When you think of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), what do you think of? A meticulous scene? No objects are out of place, no dust anywhere, and no dirt on the floor? A ridiculously clean space that only someone with OCD could manage? Someone incessantly checking locks, washing hands, or some other counting ritual?

For a long time, I thought this was the only way that OCD manifested itself. I thought it made you a slave to neatness and order. For some, this is a reality every single day. They have to battle with their mind telling them something very bad will happen if they don’t wash their hands exactly 36 times. They are terrorized by the microscopic monsters that coexist with us.

Then there’s me. I’m probably the most messy person you know. In fact I’ve had paint on my walls for a year and half now and haven’t finished the trim. It seems even when I clean, my house just goes to disarray in a matter of hours. I don’t count anything, although I do get scared if I think I forgot to lock the door, but I think that’s most people. I’m not a prisoner to rituals.

What they don’t tell you about OCD are the symptoms they can’t romanticize. Yeah everyone wants a clean house. People without OCD tend to look at people with the disorder as if they’re lucky because they “like” to clean so much. They don’t like it (for the most part). Their mind forces them to do it. It may be relaxing because it temporarily soothes the anxiety they feel, but most people with OCD would rather be doing something else.

The symptoms I have are the ones they don’t tell you about. I am an intense perfectionist. In fact, a lot of the time my work suffers because I get so hung up on the way I think it should be, that it ends up coming out sloppy and unfinished. When it starts to not be exactly perfect, I just give up and let it be sub par because I am exhausted.

My mind is constantly swarmed with thoughts of self hate and self doubt. My work is never clean enough, I’m never pretty enough, I’m not good at anything. That’s how I see myself most days. Even after years of telling myself I’m better than I think, residue of these thoughts still haunts me.

I am very particular. My boyfriend could tell you how many times a week I tell him that the way he did something was wrong. For instance, he squeezes the toothpaste instead of rolling it. That’s probably a small annoyance to some, but it can cause me to breakdown when it happens one too many times.

I obsess over little things. Something I said or something someone said to me in passing conversation — it replays again and again in my head. Even if the thing at hand is very small, I will still obsess over it. Thinking of how stupid I appeared or whether I could have made the conversation more interesting. This anxiety triples when the conversation is with someone I really admire or need approval from such as a boss or a love interest.

I don’t walk on storm grates. I have an intense fear that I will fall down them. I’m not sure why, but I will never walk on a storm grate because I am too afraid of what could happen. That’s what happens when you obsess. You begin having irrational fears. When I was younger, for an entire summer, I had agoraphobia. I was literally convinced that if I went outside I would die. My mom still made me go outside of course. I remember once she sent me to a store I used to frequent a lot across a busy street. I remember the feeling I had walking across that street. I knew it would be certain death. But I also knew I was being irrational and I didn’t want my mom to make fun of me, so I went. I survived.

Because society romanticizes OCD and makes it a cute little joke, I didn’t even know I had it. I didn’t know there was anything more to OCD than rituals and cleaning. I thought I was too lazy to have OCD. There are many people just like me. Their self worth is so low that they think they’re not good enough to have a mental disorder because of how it’s been “marketed.”

OCD is not wanting your desk to be organized. OCD is not worrying whether you left the oven on or not. OCD is crippling, it leaves you in fear of the things that you have to deal with on a daily basis.

Please don’t romanticize my disorder.