| >> |
05/26/11(Thu)09:18 No.26272600Compulsions spring from recurrent doubts or fears that
something awful has happened or will happen. Patients are
often subtyped according to what they feel compelled to do.
Common subtypes include checkers, washers, touchers,
counters, and arrangers. Although patients recognize the
senselessness of their compulsive behavior, they are unable
to resist acting on the compulsion. If they try to resist, the
anxiety associated with their fear or doubt may become so
intolerable that they have to give into the compulsion and go
back to check, touch, count, or wash. In one case, a patient,
upon driving over a bump in the road, was filled with the fear
that someone might have been run over and thus was
compelled to go back and check to see if there was a body in
the road. The relief at not finding one was only momentary,
however, because almost immediately the fear arose that the
victim had not been killed but simply badly injured and had
crawled off the road, and this fear gave birth to the
compulsion to check behind the bushes at the roadside, then
in nearby backyards, and so on. Other common checkings
include going back to see if the door is locked or if the gas is
turned off; one patient could not mail a letter because of the
need to open it repeatedly to check if everything had been
spelled correctly in the letter itself.
Washers generally fear that they have been contaminated by
germs, dirt, or excrement; they feel compelled to wash
repetitively no matter what the circumstance. To one office
worker, doorknobs were a source of contagion, and if one
were ever touched a trip to the bathroom was absolutely
necessary to repeatedly wash the hands, even if it meant
keeping the boss waiting. |
