How to Stop Compulsive Hand Washing

Do you find yourself getting anxious or upset if you think your hands might be at all dirty?

Have you got caught up in a compulsive pattern of washing hands so frequently that it is  interfering with your personal life?

People who fall into obsessive compulsive disorder are burdened by two concerns. They worry that if they don’t perform their conduct, such as washing their hands, something very bad (though usually unspecified) will happen. And on top of that, they worry that they are going mad. Surely only sick people act like this?

Neither of these worries is trivial. They both cause high levels of anxiousness and stress. So the first thing to say is that obsessive compulsive hand washing is not a sign that you are going mad. What it indicates is that an excessively strong negative emotional mark has become attached to something (dirt on your hands) that wouldn’t normally have any emotional effect on you.