I have always wondered if my OCD could of played a role in me getting MS? Is anyone here over clean and tidy etc?
Reason I ask My OCD is a mental condition I have had since I was 6 years old… I wash my hands around 300 times a day or more and make sure everything around me is clean and wont eat in place’s I think looks like will make me sick… I check doors locks etc non stop and a few more things like this but I wont go on.
My dad used to tell me how this would make me sick as no germs where getting to me like this… That I may aswell live in a bubble.
Then I think about the Vit D idea and remember my mum was obcessed with the sun and used to make us sit in it all the time so could be that there was too much as me and my brother where always burnt.
I never got virus’s when I was younger because of my OCD so I rule that one out, however I was born Bosseyed and had my eyes corrected at age 2.
I also had epilepsy which stopped around age 12 so I have never been completely healthy ever…
I’m sure it’s not connected whatsoever. MS has never been linked with lifestyle or behaviour - except the Northern Hemisphere/lack of vitamin D theory.
But there’s no way TOO MUCH sun could have made you short of vitamin D. I’m sorry to say that getting burnt all the time in childhood would be a risk factor for skin cancer, but not for MS - quite the opposite. You wouldn’t get MS from too much vitamin D. The body stops making it anyway, once you’ve got sufficient, so you can’t overdose by sitting in the sun, regardless of the other health risks.
I wonder if it’s actually a feature of OCD to wonder if everything is caused by your OCD?
I’m sure we’ve all wondered, at times, whether we did anything to cause it. It’s human nature to think: “Why me?”
But the NICE guidelines actually say it should be part of the diagnosis discussion for patients to be told they did nothing to cause it. It’s a shame not all neuros seem to bother with this, which leaves a lot of patients needlessly examining their consciences, for whatever reckless thing they did, that somehow led to it. But it doesn’t work like that.
Your dad’s comments about getting sick unfortunately must have come at an impressionable age, so when you later did get sick - for unconnected reasons - you’re bound to have wondered if his prophesy was coming true. It’s a shame he said it at all: it was probably just an effort to discourage the compulsive behaviour. I don’t suppose he thought for a minute that one day you really would get ill, and his words would come back to haunt you.
But rest assured it’s just coincidence - it’s nothing to do with how you’ve lived your life.
