I did my exposure time early on Wednesday because I went to help my friend paint again (and got multiple brown paint spots on the front of my shirt…). Each day, I’ve been setting aside some time to go around the house and sit in chairs, on couches, touch door knobs, light switches, handles, or other items I typically avoid. Then I make some effort not to avoid those things for the rest of the day either.
I’ve also been using the “kids” bathrooms at least once a day. I had been avoiding using those because I know they sometimes drop the soap containers in the sink (and because the bathrooms just tend to be dirtier, including the towels).
Mostly good
But overall, Wednesday was a pretty good day, anxiety-wise. I don’t think I had too many intense moments, so that was a nice break. We went shopping, and I did get some grease on my hand from a stool we bought and used a wipe in the car to get that off, but I think that’s an appropriate time to use a hand wipe. Jamund and I went out to dinner and he found a hair in the soup (but didn’t tell me until after) and I basically shrugged it off.
Going on walks
I went on a lot of walks yesterday as well and when I consciously remembered, I looked up instead of focusing on the ground ahead of me (I tend to do this to look for and avoid dog poop). I’ve been going on walks daily because I’ve taken a break from doing morning exercise. I stopped partially because of my anxiety/depression and partially because of time issues, so I should probably try and work out some kind of viable solution or work around to still use my exercise mat and do those “exposures” but also not be stressed out and rushed.
Jamund used a public bathroom at a park while we were walking at night and told me it was disgusting (leaving out details until this morning), and that did give me a bit of anxiety considering he said there was no soap and he could only rinse his hands and used his elbow (he was wearing a long sleeve shirt) to open the door handle or something… So the prospect of washing that shirt with all the other clothes as normal is bit troublesome for my OCD but I intend to do it.
Otherwise, Wednesday was a fairly okay day. I kept my hand washes to either 9 or 10, I think. Maybe I need to start attempting “harder” exposures now? (cue grimacing face 😉