Slightly Obsessed With The Idea That I'm Not Clean Today

[barefoot]

So, yesterday I had to go to hospital for a scan. I thought I felt totally ok about it. Looking back, I think I got myself in a bit of a tizz about it:
- I somehow forgot to change trains on way way into London, which meant I still made it there but on a stopping train, not a direct train, so the journey took almost an hour longer than it should have.
- Then I had to rush to get to my appointment and just scraped in on time - whereas I'd aimed to get there early, grab some lunch, sit and read for a bit, allow myself plenty of time etc.
- Also, I don't really like being in hospitals, plus I find getting undressed/changed in public places quite stressful and do it in the fastest time possible so that was also a bit frantic when I was in my cubicle having to get changed into the gown.
- Then I couldn't get my locker to lock for ages and I think I got a bit wound up about that.
- And on the medical questionnaire I'd filled out that they asked if I'd had X-ray dye used before and whether I'd had any reaction to it - I have had it before and didn't have a reaction to it but I wasn't supposed to be having dye yesterday (if I was, it would have meant a deep injection into my joint and I would have taken a valium beforehand, so I hadn't done that)...so then I was worrying about whether they were going to try to give me dye and, if they did try to do that, what - if anything - was I going to do about it. (As it turned out, they didn't try to do dye - phew!)

Anyway...

While I was in my cubicle waiting, I decided to pop to the loo, which was just over the corridor. I'd already put my shoes in my locker, so was sitting with bare feet. I have no idea what possessed me to do this, because this is the most unlike me thing, but I walked across the corridor and went into the toilet (a self-contained unisex cubicle) with nothing on my feet. And then...well...the floor near the loo was wet (yuck!), so that was then on my feet.

I came out the loo thinking that I'd go and get my stuff out of the locker as I knew I had some hand sanitiser in there so I could clean my feet but, as I got to my changing cubicle, the nurse was waiting to take me through to the scan. So then I just went with him - walking barefoot along the corridor, wondering whether that was better because I was getting the piss off my feet and onto the floor or whether walking on it was simply ingraining the piss more into my body.

Was in the scanner for half an hour. Couldn't stop thinking about what was on my feet. It was like I could actually physically feel the weight of it on there.

After the scan, I went back to the cubicle - used masses of hand sanitiser to try to clean my feet...then used a load on my hands as they'd been touching my feet. Finally got dressed and got out.

Went to my therapy appointment straight afterwards. Started telling my therapist all about it. We're both very into hygiene and are pretty much addicted to hand sanitiser. Looking back, I think I probably needed was some kind of reassurance that my feet were not now covered in piss and that my shoes would be fine. What actually happened was that I sort of started telling it as a kind of funny story but then we both got caught up in how disgusting it was. So, then we both started saying that I'd have to throw my shoes away and I just needed to get in the shower asap, because Oh my God, my feet are covered in piss and what on earth had I been thinking?! etc etc. After quite a while, I think my T realised that I wasn't telling a funny story any more and that I was getting a bit stressed about it, so she started saying how I 'd clearly been preoccupied with being in a hospital/having a scan etc hence I made a mistake with my trains and then walked barefoot into a public loo etc. But, by that point, I think we were both just so caught up in how disgusting it was.

When I finally got home, I basically used floor wipes as stepping stones to get upstairs to the bathroom, so my dirty feet didn't touch anything. I then ran a shallow bath, dumped a load of eucalyptus stuff in there, rolled up my trousers, stood in the bath soaking them...stood there for ages...washed them lots of times with soap. Got out, cleaned the bath.

So, I surely had clean feet by that point? But it didn't feel like it. And it still doesn't feel like it. I've had two showers so far today and still can't stop the almost tangible feeling that there's something filthy all over my feet. Ugh!

I don't know why I'm posting really...though having written this out, I think I can see that I was maybe not feeling totally fine about having the scan! I think I sound a bit deranged...!
Perhaps could someone try to reassure me that I'm now clean...? Even though I don't feel like it?

 

[Bloomy]

You are clean. Sometimes the feeling can last for some days depending on what actually happend or shorter or longer, but itll evetually go away. Meanwhile try to focus on something else to distract your mind.

Take care

 

[JEKBreatheandBelieve]

I am not a doctor, but I am pretty certain all that work to get your foot clean makes it more than thoroughly cleaned. Just try to keep telling yourself that you have done everything that has now made your foot clean. And if that doesn't work, try a healing guided meditation that you make up to reassure yourself that it's clean (if you feel comfortable doing that sort of thing. But really, you're clean.

 

[mamachick]

What a horrible experience and I can relate to that yucky feeling. I never thought I was a fanatic but now thinking about it, I realized how I plan hospital tests, as it seems hospitals are not the cleanest places.
I think of what I will have to take off to have the test. I carry a big purse and put my clothes in that rather than the locker. (don't know what was in that locker last) Then I have clogs that easily slip off and on and can wear through the corridors. I think it stems from my daughter getting lice several times when she started kindergarten.

Theres always those critters, plus here in the US we have outbreaks of bedbugs. Then I have heard of people bringing cockroaches in their homes in produce boxes, paper bags and even in their purses. So I get rid of all that stuff too.

If I want a book, I now buy it. I use to use the library many yrs ago until I found gross stuff on pages. Not enough sanitizer for that.
I don't think you sound deranged.....just consciences about the facts.

That said, Im sure your feet are now piss free. I do know how you feel though. When I was a kid, my mom smoked like a train and had chronic bronchitis. She hockered on newspapers and left them on the floor next to a chair or couch in living room, next to her bed, and other random places. I stepped in this shit many times as a kid while getting ready for school in a partially dark house, and would be found with my foot in the bathtub trying to remove the slug like substance. It felt like it just melted thru the skin and I could still feel it during the 4th grade spelling test hours later (probably from the scrubbing).

I once went to a psych ward and watched another patient with an eye patch take it off randomly, telling us all that he had herpes in his eye. It was so damn gross. Then staff would put cookies out and patients would grab them up. Not me, all I could see was this man rubbing his eye and then fingering the food put out for all to share. I thought I would starve in there but was afraid to tell staff as they would think for sure I was a germ phobic.

You know they do mersa test upon admission because so many people get it while in the hospital. Also while there, I had severe itching and ended up with a raw spot on the top of my foot. Since we were not allowed to have shoes (might hang ourselves with strings or beat ourselves with the soles of shoes), we only had these skid proof socks. My abrasion from scratching got infected as I knew it would and I had to convince staff to give me band aids and neosporon. You would have thought that I was seeking morophine for all the channels I had to go through to get this stuff. One lady got her dr to order hair condition and a real hairbrush, then all the women asked to borrow and did so. Not me-I figured I would really be depressed if I got home and had lice.

Then I remember having a roommate and sharing a bathroom. Did you ever pee in the loo and feel the water splash up and hit you in the privates. I did that....and thought....oh God.....thats going to cause a UTI...but it didn't. You know in the psych wards they don't even have shower curtains or towel bars or anything-bare tiled walls. Guess you can hang yourself that way or something. They have a tiny sink and both patients have all their grooming crap together. So you pretty much have to put your towel on the corner of the sink while you shower, but the sink isn't clean and with a brisk move, the towel will fall to the floor. Now you are drying with a towel that has been on a floor. Oh the place is mopped everyday, by a man with a big bucker and a wringer mop (can only wonder what a shitpool of germs are swarming in that water)

If you have any issues with cleanliness and germs, stay out of psych ward for sure. Its bad enough that you have to use their toothbrush that cause the bristles to get stuck in your teeth, no listerine, no shaving, and only one soap for hair and body--that will leave your hair like a rat nest, and only a little 4" comb to untangle (not cool with thick long course hair), no make up, no drawstrings to hold sweat pants up. But when you have to listen to the other patients saying what diseases they have, you will think you will go bat shit crazy to leave. They had one patient on ward in isolation that had TB and he was bored I guess, but when patients walked down the hall, he would scream and expose himself. The were suppose to use one particular blood pressure cuff for him, but I watched them use it on general population after using it for him. Just not cool.

Everyone is using this hand sanitizer these days. It just doesn't feel like that is cleansing to me, leaves a residue that drives me crazy. I think they will come out and say that hand sanitizer does not kill germs in the next few years, it was all hype.

So I really just wanted to say, I feel your pain. I hope the thoughts fade as time passes. Thats how it works for me anyway. With a few more showers. Maybe you can treat yourself to a nice pedicure at a spa where they soak and scrub and lotion you up. That always makes my feet feel fresher and it might help you forget the pissy floor feel. I know it is the memory of that sticky feeling the second you realize....I can still remember the feeling in my gut of stepping in moms shit and its been 50 years.

 

[barefoot]

Thanks. Have had three showers so far today. Trying to distract myself.
Just feel so...ugh!
Don't know what I was thinking going in there barefoot - it's the sort of thing I would never do. And yet...I did! Unfathomable!

 

[Jung in the JUNGle]

here is an experiment to try if you are game

find some clean mud, make it yourself so you know its clean, just dirt and water.

stand in it for sometime and watch the triggers process.

the reality is that germs are everywhere and they are microscopic so our bodies are not the secure barrier you may think it is.

whats the value of this?

learning that you can only get 'so clean' and that a bit of grime actually isn't that bad. If you observe well enough you will see there is another associated memory, for example sexual predation victims that have extreme sense of being dirty when this is merely a social judgement heaped on top of a tragic experience.

This is an encounter therapy approach that allows someone to gradually be comfortable in situations that are stressful

 

[Silver.]

^^ there is a big difference between knowing germs are out there and stepping in other people's piss

 

[Deleted member 541]

I would have puked, and then washed my feet in the f*cking sink, wrapped paper towels around my feet to get back to do the scan... I'm sorry, but I was giggling while reading your post, but cringing at the same time.... yup, I'd throw the shoes away too....

 

[barefoot]

@Jung in the JUNGle - thanks for the suggestion. Yes, germs are indeed everywhere. Though, as @Silver says, for me, this is much more about the fact that I've stood in someone's wee, rather than I've got muddy feet.

 

[barefoot]

@She Cat - hadn't really expected someone to laugh at something that I'm finding quite difficult at the moment. Each to their own, I guess...!
And, yes, I think the shoes are going to end up being thrown out.

 

[Deleted member 541]

@barefoot I meant no offense. So I apologize if I offended you.

 

[Jung in the JUNGle]

I was not meaning to belittle your genuine reaction that stepping in a pile of kucko s indeed no fun

What is was trying to point out that your hyper sensitivity to dirt and germs is the drama for you.

It is the same thing with what Vietnam Vets call the 'thousand yard stare', they get triggered and go into hyper vigilance which triggers further stress reaction and then goes into an unmoderated downward spiral, then they get flashbacks and react completely out of synch with the actual environmental situation.

your story strikes me as a similar hyper reaction where others might swear and be disgusted, but then wipe their foot and move on. From your dialogue (my only diagnostic input) and the extremes you went to would have made very little difference. The first wipe down would have got you clean.

I am trying to demonstrate that some desensitivity training ( a bit of nice kucko) would help recalibrate your reaction to the point where it doesn't become so figural in your head space.