OCD Door Locking: How We Can Help
OCD Door Locking: What’s the Solution
OCD door locking is a variation of OCD which affects many, many people. You yourself may be suffering from door locking OCD, hence why you’re on this blog post. If you’ve found yourself locking your door, then triple checking to see if it’s still locked when you just locked the door itself; you may be suffering from some form of door locking OCD. Let’s explore how you can identify your potential OCD door locking habits and how we may be able to help you overcome this condition through holistic counseling methods, designed with you in mind.
What is OCD Door Locking?
OCD door locking is quite simply what it sounds like: OCD, paired with the action of locking a door. Locking the door is a habit many people will do automatically without a second thought attached to the action. OCD door locking may range from mild cases where the person experiencing an OCD thought may simply double check their door to see if it’s locked. A severe case of OCD door locking may consist of the inability to close the front door, lock it, and leave it; even after checking to see if it’s locked dozens of times. This level of OCD door locking can be detrimental to your social life and work life (i.e.: late to meetups and work).
What Causes OCD Door Locking?
Many factors may end up causing OCD door locking habits to develop. The important thing to remember is anyone can be helped, even the most severe cases of OCD door locking have been shown to respond to various forms of counseling. Let’s see what may be causing OCD door locking to develop in certain individuals.
Generalized OCD
Generalized OCD may consist of your standard OCD symptoms, which flare up with certain triggers. In this case, these triggers could be anything from leaving the house and locking the door, to arriving at the office or going on an extended trip and believing you forgot to lock the door; leading to every bad thing happening to your home while you’re away.
Past Traumatic Experiences
Past traumatic experiences may cause OCD door locking to develop out of nowhere, or worsen if you’ve already had OCD door locking symptoms in the past.
Have you been recently burglarized?
Did something seemingly go missing in your house and you suspect it may have been due to accidentally leaving the door unlocked one evening?
Do you have bad neighbors and you’re worried they may take out their frustrations on your home while you’re away?
Do you have an angry ex who said they would ransack your house when you least expect it?
All of these situations could cause extreme stress and anxiety to manifest, which is then temporarily extinguished with the help of OCD rituals in the form of OCD door locking. This however is not a long-term solution whatsoever. In fact, it just postpones the feelings of stress and anxiety, and it does not solve any of the underlying problems.
Underlying Inflammation
OCD is commonly linked to underlying inflammation in the brain. If you have chronic moments of OCD, or a constant barrage of unwanted OCD thoughts, you may be suffering from an increased level of inflammation in the brain from a variety of factors.
Stress
Stress is ultimately a huge factor when it comes to flare ups with OCD. Have you been having relationship difficulties? Your OCD is likely to flare up. Having Trouble at work with your overall performance and the boss won’t stop hounding you? Your OCD will likely flare up over time from the repeated exposure to stressors. Are you simply trying to regain footing within your life to progress further, yet it doesn't seem to be working out at the moment? OCD will likely rear its ugly head. Why is this?
It generally comes down to wanting to control all facets of our life. Whether they can be truly controlled or not is unique to each of our personal experiences, yet we should primarily focus on what we can actually control to help OCD flare ups subside. Stress induces OCD, and stress is a daily part of everyone’s life. Some may have it worse, some may have it easier. What it comes down to is learning how to manage stress effectively through techniques, strategies, and coping skills to help minimize the carnage a stressful day may bestow upon our psyche.
Anxiety
Anxiety mixed with OCD can be a truly frustrating condition. Anxiety alone can be debilitating, yet when it’s mixed with OCD, it becomes a whole new flavor of “OMG, what is my life boiling down to?!”.
Anxious feelings may promote the onset of an OCD episode, and before you know it, you may find yourself performing rituals (such as obsessive door locking) and delaying your entire day to help overcome the mental barriers OCD is throwing at you. This is not ideal, yet it can possibly be improved upon with the help of counseling.
Unhealthy Lifestyle
An unhealthy lifestyle is not great for any condition, especially mental health conditions such as OCD. Inflammatory foods, alcohol consumption, tobacco usage, and drug use may all contribute to a worsening of OCD symptoms and possibly create new problems you never thought were possible in your life. It’s best if you’re experiencing OCD symptoms to journal which unhealthy lifestyle activities you’re partaking in that week.
This way, you can directly reference the fact you had way too many drinks the night before and your anxiety and OCD is sky high as a result of the hangover feelings mixed with the thoughts of “Why did I say that last night???”. From there, you’re able to pinpoint which substances make your OCD much worse and effectively recognize what you need to do in order to regain control of your mental health, one step at a time.
Why Does Door Locking OCD Have Such Strong Control Over Its Sufferers?
OCD door locking tends to have a much stronger impact on its sufferers due to the fact our home is sacred. It’s where our most important items reside. It’s where we rest our head for eight hours per night. It’s where we’ve had many memories established. It’s also where we dwell during our downtime. A safe home, whether it’s an apartment, a condo, a large house, or even a dorm room is important to our mental stability.
The thought of someone possibly breaking into our home due to our own neglect (e.g.: not locking the door securely) can make even a non-OCD person sick to their stomach. When OCD door locking is in its full form, it begins to attack our primal need for safe and secure shelter. Without safe and secure shelter, we remove a crucial component of our hierarchy of needs. With OCD door locking, it’s not so much the act of locking the door “X” number of times, it’s the comfort it produces to help reassure us our dwelling will be okay while we’re out for the day.
Inherently, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to protect your home. It’s only natural to want safety and security. When it comes to locking the door three times in three sets of three before you can even step off the front porch; that’s where it becomes a bigger issue. We know the door is locked, so what can we do to help OCD door locking symptoms over time?
What Can You Do to Help Your Door Locking OCD?
Below are a few things to start off with when it comes to managing your door locking OCD:
Short-Term Solution: Buy a Door Lock with an App to Reassure Yourself While Away from Home
A door-locking app is a very short-term solution, yet it may be effective to mitigate your symptoms in the meantime. Seeking out therapy should be priority number one, as you’re not always going to have access to a door-locking app throughout your entire life. Yet this may help some sufferers of OCD for a short period of time as they begin to focus on regaining control of their OCD through counseling.
Medium-Term Solution: Practice Letting Go
Practicing letting go is not only helpful for OCD sufferers, it’s also a great practice to incorporate throughout your entire life model.
Did someone anger you while driving? Practice letting it go.
Did someone say something which rubbed you the wrong way? Practice letting it go.
Unless something or someone truly affects you in a permanent way, it’s best to practice letting it go and not bottling it up later where you may end up exploding over nothing. Practicing this method of letting go is instrumental to building a stronger mental fortitude towards all challenges throughout life.
Medium-Term Solution: Develop Ways to Control Your Stress & Anxiety
Through counseling, you’ll be able to develop unique ways to control stress and anxiety. Everyone is unique, and we understand this at Sagebrush Counseling. This is why no two counseling sessions are ever the same. Yes, the root principles of therapy will be adhered to, yet it’s important for us to identify ways in which you’re able to evolve past your OCD and recognize the beauty and joys of life. This is a state of clarity where you’re no longer beholden to the rituals and OCD patterns which may end up ruining your day, week, month, or year.
Medium-Term Solution: Journal Your OCD Thoughts to Reflect On Later in the Day
As mentioned before, journaling is a fantastic way to recognize the OCD thought patterns you may be having and what may be setting them off. Oftentimes, you may look back on your journal entries and realize “This is actually all kind of silly, right?” when looking at what you were doing to help control the OCD inside of you. This self-reflection can help you realize that you are ultimately the one in control of your life, not OCD.
Long-Term Solution: Seek Out Therapy with Sagebrush Counseling
The best long-term solution is to seek out therapy to help better manage your OCD and strive for reaching the goal of having days where OCD thoughts are not even on your radar. This can be achieved with the right work ethic, the right level of commitment to the process, and the right mindset going into our counseling services.
Contact Us for Help with Your Door Locking OCD Today!
If you’re located anywhere in Texas, we can help you with your OCD door locking. If you’re located outside of Texas, please contact us to be placed on our waitlist as we expand into other states in the near future. We look forward to hearing from you soon and we’re eager to begin helping you overcome your OCD door locking!