Electrical OCD... Calling Electricians and OCD Sufferers!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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As many on here know, especially in GQ, I have OCD and sometimes it causes me to focus on meaningless stuff and the mundane. I know it is easy to mock it, but try not to, please. My OCD felt as if it went into remission a couple months back and I felt really good, then it hit me with a vengeance, and I started getting weird again. I had this thing about checking plug sockets and such but that went away with the advice and information from quite a few of you on here (thank you). As the nature of OCD goes, especially the ‘checking’ type it tries to morph into something else to worry about. So, I read through some of my old posts, which turns out to be a bad idea since one about electrical outlets next to beds triggered an episode. I found myself worrying about the electrical outlet by the bed at my place, although I honestly ‘know’ its fine, the OCD part of my brain caused doubts (fellow sufferers will understand). My mind almost subconsciously was searching for something to worry about, so I kept worrying along the lines of “what if my blanket snags the receptacle plate and rips it off and I don’t notice, maybe the screw holding it in is stripped and it falls off, then a blanket gets bundled around the unused/nothing plugged in receptacle in the box…fire fire fire” To many of you, this seems absolutely insane to worry about, and to the majority of my mind, it is as well… but it was still there, still is, just ignoring it…for now and it seems to be working electricians please chime in on this and tell me how ridiculous I am being and why a blanket touching an exposed receptacle isn’t even a big deal
Anyhow this kind of worry was the last straw and I decided to do some research on other medications and alternatives. I read a lot of medical journal entries about cavalier treatments for OCD and I came up with Inositol. I have been taking it for about 2+ weeks (takes up to 6 to work) and slowly have been increasing the dose (takes 12g-18g) slowly (the absolute only side effect of taking this stuff is diarrhea from taking too much for the first time)…It did nothing the first week, so I got more skeptical but since the research was promising, I persevered. One day around the 2 week mark. I woke up… my mind calm, well rested…still had my OCD worries but barely any desire to ‘check’ things (which can be akin to needing water when you are thirsty/dying of dehydration in terms of temptation)… I was so relieved at that point was taking 11g of it. No side effects, no diarrhea, nothing weird… it just… worked… I tried this only because those who see improvement with SSRI medication are those who see benefit from it, since I have been taking Zoloft for 12+ years, and it works for all other anxiety… I thought… why not?

I hope this message reaches fellow sufferers, regardless of OCD type… It costs about $20 for a months worth of this stuff (INOSITOL) in powder form (more if you opt for the pills at health food stores)… so its not like its going to hit the pockets too hard, and it has virtually no side effects (except the diarrhea which I personally haven’t experienced from it) and is NON-TOXIC. Best part is there is actual clinical proof of its efficacy. It cut my OCD symptoms down by about 60% i’d say… I can function and enjoy life better… Just thought I’d share… look forward to replies… good luck… by the way, the inline question for electricians… I apologize for this, its just a lingering thought I need to put to rest.

Oh, btw, its tasteless but very mildly sweet (like a quarter of the sweetness of sugar) so you can pretty much add it to anything to ingest it)…

I am off to sleep in my bed whether or not an receptacle plate is on it or not… blankets stuffed around the outlet receptacle terminals or not… I have the day off so I am going to enjoy it. I finally can, at least much more, thanks to this INOSITOL stuff… Who knows, maybe everyone will get lucky and have me stop asking so many questions about stupid crap once more time passes :smiley:

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It won’t, promise. Part of me want’s to throw out some suggestions, but I know (And I’m being serious, not sarcastic) that since you’re not being rational, I don’t think they’d help. For example, you could turn off the breaker, but I don’t want you staying up all night wondering if the front of the breaker box is going to fall off now. Now I’m going to be sarcastic. Calm down, get a hold of yourself.
I’m going to loop back to this in a second, but maybe popping a benadryl or two before bed might help the racing thoughts while you’re laying there trying to fall asleep.

I thought you may have spelled it wrong, since it sounds like sugar, but when I googled it, sure enough, results popped up for people taking it (and it is a form of sugar) for ADHD, which makes sense, but also anxiety. I was going to ask you for some hard evidence that it actually does anything because all I saw was a few random forum posts. But, as I like to say when people scream “it’s just the placebo effect”…well, who cares, if it works it works.

Did I answer it? Did I miss it? Was it there? I’m not an electrician, but I do quite a bit of electrical work, I can certainly answer questions about how outlet boxes are put together. But that may be counterproductive to your situation.

My suggestion for you (if it’s an option for you and your current situation) is that you see a doctor. Most GPs can even help with this. There’s a few frontline treatments many GPs can try before referring you to a psychologist. It may also be worth (and a doctor will have the experience) talking to someone to make sure it’s OCD and not ADHD or some type of anxiety or even panic attacks. In other words, instead of literally taking sugar pills (but if they work they work), maybe some antidepressants/antipsychotics or even a very small dose of benzos to ride out some of the bumpy parts of the day.

You have to be careful or you’re going to go all Chuck Mcgill here and slide down a slippery slope. It’s one thing to be OCD about making sure you locked the door. It’s another thing to be nervous about the electricity in the walls.

Maybe think about what it would take to make you more comfortable. The outlets, in general, can’t be moved as they’re generally spaced around the room by code. But how about an outlet cover? You can find these at just about any hardware or toy store in the aisle that sells stuff for protecting your house for a new baby. Would something like that help? Maybe you should run to Home Depot and take a look at them. They take less than a minute to install and no more exposed outlet.
Hell, maybe just get some blue painters take and cover outlet plate with that?

But, honestly, is there anything that could be done that would make you feel better/safer or, being honest with yourself, for every solution are you going to find a way to be uncomfortable with it? If that’s the case, you need to be at peace with it (even with your insolitol) or find a professional to talk to.

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What are your blankets made of? Wool, cotton, polyester, something like that? Those are all insulators. In the scenario you describe, there are risks, but the risks are all along the lines that your favorite blanket might snag on the outlet and/or cover, pull tight when you roll over, and tear a hole in the blanket.

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Steel wool and Chore Boy.

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Modern house wiring has special requirements for bedroom electrical outlets. It’s called arc fault circuit interrupter (AFCI) and it monitors for electrical arcing that can cause fires. It’s very effective and has been a electrical code requirement for many years.

Your blankets are safe. You can sleep well.

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Hahahah! This post made me laugh my ass off. Thank you! The Chuck McGill thing is hilarious(Michael McKean was a perfect choice for that role btw), but nah I won’t go that far… I love electronics too much. Airplane! too, as I often think about that scene when it comes to my condition :smiley: I meant more along the lines of "Is it safe to put a bed up against an unused outlet without a cover faceplate?, I figure if cotton or polyester is an insulator and the outlet doesn’t heat up it’ll be fine… but OCD tells me differently lol. Thanks for the responses. The Inositol really does work, I can’t believe it.

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While they have been code since 2002, that doesn’t mean anything. The only thing that means is that if the house was built (or a major remodel was done) after 2002 (or whenever the OP’s state adopted the 2002 or later NEC70 code), the outlets should, technically, have been changed. But, if the house was built before the code went into effect, it’s perfectly legal to have non-AFCI protected receptacles. Furthermore, many/most homeowners won’t upgrade outlets if they need to be replaced. If you go to home depot and see a two dollar outlet and a 20 dollar outlet and it’s just going in an interior wall, no where near water (ie, behind a bed), what are you going to pick. Especially if it’s never going to get inspected. I put GFCIs in at work, where required by code, but I have an electrical inspector poking around once or twice a year.

I think we covered this in the other thread. Yeah, if you smash your headboard against the plug, it will break the outlet, or at least the cover, I’ve seen it happen. What will happen, if anything at all happens, after that depends on exactly what breaks. It all likelihood, you’ll have a short to ground or a short to neutral which will blow the breaker. That’s better than a broken wire (on the thing you plugged in) that you don’t notice until you grab it. And that’s better than a “small” short which just gets hot…those are the ones that start fires. But, just pull your bed away from the wall a few inches and you won’t have to worry about it. OR, get that outlet protector I mentioned upthread. It’ll also keep anything that’s plugged in from getting bashed into the wall, or at least give you some advance warning.

Regarding the blanket, while the chances of the screw falling out, the blanket getting into the box, touching the hot side, not shorting out but also giving you a shock or catching fire about as close to zero as I can think of…I also wouldn’t work on the assumption that your blanket doesn’t conduct electricity. In fact…no, not in fact, no point in worrying about hypothetical. You’ve never seen a faceplate fall off by accident, you probably couldn’t get one off without a screwdriver (or a knife), much less a blanket and better than half the time, once you get the screw out, you have to smack it a few times to break it free of the paint. IOW, the faceplate isn’t going to fall off because your blanket, which probably never falls back there anyways, brushed up against it.
I know this is an irrational fear, so I’m not sure what you can do to work through it, other than talking to a doctor that deals with these kinds of things. One thought I had is that you go to home depot, buy the components to build an outlet (ie an outlet, face plate, box and maybe even some wire and a strain relif and if you really want to go all out, some drywall to mount it in. Then see how what it takes to make it fall apart ‘by accident’. When you’re convinced that it won’t, set up all these scenarios that you’ve come up with and see how much abuse it can take before there’s a problem. What you would do, for example is connect (mind you this is a free standing, dummy, set up, not connected to anything) neutral and ground, then connect a continuity tester to hot and ground/neutral. Plug something in and see how much you have to abuse it before it beeps. It’ll be more than you think, I think. It’s not like the these things fall apart the first time the bed gets pushed into it too hard.

But, I think this either won’t convince you or your fear will simply shift to another object.

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In case you are dealing with outlets that nothing is plugged in to, you could get some of these:

They cover the entire outlet, including that pesky screw.

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You don’t need an electrician’s advice. You need a psychologist’s. As you say, the OCD is irrational. All an electrician can provide is rational info. Which is useless against an irrational phenomenon.

You can connect house power to a blanket and nothing will happen. The impedance of a dry blanket is near infinite. If it gets wet the impedance will drop hugely and now something else scary will probably happen.

But none of that is relevant; your OCD has already *assumed *that 5 vanishingly unlikely things have already happened in sequence first to get to this place where dry vs. wet blanket matters. If your semi-subconscious is willing to assume 5 utterly false things, it’ll assume 6 just as easily.
I know diddly-beans about OCD. My advice: Get the medical help you desperately need. I know enough to know that this isn’t a readily curable problem. But there are some ameliorations available. Get them and use them, whatever they may be. Good luck. Seriously.

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Well, I’m on my way, since I haven’t acted on the compulsions to check things, its just recurring thoughts/worries about the mundane that annoy the hell out of me (I haven’t checked any of that stuff), just learning to ignore those . It is working pretty well, but sometimes rational explanations do get “through” and eliminate the thoughts, so at best its convenient. I am at least 10x better than I was a couple months ago, so all in good time this situation will resolve it seems, or at least be on the very managable side. I just think “how would any other person think about it this stuff, oh yeah, they don’t” and that is usually enough to move on, but I do get curious about learning stuff about it (electrical stuff) as well. Just in my nature to try to soak up more knowledge whenever possible. Thanks for the replies. My major point is to reach anyone with OCD and tell them about Inositol though, I couldn’t believe something so simple could have such an impact (psychiatrists even recommend it in some cases as an adjunct to an SSRI). Its like the elephant of OCD only steps on my chest occasionally now instead of sitting on it.

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Just wrote in to reply and tell ** Joey_P** he was correct… It already morphed into something else lol. I just set up a new TV Stand/Entertainment center and now my OCD was telling me to check to make sure the legs aren’t squishing a wire… Only this time I said “enough thats ridiculous, i just don’t care anymore, nothing will happen and if something does, oh well”

It’s a start lol.

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Congratulations on your ongoing victories.

It does seem to this non-expert that many sufferers seem almost take pride in their affliction rather than disliking it and doing all they can to manage it and then live as best they can with the residuals.

Best of luck.

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Thank you! I take no pride here, I wish for nothing more but a perfect mental balance, I loathe OCD more than a worst enemy. I know OCD doesn’t make someone “crazy” but damn it, sometimes it feels that way. I aim to completely eliminate it from my life if possible. I almost always prevail over it, its just irritating as hell. A major annoyance at worst. I just always think “what would a normal person think about this; that’s right, nothing!” and it usually gets me by… I just want to rewire my brain to get rid of it altogether. Some doctors say it can’t be done, if there is a will there is a way. Just like OCD thoughts can find a way to creep in, I’ll get my willpower to push it out. It really takes some mental endurance though… Even now, without an anxiety spike from it, I realize how ridiculous it is to worry about that stuff. I just feel bad about plaguing the boards here with my silly questions (learning about it is still fantastic though)

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I think we all get those racing thoughts from time to time. What if the TV falls over? What if my car isn’t fully in park? What if, what if, what if, but you have to put it out of your mind and move on. It hasn’t happened yet and probably won’t happen. In reality, many of these things are probably more likely to go wrong the more you futz with them. And, furthermore, the more you worry about them, the more you stress out and the more your stressed out, the more you worry about them hoping that if you can ease your worried mind, you won’t be stressed out, but it’s just a cycle*.
Just to reiterate, while I have no issue with you wanting to know how things work and why they’re safe, I still think you should see your doc. Even your GP, if they’re willing to and have the knowledge to, write a script for psychotropics, is probably a great place to start. Sometimes, just something to ‘take the edge off’ is all you need to get your life back to normal.

*It reminds me of a quote I heard from Adam Savage. It was something along the lines of (very paraphrased) ‘I thought if I rush to get all my work done, I’d have free time for myself later, but it turns out if I rush to get everything done, I just end up with more time to get more stuff done so I end up working even more’.
IOW, you need to break the cycle, in your case, it really sounds like you need professional help in the sense that you need an ‘uninterested’ third party that can evaluate what’s going on and say ‘here, take two of these and call me in the morning’ or ‘oh, this is no big deal, I’ve seen it a million times, try changing this or that, and see if that helps’. Either way, it certainly doesn’t seem like it’s going to get better on it’s own, and it can’t help to seek the help of a doctor that’s has the experience and the ability to help you.

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Thanks for the reply Joey_P I do see a psychiatrist (actually changing to another in October) take a medication for it and it does help, plus the other inositol i take gets rid of the rest of the ‘edge’. I’ve pretty much reached the end of what can be done so I am just trying to figure out the rest on my own with therapeutic approaches and such, called ERP (deliberately leaving something that bothers me in its current state and letting the anxiety resolve on its own) and it works to a degree, I just feel like I need an extra something to get over the last hump. I will run it by my new Doctor in October and see what else can be done if anything. I have what is considered a mild-moderate case, at least i can be thankful its not like Chuck McGill or Bill Murray in “What About Bob?” or Nicolas Cage in “Matchstick Men”. I don’t do that counting stuff or anything. Its just a major annoyance. It is really hilarious that you put the bit about the TV falling over in your post… that actually did cross my mind (what if it falls off the mount) and I already defeated that one (I’ll just buy another or fix it if it breaks, thought went away). It seems like I am just slowly beating the thoughts away and occasionally another pops up like a slow game of ‘Whack-A-Mole’… Just gotta find a way to turn the game off and move on, I suppose only time will tell, and this new doctor. Thanks again for the replies and if I was ever a dick in any of my posts, I get really serious about beating this thing and it seems to be progressing positively, just trying to get rid of the remnants and recurrences.