The "Is OCD Taking Over Your Life?" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Sitting in my lounge chair reading about OCD AND ME!  OCD stands for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) which can take over your life!  Yesterday my wife and I had to go to the grocery story.  Hopped in the car, backed it out of the garage, closed the garage door and drove to the end of the street.  Turned left and in a few seconds my wife said to me..."You did close the garage door, didn't you!"  A few seconds later I was turning around to head back to make sure the garage door was closed.  Does this sound like something you would do from time to time.  You know what I just described is a form of OCD.  Seems that my wife and I are both the same.  We do something and wonder a few minutes later... or an hour later if we did it or not.  So...you have to go and check to make sure you did it.  And, the bad part is that a few minutes after that you may question yourself once again...and go check it out one more time.   I never realized that what we were doing had a name for it.  Obsessive Compulsive Disorder...which some people call being a worrywart!  Are you like that.  Do you head back to bed, get in the bed and all of a sudden get out of bed to check if you had turned off the lights in the living room?  You're just not sure about the lights and you know you won't be able to go to sleep unless you check.  As I read the story in my latest Saturday Evening Post, I just knew that I fit into the category of having OCD.  But, the more I thought, the more I realized that I must be just like many, many other people....just can't remember simple things!  For many years I could remember anything about everything.  I never seemed to have any trouble with my memory.  Then, I began to age, like into my 60s and 70s and then late 70s....and I began to question myself about minor things.  Things such as.... did I remember all the items I was supposed to get at the grocery store or did I pick up my pills at the pharmacy?  Wasn't long before I was trying to remember if I had washed my hands before sitting down to eat.  So I would go wash my hands and sit down....and wonder once again...did I wash my hands.  You have to be like that somewhat...don't you?  Don't you forget to  brush your teeth some days?  How about flushing the toilet?  How about forgetting to turn off the TV when you are halfway to your final location in another town.  It's not that you didn't do these things as you should have done them....it's not being able to remember if you did do them.....and that makes you have to go back to check and see if you did do them.  I can't imagine that there aren't many other people like me who tend to forget to do something.  But....do I really have OCD I wonder!  Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is treatable according to a few places I read about it.  And, if you are like I am, I probably wouldn't mind taking a pill to help correct the problem...if it would work.  The story about OCD in Saturday Evening Post reported that one person described how they had to take meds to help with OCD, but after a year of medication reported that they still check the front door or check the stove before going to bed.  So, my friends....why spend money on pills if they do no good!  I might as well just prepare myself.   I'm just going to have to put a louder alarm on the front door just in case I forgot to check to see if I had locked the door before I went to bed, and hope that the alarm will get me awake as well as scare off anyone trying to enter my home.  Getting older isn't as easy as I thought it would be!!  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.