Sandwiches

I was talking to Jay recently about his OCD:

"Dude, do you remember when you thought your boss was using your laptop to spy on you?"
"Yeah, man I remember that. That was hilarious."
"What do you think about that now?"
"It's crazy. It makes absolutely no sense, but at the time it seemed reasonable. I don't know man, my OCD seems to come and go. Earlier this year was really bad, but now I'm not having any problems."
"Well, that kind of makes sense. You moved and started a new job, so I imagine the stress had something to do with it."
"Yeah man, but it was bad. Did I ever tell you about the trip I took with Jessica to LA?"
"No, what's this?"
"Well, I started getting really paranoid about the silverware at the restaurants we would go to. I was worried about catching AIDS or Hep C or something. I was thinking that there was something on the knives and forks and since my gums were bleeding I could catch it."
"Dude ..."
"I know it doesn't make any sense, but my strategy for avoiding the silverware was just to order sandwiches. Everywhere we went I would just get a sandwich. We were going to nice restaurants but it didn't matter, I would scour the menu for a sandwich."
"And did that work for you?"
"Well Jessica noticed and she got soooo pissed. She said 'I know why you're getting sandwiches Jay. It's your OCD isn't it? I can't deal with this', and I'm like 'No, come on; I've just been in the mood for sandwiches. It's no big deal.' and she's like 'Now you're lying to me too. I know you're lying about the sandwiches.'"
"What happened?"
"It basically ruined our trip. She was pissed the whole time. I even stopped getting the sandwiches. I just made sure we went to really high end places that I knew were clean, but it didn't help. At the end of the trip I was like 'Come on, that was a fun trip' and she just said 'Jay, if I'd known you were going to be this way I never would have taken time off work for this. I would have rather been at work than come on this trip with you.'"
"Harsh man. But I love that line: Jay, I know about the sandwiches. Don't lie to me about the goddamn sandwiches!!"

Disease Control

I've talked about Jay's fear of infection, and the lengths he'd go to in order to disinfect himself. In his quest to convince himself that he didn't have "the hiv" or any other STDs he would frequently go to the doctor for a full checkup even if he just touched something unclean or got coughed on in a bar. I was used to hearing about these doctor visits, so when Jay called I asked about them:

"Hey Jay, you been to the doctor lately?"
"No, I've been calling a nurse hotline whenever I get freaked out"
"Hey, that's great. That should be a good option for you. No more crazy trips to the doctor"

Now, some good health care plans will give you 24/7 access to a registered nurse, so I'm assuming that this is a feature of his health plan. Of course this is Jay, so nothing is that simple. About six months later I finally get to the bottom of this:

"Jay, are you still calling that nurse hotline?"
"No, it's junk now. The CDC got rid of the nurses."
"The CDC!? Jay, are you trying to tell me you've been calling the Center for Disease Control?"
"Yeah man. They used to have real nurses who would tell me for sure that I didn't have the hiv."
"Dude, isn't the CDC for ebola outbreaks? What the hell have you been asking them about?"
"Well, today I called them because Claire left a toothbrush at my apartment and I touched it to throw it away, and then I touched my eye before I washed my hands. You don't think I could get AIDS from that do you?"
"Well, first of all Claire didn't have AIDS so I find that kind of unlikely. Secondly, didn't you break up with her like three months ago?"
"Yeah, it was five months ago but still. You know hiv is found in saliva."
"Dude, you're crazy. What did the CDC say?"
"Well, like I said, before it would have been a nurse who would have told me 'you're fine'. Now it's just some dude who searches their database. He said 'I'll search hiv saliva', then he said 'well based on what I'm reading hiv doesn't survive outside the body for more than 20 minutes so it's highly unlikely you're infected'."
"Well, there you go, you're fine."
"Yeah, but he didn't say it was impossible; just that it was highly unlikely. I'm worried man."

Does it kill AIDS?

This is a quick follow up to the incident Jay had with his office mate. Jay had a really nice female coworker Jen, who was concerned with Jay's Lysol spraying. One day she knocked on Jay's (now single occupancy) office door after some friendly small talk offered him an alternative:

"Jay, I got you a bottle of anti-bacterial gel. You just put some on your hands and it's like washing without water. You don't need to spray anything"
"Thanks Jen, but .... does it kill AIDS?"

You're killing us Jay

I mentioned earlier that Jay had huge fear of infection and specifically "the hiv". He eventually got a little better, but about three years ago Jay's OCD was so bad he was spraying Lysol on his hands. Yes, he would carry around a can of Lysol and spray it directly on his hands when he started getting freaked out. He was fixated on Lysol because he'd heard it killed the AIDS virus.

Now, Lysol may be a great disinfectant but it's meant to be used sparingly in a well ventilated area, and not sprayed directly on someone's skin. Read the warning label, or read the Wikipedia page before you start using it.

Now Jay wasn't just spraying Lysol at home, he was spraying at work as well. In large quantities. In a small poorly ventilated office. That he shared with a coworker. This coworker was very understanding, but was justifiably concerned about breathing in Lysol every time Jay would spray down his hands or keyboard. They talked about it and Jay agreed to try to spray less often. Jay tried to resist as long as he could but soon enough there was a soft SHHH as Jay tried to quietly spritz his hands. The coworker's defeated comment:

"Sigh.... you're killing us Jay. You're killing us."

Shortly thereafter Jay's office mate got himself transferred to a cubicle and Jay ended up with an office all to himself.