Math and OCD
I am a first year undergraduate student pursuing a bachelor's in mathematics. I have also been diagnosed with OCD. I got diagnosed in 2021 (I think?), but I had been living with it since way before that.
My OCD is kind of dynamic in the sense that it affects different things at different times in my life. Whenever I use something a lot, my OCD begins to creep in and affect that. For example, I use my phone a lot, so my OCD affects my phone usage a lot (I won't go into details about this because it's irrelevant).
The problem is, it's started to affect my math too. Sometimes, especially during high-anxiety situations like exam prep, I start obsessively reading the assigned texts. I feel "incomplete" till I can read the textbook cover-to-cover. I pore over every word of the text, including the preface, the index, and even the copyright information sometimes 💀
This is of course, very time-consuming. Another problem is that I struggle to move on from a concept or a theorem till it "clicks" to me. Even if I read the proof of a theorem and understand it fully, I am unable to move on till I feel it in my bones. Even if I come up with the proof on my own, I need my understanding to be on rock solid foundation before I can move on. This gets very frustrating at times. It's frustrating because I know it's my OCD. I can recall and explain the theorem clearly to anyone who asks. If asked to prove it during the exam, I can do it perfectly. But I don't feel good about it because I don't "feel it". Sometimes I soldier on and eventually I forget about this, but sometimes I'm not able to move on at all. And it's also frustrating because it's usually trivial stuff that I get caught up on. Let me give an example. When studying topology, you learn that a topology T on a set X is a certain collection of subsets of X. Naturally, this means that the topology T is a subset of P(X) and hence T is a member of P(P(X)). I know this. I understand it. The issue is never with my understanding. But I don't feel it. I don't have a good mental image of elements of P(P(X)). So essentially what happens is that every time I read the definition of a topological space, I have to go and "convince" myself that T is a member of P(P(X)). Now why does it matter? It doesn't, and I know that. This isn't what topology is about. But I still get hung up on this. And this is how my OCD works for pretty much everything else in my life. I get hung up on trivial stuff that shouldn't matter to anyone else. So I know for sure that this is my OCD.
Anyway, I just wanted to vent a little and ask for any advice. Also, if any of yall are facing similar problems then please tell me about it in the comments. I imagine that even those without OCD would be facing similar problems.