I’m Preoccupied with Lines

Reader’s Question

I am an 18 year old male college student. Whenever I walk around, I make myself not step on the lines (cracks in the sidewalk). These lines can also be imaginary. I always extend lines from corners of walls, legs of a chair, basically anything that touches the ground or is close to the ground (closet doors make lines). When walking on bricks or another surface that my feet won’t fit without hitting cracks, I find patterns in the bricks and make sure I don’t step on the edges of these patterns. I often have to take large or really small strides in order to not step on a line. I also keep my feet off of these imaginary lines in rooms when I am sitting down. My feet cannot be stepping on a line coming from chairs, doors, or any furniture. When walking, if I know there are evenly spaced lines, like on a sidewalk, I make sure I always take an even amount of steps in between each line. This even amount of steps also happens in the car. I count an even amount (usually 3, so that there are 4 even segments) in between telephone poles, light poles, oncoming cars and anything else that happens to be on the road. I tend to think that if I do step on a line it will cut off that part of my body. It will be like a laser cuts off my toe if it goes on a line. This sounds funny but is what goes through my head. Please help me understand why this happens!

Our Consulting Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

This behavior is called “obsessive compulsive”. An Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), as you have found, takes up a lot of time and energy. It’s a disorder that can be disabling and incapacitating. The behaviors you describe are often found in OCD as you are describing daily rituals, counting, obsessive thoughts, intrusive thoughts/compulsions, etc.

OCD will make your college achievement very difficult. As you discovered, the rituals almost totally control your daily behavior, often to the point that they create severe anxiety and fearfulness. To make matters worse — OCD symptoms increase under stress. The normal stress of mid-terms, finals, oral presentations, etc. will actually increase the severity of your OCD symptoms.

On the positive side, mental health professionals are well-aware of this condition and have effective treatments. OCD is associated with low levels of the brain neurotransmitter Serotonin. We have medications that are very effective in managing OCD. Most therapists, counselors, psychologists and psychiatrists are well-versed with this condition and can provide additional help along with a medication treatment program. To further understand how OCD works, I would recommend doing some Internet research on the topic. I’d also recommend reading Chemical Imbalance, an article I’ve written on my website at www.drjoecarver.com.

OCD is very treatable but you’ll need to see a psychiatrist for the best available medication treatment. I’d then add therapy or counseling to improve your recovery time. I’d also recommend starting treatment ASAP. As the stress of college increases, you run the risk of being overwhelmed by the requirements of your OCD — the internal demand to participate in these rituals. Untreated, the rituals will eventually require more time than the requirements for homework and study. Get going…