Читать книгу Leaving the OCD Circus - Kirsten Pagacz - Страница 24

Then came the cord checking. Before leaving the house, I had to do my cord checks. I would crawl around on the carpet checking the television and lamp cords. I would straighten them with my hands and lay them just the way they had to be laid, straight, from the outlet to the object. I would tug gently on them and smooth out every ripple. If every cord in the house was not lying perfectly straight, I would become unbearably agitated and couldn't leave the house.

This ritual could take me an hour, and there were many, many start-overs. In my Mental Movie, my unforgiveable negligence would result in an electrical fire and the whole condo burning down and innocent people being killed. Let's just say Sergeant had my ear and undivided attention. I wanted to save people from harm.

Cord checking—and doing it right—ensured that I would avoid all potential threats. Sergeant repeated over and over to me that the cords had to be checked perfectly, and nothing else would do. His badgering was monotonous, like a metronome, and I would do just about anything to get it to stop.

Even though [repetition] had no impact on the validity, its cognitive bias is called the illusion-of-truth effect and it's a powerful effect of clever agenda setting. If something is repeated to you often enough you will start believing it's true.

—ADAPTED FROM BEN PARR'S, CAPTIVOLOGY

If I had girlfriends over before school, I would try to do a superfast cord check, hoping they didn't notice. Of course, they'd often bust me doing this and laugh at me. They even nicknamed me “Cord Checker.” They got lots of laughs out of this, and I chuckled with them trying to make light of my strange behavior. They couldn't have known that for me cord checking was a life-or-death matter.

The leaving-the-house ritual became so onerous that I was frequently late to school. The hall pass lady knew my first name and how to spell it correctly. For every time I was late to school, I made up a different story. The cat had gotten out. An important phone call had come just as I was leaving. My mom needed me to wait for the refrigerator repairman. Forgot my books, left my curling iron on, forgot my lunch—you get the idea. Lying to the hall pass lady was just one of the thousands of lies I told throughout my “Sergeant Cover-Up” days.

I became a crafty liar and a damn good actress. Sometimes I would cut class and go back to my house and start over with the cord checking, especially if I couldn't tolerate seeing Sergeant hold up my mom's melting face in front of me, sort of like cue cards of what would happen if I didn't do my drills. This was incredibly motivating. While I was there with my cords, Sergeant might add something like straightening couch cushions and throw pillows.

Perfectionism is exhausting.

—MADELEINE L'ENGLE

The great painter Salvador Dali is quoted as saying, “Have no fear of perfection. You will never reach it.”