#JUST CHECKING BY EMILY COLAS FULL#
#JUST CHECKING BY EMILY COLAS SERIES#

She took all of the knives and put them in a drawer and sealed the drawer with tape. In order to check this, Colas put safeguards all around the house so she could see what the girl came in contact with. Colas needed a babysitter, but she didn’t want the girl touching any of her things or getting any of her germs on her furniture. The most shocking vignette in Colas’ memoir is the one where she talks about the process she has to go through to get ready for a baby sitter. Colas’ OCD destroyed her relationship with her husband by demanding things of him that he simply could not keep giving. This was a regular routine for Colas and her husband, and it put an immense amount of stress on their relationship to the point where they eventually separated. She then asked her husband to ask for a new waiter. Colas made her husband ask the waiter what the band-aid was for and if there was any chance of his injury coming in contact with their food. Another case of this was when Colas and her husband were out to dinner and their waiter had a band-aid on his hand. The way I figured it, if he was confident enough to eat my food, then it must be okay… Then again if something did happen to go wrong, we’d trip or die together” (21). She says, “We’d go out to eat, but he would have the first bite off my plate. The only way Colas would eat at a restaurant is if her husband tried her food first to make sure there was nothing dangerous in it. She was afraid of eating out because she thought someone thought there was poison in the food.

#JUST CHECKING BY EMILY COLAS FULL#

She could not move on to the next task of her day without having her conversation make a full star, which affects the way she’s able to communicate with and form relationships with others.Ĭolas’ primary fear was of contamination. Colas’ physical inability to leave a conversation on a unfinished star is a common condition of counting OCD. Finally he’ll conclude, ‘Why don’t we just make pasta?’ 4 stars” (3).

He continues, ‘Do you have any ides?’ 2 and 4/5. He says, ‘How about pizza?’ I still just stare at him, but I think 1 and 4/5 stars. For example, Colas says “My husband might say to me, ‘What do you want for dinner?’ I’m looking him straight in the eyes so I guess he believes I’m deciding, but in fact I’m drawing and thinking 1 and 1/5 stars. Every conversation she had had to end on a full star. The first instance of Colas sharing her counting OCD is when she reveals her need for “star conversations.” Whenever Colas would have a conversation with someone, she would be making a star in her head, one line for every word that was spoken. However, these select few passages do not reveal Colas’ whole story, which can only be captured by reading the entire memoir. After reading the memoir, I have decided to take some of the most startling vignettes and share them with you.

#JUST CHECKING BY EMILY COLAS SERIES#

Her memoir is a series of vignettes about her daily struggles with her various forms of OCD. Emily Colas was a wife and a mother of two with severe intrusive thoughts, counting and checking OCD.

Just checking by emily colas