Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

• Riley Vidgen, Grade 11
• Short Story
• 2021

You’ve been thinking for a while, laying in bed attempting to distract the nagging thought at the back of your mind. It has been there for far too long, such a stretch of time that its origin has been long forgotten, the only knowledge of its existence coming from a place of uncontrollable, all-encompassing fear. The idea runs around in your mind, again and again, becoming a physical sensation now, fingers tingling like ants crawling under skin, forming tunnels upon tunnels, opening holes for the unthinkable to get in. You want nothing more than to get rid of them, to poison them with the soap, drown them in water, if only to give some form of relief, some kind of saving grace.

Clenching fists, hard enough to drive nails into palms, biting into your skin, you try again to shut the thought out, squeezing weary eyes shut. This happens every night, every single day, and you have no way for it to stop, the obsession running around your head like a sickening lullaby, forcing you to act and move. Shifting those soft covers, bare legs moving on their own accord, desperately needing solace, you find yourself there again, the dim lights and porcelain facing you from every angle, cold tiles nipping at your feet. Perhaps it would have been grounding if rationality was something your thoughts possessed right now, but the pressure residing on your brain was so overwhelming everything else seemed dull and blurry. The reflection in the mirror seems to laugh at you, but in reality, it felt the same, hot shame, fear, and a desperate lack of control puppeteering everything in moments like these, a constant repetition becoming the only form of comfort. Such a bitterly cold comfort, truly, but there’s a fundamental inability to shift your mind away from it, regardless of how destructive it has become.

Sometimes it gets better, you try to focus on that, attempt to think of a time where you didn’t stand there time and time again, tears running down your face as you’re forced again and again to repeat an action you do not want to do in bitter solitude. The thought of ‘maybe it will get better, maybe it will stop’ running repeat almost as much as the desperate fixations did. It’s a fruitless endeavor at this point, you know this all too well, trying to stop seemingly impossible, hands nearly permanently red-raw, skin becoming scaly and sore, scarred from years of constant abuse.

Turning off the tap, drying throbbing hands on the towel for the dozenth time, eyes closing to stem the flow of thought, you stumble back into your warm, darkened room, pulling the covers around your shaking body, legs being pulled up to your chest, hands back in those tight fists.

You know the compulsions will come again, and that you truly have no power against them, the bugs starting to crawl under your flesh at the thought.