic kind of crazy, crazy like rock stars are. "Rock stars don't get magazine covers because they kept their audience waiting while they washed their hands twenty times," she points out.
Sadly, the whole time she was weird, she understood she was missing out, somehow, on a normal life. Anyway, after the worst was over, Colas wrote a book. In it, she looks back on her bleak times with compassion and humor.
Take the day her son was born. Her obstetrician didn't make it to the hospital. The doctor only lived a few blocks away. Perhaps the doctor was tired of being lectured about germs.
Writes Colas, "I'm sure I wasn't her favorite patient, but I should at least get credit for being most memorable. In her absence, I was forced to re-explain all the hygienic procedures the doctors and nurses needed to follow. To start, I didn't think it was wise to put the box with the rubber gloves in it right on top of the container where you dispose of dirty needles. It seemed like a conflict of interest. . ."
Every worrier will recognize, in Colas, a true sister. Everyone who likes to laugh will be glad she was brave enough to tell this story on herself.