I can’t freeze the world but I am sure that I can control life’s outcomes through rituals like endlessly washing my hands until they are raw, not listening to certain songs, avoiding everyday things that I have deemed as bad luck. I’ve convinced myself that I have the gift of prophecy–that is what OCD often feels like for me. The belief that I am meant to fail and to be unhappy so deeply ingrained within me that I know the outcome of personal events before they will happen. I know he will leave, I know he will go on to find the love of his life after me, I know I will fail in my career, I will die alone. Trust me, this I know. The only way to stop it is if I adhere to the rituals and compulsions that alter the fate and course of my own life. It is ridiculous, I know, but if I wash my hands ten times and turn the light switch on and off rapidly for the next minute life will be different. If it is not, it is because I didn’t try hard enough, didn’t do these things correctly. It is exhausting. I just want to escape from my brain and the need for control, to escape a life lived looking for patterns (i.e. Bad thing always happen in June, the number 18 is unlucky).