Climbing my "mental" mountain...

     Happy Summer!  This is a big blog post for me, so I apologize up front as there will be lots of details here.  I haven't been posting for awhile, because truthfully nothing "big" with my OCD has happened, in a good or bad sense.  Several months elapse between my blog posts now which is good in some ways, because it means nothing significant has happened that I need to process or work through.  But it is also bad, because it means I haven't been exposing or pushing myself or really doing anything different with my OCD.  I've just been maintaining my current level of OCD, which truthfully isn't too bad these days.  It's manageable.  But last week my family took a summer vacation to the Colorado mountains/Rocky Mountain National Park.  We have not taken a family vacation in 7 years.  If I'm being completely honest (which I always keep it real here), a lot of that has been because of my OCD.  I avoid, avoid, avoid what I am uncomfortable with.  It has been my biggest downfall in battling this disorder.  The last time we vacationed in 2011, it was difficult for me (and that was way before I even entered the worst of my OCD, which spanned 2014-2015).  Going on a vacation during that time period would have been absolutely impossible.  Even leaving my house or going to a family function or an appointment was extremely difficult at that point.  If you'd told me in 2014-2015 that I would be able to vacation again a few years later (albeit having some definite interesting way around things to help with the contamination) I wouldn't have believed you.  But it was possible.  And it did happen.  And it was a HUGE step in the right direction for me.
     When we first broached the subject of taking a vacation earlier this summer, I didn't really expect that it would happen.  I knew I was close to being able to go (as in, maybe next year), but I was scared to push myself that far out of my comfort zone.  But if I've learned anything from dealing with this disorder for 12'ish years, it's this:  You have to expose yourself before you're ready.  You will NEVER be ready to do what makes you uncomfortable.  You will always find a way to talk yourself out of it.  You will always let the anxiety win, unless you purposely face it head-on.  In addition to the contamination OCD, I also deal with a lot of generalized anxiety and so there were some other concerns I had about this trip too.  After wavering back and forth for weeks, where I literally was absolutely not going one second, then talking myself into it the next second---I just finally said "let's do it".  Now if only I could have just gone into this and pretended I didn't have OCD for 5 days....but we all know that's not how it works.  Maybe in a few years I can have a normal vacation and not have to bring my own bedding/towels, and some other things that were necessary for this trip, but alas....I went.  And that is what matters.  And for the most part, I had a great time!
     Because of the contamination issues, I have always had problems with vehicles that aren't my own.  My own personal vehicle I keep clean.  For the most part I don't do anything with it.  But if I have to sit in a public place (like a restaurant, doctor appointment) which doesn't happen super often, it "contaminates" my car seat, and I always wipe off the leather seat afterward with soap/water.  Or more lately I have been using a car seat cover, and then just remove it after the outing so I have a clean seat to sit on moving forward.  We took my husband's car on this trip which is absolutely contaminated to me.  I put a car seat cover down over that.  I wanted to put some type of cover over the seat belt but I refrained from doing that.  We ended up staying in a vacation rental home (townhouse), which ended up working well for the most part.  He actually wanted to do this, as he doesn't like hotels.  It worked great, so I am glad about this.  I was able to have a separate bedroom from him (he is one of my biggest triggers, if you're not familiar with my blog), which allowed me to keep my luggage and all of my things in a separate room.  My daughter and I stayed in the second room.  Because I am fearful of sleeping on a bed/sheets that aren't mine, as soon as we arrived, I stripped the entire bed of its comforter blanket and pillows and the only thing I left on was the top sheet.  I did inspect things briefly (but did not spend a lot of time doing this) for signs of bugs or anything strange, and did not find anything.  I brought a big king sized blanket that covered the entire bed, so I wouldn't have to lay on the top sheet (and it provided a layer of what I felt was clean).  I brought our own pillows and pillow cases and a sheet to cover ourselves with.  So we didn't really touch anything directly on their bed.  I brought our own bath towels, and used those instead of the townhouse provided ones.  The townhouse was actually very clean overall though, and I was thankful for that.  It was fully stocked with a washer/dryer, full kitchen, furniture, and dishes.  For someone without OCD, it would have been great.  But of course I wouldn't be able to use any of those dishes (not knowing how they were cleaned, etc.).  There was a grocery store close by, so I did stock up on bottled water so we would have something to drink.  We ended up not spending a lot of time in the townhouse anyway other than to sleep, shower, and occasionally relax.  We did a lot of activities while there, most of them very dirty.  Yes I contaminated myself beyond belief a few times, to even where I was surprised.  But I so badly wanted to have fun on this trip and I was motivated to just do the activities, have the fun, be in the midst of the filth and not look back.  We went to "Fun City" where they  have mini-golf, Go-Karts, bumper boats, and giant slides among other activities.  I also got on a bungee trampoline and had to wear a harness (worn by multiple other people and visibly dirty).  My daughter got inside of some water balls that were absolutely filthy.  Her socks were stained black on the bottom it was so dirty.  We also did a horseback ride through the mountains one evening, which was actually pretty dirty, if you can imagine.  All of the horses stopping to pee and poop on the trail, some of them a foot in front of you.  There was a TON of dust/dirt flying up in the air as we moved through the trail (even our trail guide commented it was dusty ride) and when I got off the horse the inside of my jeans were visibly caked with dirt).  There was also a lot of bugs flying around us on the ride.  Most of this stuff in and of itself wasn't too bad for me, because I've been working on contaminating myself in public for 3 years now.  The one difference I did find, is that had I done this in my own town at home, it would have caused me problems, feeling like I was contaminating my car after sitting in all these dirty places that so many people sit.  I would have come home and showered right away after being at a place like this for 5 hours, and put on my "indoor clothes" before sitting down on my own couch.  Then those clothes would have been washed separately from everything else, so as not to "contaminate" the rest of my laundry.  But....I found that there are some easier things with your OCD about being away from home.  There is nothing to keep safe anymore.  You are in the contaminated world for several days in a row, so you can't keep your clean/dirty worlds separate.  Or there is, at least, no need to for this time (for the most part).   There is no clean home to go to.  No clean car seat to keep.  No clean vs. contaminated clothes.  On vacation, I was able to contaminate myself, stay contaminated the entire day, come back to the townhouse  and contaminate the furniture, go contaminate his car, etc.  You get the point.  I was able to move freely about, from place to place, without worry of spreading the contamination.   The only thing I did keep safe while there was the bed.  Only when I was in my pajamas for the night, would I sit on the bed.  And no other clothes were worn on the bed.  Why is the bed always have to be the safest of the safe places???
     I was worried about sharing a bathroom with my husband while we were there.  Thankfully it was 2 bathrooms, but only 1 shower.  So for the most part we were able to stay separated, other than sharing the shower.  I was so thankful for that.  And so thankful that we chose the townhouse over the hotel.  I have a feeling I would have had a lot of problems in a hotel.  I didn't really do much other than Lysol off the shower floor and handle right before I showered at night (he showered in the mornings), so this actually worked pretty well.
     As I mentioned before, I have a lot of generalized anxiety in addition to the OCD.  I tend to catastrophize things when I get worried and convince myself that the worst case scenario is going to happen.  Prior to leaving, I had convinced myself of many things:  that we would catch lice or bed bugs from the townhouse, that we would get in a car accident on the interstate (I was googling statistics about the chance of a fatal car accident on an interstate), that we would fall off the edge of a cliff driving through the mountains, that we would pick up a virus/cold from being around so many people at the resort, that I would have an allergic reaction to something I ate there (because I do have a peanut allergy, so understandably that is an actual rational concern especially with breads/bakeries), that we would get sick from eating at an unfamiliar restaurant, that the cable would break on the tram up the mountain and that we would fall to our death 12,000 feet, that we would suffer from altitude sickness (I also googled statistics about heart attacks/elevation), and finally that we would get attacked by an animal while walking the trails at the Rocky Mountain National Park (my fear was a mountain lion).  Not only did I think that one of these might possibly happen, I had scenarios in my head where every single one of these things happened.  Can you imagine the odds of any of these things happening themeselves?  Let alone all of them together on the same trip?  Anxiety is truly horrible.  All you can think about is the dreadful possibility that something bad might happen.  As I prepared for this trip, after committing to going, I started doing some of my old "magical thinking" compulsions.  Such as, I need to do things a certain way so that we don't get in a car accident.  Luckily I've learned when my mind is going in that non-productive direction, so though I started having some trailing thoughts, I knew how to nip that right in the bud.
     I am pleased to say that nothing bad happened on our trip.  We drove up 12,000 feet to the top of a mountain and did not drive off the edge (although it was definitely nerve-wracking at a few points).  As far as I know, we did not contract bed bugs or lice (although trust me, we did some head checks and I left the clothes we wore on the trip outside in a large garbage bag for a few days).  None of us got sick (and there was even a young boy on the shuttle bus at the park 2 rows ahead of us who was coughing and whose mom was feeling his forehead and kept saying "you're so hot/feverish").  We did not have any significant breathing issues or resulting heart issues with the altitude.  We did not get attacked by a mountain lion.  We were not able to ride the tram, due to my peanut allergy. The tram ride warned of heavy peanut dust in the tram cars, so I elected to not ride that.  I'll admit, I was a little relieved to have a legitimate excuse here.  But no tram cars fell out of the sky that day.  We did have a brush with a potential disaster on the way home from our trip.  40 miles from home a semi truck did not see us in their blind spot and started getting over and honestly almost pushed our car into a ditch.  It was horrifying and scary.  I am so thankful to God, he was certainly looking over our family that day.
    I also brought my own silverware on the trip, and kept a plastic Ziploc bag of them in my purse.  I do not use restaurant silverware (and haven't for several years).  Most of the restaurants I ate burgers, pizza or sandwiches so I was able to go wash my hands before eating, just like I would do if I were at home.  But a couple of meals required silverware.  Luckily my husband used the restroom before eating both of these times, so I was able to swap out the silverware without him knowing any different.  It really lined up very well each time.  The other thing that I had not prepared myself for, which I found absolutely disgusting (but surprisingly did pretty well with) was the fact that I had to use outhouses at the national park.  And there were no sinks in these bathrooms.  Just a hand sanitizer dispenser on the wall.  I'll use hand sanitizer in a bind, as it is better than nothing...but in a restroom?  Out house?  No way.  But I had no choice, so I had to do it.  And then of course my phone felt contaminated as I was using it to take pictures, without having had washed my hands.  But...again I dealt with all of this surprisingly very well.  I think it keeps going back to the fact that everything was contaminated at that time, so I knew it was okay to keep things like that, as when we returned from the vacation I would shower, wipe phone down, etc. before entering my clean zones of my house..  s
     So, to recap, I did expose myself in several ways during this trip:  riding in hubby's car, staying in a rental townhouse, sleeping in the townhouse bed (albeit with my own bedding), sharing a shower with my  husband for 4 days,  driving on the Interstate for a long period of time (16 hour round trip)gemstone panning (which included running pans through filthy brown water), riding down giant slides in canvas bags that others used and had their shoes all over, bungee trampoline using harness that others wore, being without shoes on the trampoline, riding in Go-Karts and wearing those seatbelts, riding in Bumper which were wet and dirty looking on the seats, eating at restaurants that I've never been to, riding a horse where there was lots of bugs and dust/dirt flying around everywhere (the insides of my jeans were caked with visible dirt after this), riding in a public shuttle bus, using  outhouses where there was no soap/water, and driving up a huge mountain to 12,000 feet elevation (when I had convinced myself we were going to fall of the edge).  also, we had to board our two dogs for this trip, which invoked anxiety as well.  It scared me being separated from them for that long.  I was worried something would happen to them, and we wouldn't be there.  I was worried something would happen to us (such as an accident), and our dogs would be left without a family.  I was also worried about them having an accident in their kennel from not being let out as frequently as they would be at home, and them coming home with urine on their fur.  My husband gave them baths when they got home, so that took care of that.  Our little pup did come home with a UTI from the kennel, so I'm not sure if that was random or related.  The vet told me that stress can cause UTI's in dogs, and the kennel situation may have stressed her out.  Guilty dog mom, right here.  
     Whew!  That was a lot of stuff packed into 4 days.  There were some other issues too, such as my husbands irritability on the trip that bothered me.  Stuff not even related to the OCD, but that wore me down.  Was the trip difficult?  Certain aspects, but not horribly.  Was it easier than I thought it would be?  Yes, for sure.  Am I glad I went?  Yes.  It allowed me a chance to be normal, or at least semi-normal for a few days which was actually a really good feeling.  Do I think I can do this again next year?  Yes!  I'm hopeful that I can do it with a few less quirks than I did this year.  I'm getting to the point with my OCD, where sometimes I feel this is "as good as it gets" (just like the movie, LOL!)  When I look back on my life 3-4 years ago I was horribly consumed with OCD, and now I can function pretty normal, as long as I have some barriers and can separate things dirty from clean.  I know that is ultimately the crux of this disease and without eliminating that barrier, this disorder will never be gone.  But I am leaps and bounds better than before, and we have to take pride in our success.  Because this disorder is so difficult to live with.  Little things throw us off, that other people don't even think about it.  It is so mentally exhausting how much we overthink things, compared to other people.  So although I did not do any physical climbing of a mountain while on my trip, I certainly climbed one mentally and metaphorically.  And I have to say that getting to the top of that mountain felt pretty good.  If this is as good as my OCD gets, I can be okay with that.  I have a lot of other updates for the summer which I will post about soon too.  Hope you are all having a great summer (can't believe it's almost over), and just know that if I can conquer this with my OCD, I know that you can conquer your mental mountain too, whatever that may be for you.  Even if you feel you are not ready for whatever exposure you need to do, JUST DO IT!!!!!!  Just like Nike says :)   You take a piece of your life back each time you do an exposure and push  yourself.  And you stop missing out on the stuff that you've been missing out on for so long.  If I hadn't pushed myself, it would have been a whole year again before I would have even had the chance to take a vacation.  Don't let OCD take your life from you.  It is a scary ride to get out,  but it is oh so worth it.