I’ve been guilty of it myself. Admiring a stranger’s colour coded closet, entering a well-made bedroom, perusing an alphabetised bookshelf categorised entirely by genre. Attributing all these things to the curator’s tendency towards “OCD”. I have uttered as much, even as I privately run through a mental checklist of my own paranoias. “A touch of the old obsessive compulsive disorder?” I‘ve remarked, when stumbling across a precisely labelled Tupperware collection housing a vast segregation of dried pasta shapes. This provocation occurred in the kitchen of a friend’s apartment, shortly before she launched into a story about a mundane encounter with her sick nephew. This is the last thing I really remember hearing, because at this point in the story my mind began to spiral uncontrollably.
For my mind is full of scorpions. Devious, nimble little beasts that have occupied my head for the best part of 30 years. They wield their own special power over my brain, shaping the architecture and rhythm of my thoughts. I am their dutiful puppet, stuck inside an endless loop of sleepless nights and watchful days. You cannot fail to ignore the presence of this unwelcome visitor. As you talk with your friends, it is in the room. Lose sight of it and a panic begins to take hold. To live a contented life alongside an uncaged scorpion requires a delicate balance of trust, will and surrender. This is the image I return to when attempting to articulate my experience of living with obsessive compulsive disorder.
