Episode 32: tips for dealing with obsessive compulsive disorder

When this podcast, I am showing some more changes we’ve made to the house over the years to deal with Jake’s OCD, which usually comes along with autism. 
 ussane, as well as keeping Jake safe. #Autism awareness.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Good morning, Jamie. Oh, you're such a sweet boy. That's my boy. He follows me everywhere. He follows me everywhere, don't you, baby? Yes, you're a good boy. You're a good boy. Yes. So today I want to show you a few more things that we've done around the house. Uh, because of the destroyer of homes. You'll notice here we have photographs, and then we have collected um Hummels. They're from Germany, which is uh in dedication of my grandfather because he always collected the Hummels from Germany for years and years and years, and then he gifted them to our family. And because Jake started throwing the Hummels in the trash, which was not a good thing, um, and he wouldn't keep any of the photographs up here, we had a gentleman come and put a plastic shield right here. Couldn't do glass, because if he hits it then he would break it. But we have a plastic glass up there that he installed, and that way Jake can't get into it anymore and throw them out. So that's one of the things that we've done to protect Jake and to protect our pictures and hummels. Then, now this is kind of funny. Um, if you go into the kitchen, you'll notice that we have no doors for the washer and dryer. We used to have those sliding doors. Jakey got annoyed with the sliding doors having to close them all the time, and so he eventually tore them off. We put them back on a couple times and he kept tearing them off, so we decided to throw them out. So, you know, I always try to look at the glass half full. It's much easier to get into the washer and dryer now, since we don't have the doors. Um, the other thing we had to do is we had to put these cabinets up because Jake will not let us keep anything out. You'll notice up here we've got just a couple things, it's hard for him to get to, but he does get to those occasionally. But um for all of the items that we need around the house, we got these doors, and as long as they're closed, they don't bother Jake. Oh, that's all the balls for the dog. But so we keep everything in here, and as long as it's closed, Jakey doesn't mind. But if he sees anything out, it goes in the closet, so we can't do that. Then I wanted to show you in our bathroom. This is Jake's bathroom, and you'll notice that we don't have anything covering the shower. We used to have glass slides here for the shower. You'll see the frame. Well, Jake didn't like those either. Excuse me. So eventually he started tearing those down, and actually they shattered all over the floor. Thank God we caught him because he was in the middle of it and we had to pick everything up so he didn't get cut. So we decided no more glass, no more um, you know, barrier there. We tried to put up um just a shower curtain. He tore the shower curtain down. So we decided okay, no more shower curtain, no more doors, and we don't go take showers in here anymore. So this is just Jake's tub because he only takes baths, he doesn't like showers. So anyway, so we did that. Then Jake tore off right here where the toilet paper roll was. He didn't like that, so he tore that off. So we got this little guy here, this little rolling cabinetry, which is really great. Got that on Amazon, and we hide the toilet paper in this second drawer. As long as he doesn't see it, he doesn't throw it in the closet. But you can't keep that toilet paper out, baby. Because if you do, it is gone. It is gone. Let's see, what else did I want to show you? This is um our air conditioning unit. Jake used to rip the air conditioning unit off. I know, it's hard to believe. So we got this little sucker right here, so he can't get into it and he can't rip it off anymore. So that saved us a little money. And what else did we do? Oh, um, sorry. Allergies. This right here, Jake won't let us keep anything, you know, anywhere. I mean, you'll notice most things are empty. Um, so what we did is we just put his stuffed animals on top. A couple of those are actually Jamie's the dogs. And so if he wants to throw them in the closet, they don't break. So most of the things that we have in the house that we actually leave out are unbreakables. Uh, for example, you know, we have we have a lot of things like this that are unbreakable, these little rattan baskets. And he can throw those in the closet, and you know, they never get hurt, which is great. This right here, this is a table that my husband and his parents made for us, and it's got pictures of us when we were um most of them are from our honeymoon, and other items from our wedding. Our wedding was um Asian because we're martial artists, and we had the wedding um at um Master Studios, and so anyway, so you can see a lot of stuff in there that was for the wedding, and our honeymoon is right there and right there, and then those little pieces in there are from Germany, um, and that was from our um honeymoon when we went to Germany. Now you notice at the bottom that it's tied down because Jake will take this, pick it up, it's very heavy, and shove it in the closet. So we tie a lot of things down in the house. Sometimes he gets used to it and we can eventually untie it. Um, other times we just leave it on so he doesn't, you know, start thinking about untying it and throwing it in the closet. So I think that's about it for now. Those are the other things I was I wanted to show you guys. Anyway, you'll notice you'll notice the kitchen. We keep very little on the countertops. He throws that in the closet every night. That's our basket. He throws this under the closet. So anything that we have out, he throws under the closet. So most of the time, once we're done with something, we stick it and we put it away. But that's how you deal with somebody that's not only autistic but obsessive compulsive. That's it for now. I hope I gave some of you with the same issues some tips. Have a great day. Bye.