Tuesday, December 28, 2004

Idiot-syncracies

Is mental illness a fad? I have to admit that I wonder about this. It seems we keep various diagnoses and psychiactric catch-phrases as readily on hand as we do our driver's licenses, car keys, and debit cards. They are a necessary part of life--a way to function, a way to be understood by both ourselves and others. We love these invisible, clincial crutches that comfortably bear our infirmities, making us the innocent bystanders in Darwin's lottery. God save the gene, you might say. If it's not a fad, it certainly seems our society is as adept at churning out defunct psychoses as it is quarter pounders with cheese (hold the onions, thank you very much).

With that being said, who among us is not, at the bare minimum, a partial OCD victim? Don't we all willingly (and gleefully?) embrace illogical habits? I know I have several. I wish to present a list, and I'm hoping others will feel free to share their own irrational customs. If I think of any more, I will add them to the comments. But for now, here goes...

  1. I have to alternate the direction that I eat my pizza crusts. That is to say, if the first crust that I eat is eaten from left to right, I will eat the next one from right to left. This keeps things balanced. As you may be able to guess, it is difficult for me to eat an odd amount of pizza slices and feel okay about it, because this naturally throws off the cosmic balance I am trying to ensure. Also, if I eat left-to-right and then right-to-left, I will likely eat the next crust right-to-left again. Why? Because now it is time to go right-to-left first and then go left-to-right. It's like a pattern. RL,LR,LR,RL. It's like a neat little bookended experience.
  2. Most of my idiosyncracies deal with balance, it seems. My mother would say this is the Libra in me. Who knows, but it's true. With that being said, if I am eating something like cashews or peanut M&M's (something small that I am eating one at a time), I will alternate which side of my mouth I chew it on. And, like pizza crusts, I am likely to do a revolving pattern, e.g. left-right-right-left, etc. I may vary it from time to time, but only if I can keep it balanced overall.
  3. Speaking of M&M's, I do not like to eat the same color M&M back-to-back. In fact, I even prefer not to eat similar colors back-to-back. For example, I will try to avoid yellow followed by orange, or orange followed by red. I'd much rather alternate between light and dark. Blue, yellow, brown, green, red, etc. That would be a good rotation. When I am nearing the end of my snacking (whatever is in my hand or left in the bag or what have you), I have to begin planning how I will eat the remaining candies. I actually plan it out when I get down to eight or so candies remaining. I try to choose a diverse and fluid progression to make my snacking the most enjoyable it can be. And I will probably not want to end on a less-appealing color, such as brown. So that comes into play as well.
  4. It would very much bug me to drink Coke from a glass (or wax cup or whatever) that said Pepsi on it. And vice versa, of course. It's worse that they are blatantly opposing brands of cola. It's not as bad if the drinks aren't quite the same, such as putting Mountain Dew in a Pepsi glass. I could probably handle this, though it's not prefered. It would be worse to put Mountain Dew in a Coke glass since Mountain Dew is made by Pepsi. But even that would not be as bad as Pepsi in a Coke glass. Funny enough, I could drink milk out of a Coke glass and not be that bugged at all. But sodas must preserve some sort of brand fidelity when it comes to the cups I use. But even this gets somewhat tricky. It would probably bug me more to put Pepsi in a Mountain Dew cup than vice versa. That's because Mountain Dew is made by Pepsi, but Pepsi is not made by Mountain Dew. Also, Mountain Dew is so fruity and bright that it would be really weird to have a dark soda in an MD glass. How complicated, wouldn't you say?

So there are a few habits that I feel a natural inclination toward. I can't help that I feel these things, or at least I don't believe that I can. Will they remain with me for the rest of my life? It wouldn't surprise me. But luckily I don't consider them all that burdensome. That, of course, would make it much worse. I know all of you must have things like this. Please share. I look forward to it.

3 comments:

  1. What fun…Where do I begin?

    Patterns don’t play much of a roll in my own “OCD” but as a child, when wishing my parents goodnight, I would rotate which one I mentioned first and I would say it twice (I was very afraid to imply that one parent was favored over the other. On day one it went “Goodnight Mom, Goodnight Dad, Good night Dad, Good night Mom. On Day two it went Good night Dad, Goodnight Mom, Goodnight Mom, Good night Dad, and so on…

    I also used to use the sugar spoon exclusively. No other spoon would do. No sugar spoon, no eating. I used to hide it in the second drawer to avoid loosing it.

    Another childhood quirk (that I still occasionally display when I’m under a lot of pressure) was to narrate (out loud if I thought I was alone) everything I did as if I were telling a story about a girl….”Then the little girl went into the kitchen and poured a bowl of cereal. She was very angry when a piece of the delicious cereal fell to the floor…”. I stopped doing it out loud when I was in Kindergarten or 1st grade, and was in the “lavatory”. I thought I was alone, but when I heard other girls laughing at my story about the girl in the stall, I realized I was not alone. I also realized it is not socially acceptable to tell stories about things you do in the bathroom…

    I also like to time things I have to do and beat my time…housework, driving, Etc.

    Most of my nutty habits involve food. One of my minor quirks is eating each item on my plate one at a time to completion (unless the foods mix well…cobbler and ice cream or peas and mashed potatoes, rum and coke for instance). Meat always goes last. This habit can cause gastric discomfort if I am really in the mood for steak but have an unusually large baked potato to contend with.

    I also have to make sure there are no visible veins or fat in any meats I cook or eat. Hamburger, hotdogs and sausages are often problematic because who knows what the hell could be in there. One time Gina found a vein in a rib the girth of my pinky finger, and I haven’t eaten ribs since.

    Eggs are my big problem. I have the habit of picking out the “white thingy” before cooking with them or eating them…(by the way, I shared this quirk with Grandma Dean). As I get older this phobia continues to get increasingly more pronounced. I can’t eat eggs or anything with egg products at restaurants because I know they are not white thingy free. I used to have to cook my eggs separately when cooking breakfast for the family, but lately when I cook eggs I lose my appetite all together. It’s getting to the point where I’m having a hard time eating cookies and cakes unless I know they have been picked clean of anything that resembles the first stages of life. I’m afraid this illness might eventually become debilitating. I’ll end up as one of those skinny old ladies that eat nothing but string beans and Coca-Cola. I'm not far off.

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  2. I think you're all just nuts. Nuts are you all I think. You all, I think, are just nuts. I think just nuts are you all...
    In math it's called perturbations. And yes, I must admit, I'm nuts too... although not so uniquely. I just have to check three times that I locked the door, set the alarm, went to the bathroom, etc. before I go to bed.

    If I've had an eventful day, I cannot sleep until I write in my journal or it will go through my head all night long.

    I also have a problem twidling my fingers and toes. I cannot hold them still. It's a nervous tick I think, except that I do it even when I'm not nervous. And I have to do patterns and such as well. I am constantly rubbing my fingertips together- not like Mr. Burns- subtly and on the same hand. Or my big toe against the next one... clockwise, counter clockwise, left foot, right foot or both feet at the same time! Sometimes it has to match whatever I'm saying in my head. One rotation per syllable.

    I'm also obsessed with looking for patterns. I watch the VCR clock and wait for it to get to something like 749 because 7 times 7 is 49. I did it when I was little too and it drove me nuts. Addresses, PIN numbers, it's all the same.

    Unfortunately, it does drive me crazy and I sometimes wish it would stop. I twidle my fingers so much sometimes, my hands ache!

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  3. This is actually a little bit of what I was getting at when I posted about "boxes". Not so much the little idiosynchrasies you all are talking about here though. But the idea that diagnoses just become part of "who we are"... which they should to some extent, but I do think its gone too far. In my post I used myer's briggs as an example. It seems like its gotten to the point where we can say "well, I just did it because I'm an INSJ... so deal with it!! Its who I am.". Or my adult ADD made me do it. Etc. It seems like mental illness and personality tests are pretty much in the same category these days. And I guess that's ok... I'm glad people can be open about things now. But I do wonder if we've gone a little TOO far. But I don't see anything wrong with all the idiosychrasies you all listed. I'd say you're all a bunch of weirdos, but nothing wrong with that.

    Just kidding! (about the bunch of weirdos that is)

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