I count things.
I didn't realize I did, though. Not until the last two years or so, when I found myself keeping track of random things in the back of my head, while present situations were being dealt with by the rest of my brain.
I'm sitting here, at the edge of the bed after a long bath, and I just counted how many times I passed the deodorant stick up and down my armpits. The same pattern, down-up-center. 9 times, on both arms...I have to have the same number of strokes on both armpits or I'll feel incomplete, dirty.
I am, at the same time, counting my breaths and the seconds it's taking me to get dressed. The steps it takes me from the dresser to the bed and back (6 each way). I'm detangling my curly, wet hair with equal comb troughs on each side of my perfectly partitioned hairline. Again, the numbers on each side must match...while I'm counting the deep breaths I'm taking. Breaths that I've timed to match my brush strokes.
This is how everyday is...or at least the days where the anxiety gets the best of me. I count my steps as I walk at work, my bites while I'm eating, the times my car blinker ticks when I have my turn signal on. I try to match the numbers to a pattern or make a rhythm game out of it...
I count everything but sheep...
Maybe that's why I never sleep.
wait til you start counting every word and then arranging the letters so they are always even on either side. like, picture your fingers. there are five. the middle finger represents the exact center of the word. take the work "hello" its perfect. the first L is the exact center of the word. Now take a word like 'fuck'. there is no center so it has to be 2 letters on either side of the middle finger for both sides to be even. now 'family'. there has gto be three letters on either side of the middle finger. I do that for every word i think or say. Yeah...i'm just as fucked up as the rest of you, probably more. oh...ps. i do five on each armpit :)
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