soap contamination

Does anyone else struggle with this?

Whilst showering I try to completely finish my initial bar of soap to avoid this and always must end with at least 7 full body lathers on a fresh new bar which then becomes my hand/forearm soap which I attempt to ration for the rest of the day but it often ends before I'd like. I try to keep my soap count to 2 bars per shower but often use 3 and have used 4 in the past. If I cant completely finish my initial bar I set it aside and only use it again if feel I have reached or exceed the level of contamination I felt I had previously reached. As a result my skin is gradually getting worse and worse to the point where certain areas become red like chaffing and burn like hell. My family members tell me to put something on it to help heal it but I cant even do this for fear of it attracting contamination even with things that are natural antiseptics anyway like aloe vera etc. I have tried using antiseptic soap to ease my fears (which is apparently no more effective than regular soap anyway) but it burns to much however it does make good hand soap but tends to be out of my price range for the amount I of soap I use. Due to the amount of soap I go through I only use the cheapest brand name soap I can get which is really quite good anyway. I wont mention the brand but its comes in value packs of 8 and is available in lavender, linen, or aloe vera and only retails for $2.80 which is exceptional value. Does anyone else have similar fears and rituals and are they valid or are we just completely paranoid.

I'm not sure I understand what sort of contamination you mean.

When you say one bar of soap, are you talking about an approximately 3x2x1" block? If that is the case, then this is probably the cause of irritation. That is way too much. I could take a few weeks to go through one bar.

Yeah I'm talking 100g bars here and using so much is obviously the reason for the irritation but I fear if I dont finish the first bar thats been used whilst I'm most dirtiest I wont be able to use it again for another shower until I reach that same level of dirtiness. I'd love to be able to only use the one bar to shower with but my mind tells me that when I've had a decent clean with the first bar to switch to a new bar so that I wont be washing with the germs or contaminants that may have ingrained themselves in the first bar. I told my Mom about it the other day and she just said to use smaller bars of soap so they run out quicker then I can change to a new one faster. I had thought of that previously but there aren't many avialable on the market at a good price. I then told her for the price I pay for the amount I get now and the amount I go through switching to smaller ones would end up costing me at least 3-4 times as much. She then just said to cut the ones I get now in half now why didn't I think of that before dont you hate it when the answers staring you right in the face but you still cant seem to realize it. So next time I get another pack of soap I'm going to cut a couple of bars in half to give it a shot I just hope they aren't too hard to cut through. I'll let yous know how I get on.

I feel this way about bars of soap too. I don't like using them more than once, because of germs. Instead of using bar soap, why don't you use liquid soap out of a bottle so you can squeeze out as much as you need and then the dirt won't get into the rest of the soap? I always thought I was paranoid about it as well, then I started using liquid soap and I feel much better. I'm also the same way about toothbrushes, I have to boil and sterilize my toothbrush every time I use it.

I can relate. Here's how one of my shower routines goes:

1) Take antibacterial handsoap into shower with me, and go into the shower.
2) I spend about the first 5-10 minutes of my shower washing my hands so that I don't contaminate the rest of my body, because I obviously had to use a doorknob and various other items to get in there. Some mysophobes use their feet, but I'm not quite that talented...yet.
3) My first task after practically sterilizing my hands is to wash my hair. I'm well aware of two things - one, the people who stock those shampoo bottles at the store are likely filthy (in my eyes), and two, other members of the household use it too, making it even more dirty. Therefore, using one hand, I open the shampoo bottle, squeeze the amount I need into my other hand, and slap that into my hair, and because of the thickness of my hair, I can actually let it sit there for a given period without it leaving the same spot, as long as I don't move the wrong way. Getting back to what I was saying, I put the bottle back down with the one hand, and proceed to again wash that hand (usually just the finger tips because that's the only place I handle it with) either 3 or 4 times, or until it feels better and void of whatever was on the bottle. I then go through the normal routine of washing my hair.
4) Next, I wash my face. I use the clean side of the cloth (which I have personally overseen and designated as such) to get any excess water out of my hair so that soap doesn't drip into my eyes when I'm washing my face. If it's a brand new bar, I don't do the following, but if it isn't, I do. Now, see, there are 3 people in my house, and we all use a different bar of soap. But this isn't enough for me. If it's even a day-old bar, I'll cover it; absolutely BATHE it, in the antibacterial handsoap and rub it in my hands, with the perception being that washing the soap like I do my hands will sterilize from anything that could've potentially come into contact with it. From here, I wash my face normally (despite it being "normal", I'm still very thorough with it, face cloth and all, due to my face needing a great deal of washing to prevent myself from breaking out with acne, so that's not really OCD related, but anyway...).
5) The next step depends on the height of my OCD on that given day. Sometimes, after sitting the bar of soap down while rinsing my face off, before I proceed to wash myself from my neck to my groin (back and front, although I never really wash my legs or feet just because of the time it would add to the shower). Sometimes, just the fact that I sat it back down neccesitates sterilizing it once again. I do this, and then proceed to use the bar as I described a couple sentences ago.
6) Once I'm rinsed off and finished, I turn the shower off using my foot while balancing myself on my clean face cloth, and also open the door in the same fashion. I get out, I dry off (once again, with a towel I've designated as clean), but never using the side of the towel that was in direct contact with the hanger or wall. I slide my slippers on, never letting my feet directly touch the floor (or ANY floor or ground, for that matter). I slip my boxers on (because it's small enough to avoid contact with the wall; I would never put my clothes there because they're big enough that they could, and probably would).
7) Next comes my most hated part of the whole thing. I have to pick up the bath mat that we lay on the floor for baths and showers, and put it back on its hanger. If it were up to me, I wouldn't touch it period, but you can potentially ruin the mat if you leave it laying after having dampened it, plus I'll normally get an earful if I don't put it back up. So, I do. And what irks me the most, is that, when I'm picking it up, I do so with my finger tips to avoid as much contact as possible. And when I flip it up onto its hanger, and it's about halfway down the other side, it's so thick that the top of it falls down on the back of my hands, which, while it still goes over and hangs properly, upsets me to no end because I know what I'll have to do, and that is, not only do I thoroughly wash my fingertips again, I'll have to wash the back of my hands as well. Of course, I'll open the doors and turn off any lights before washing after that happens, just to avoid rewashing my already dried-out hands yet again. So I wash them for the final time after hanging the mat, opening the door, and shutting off the lights. Oh yeah, I put the antibacterial soap back by the sink so no one gets suspicious when they find it in the shower the next day (I've had that happen a few times).

That ended up way longer than I originally meant, but I felt compelled to mention it after reading your post. Also, in regards to the antibacterial soap...when I had to go out every day to college, when I came home, I would be at the sink for a half hour, sometimes more, with hot water, washing my hands vigourously and repeatedly with the aforementioned antibacterial soap, and I would continue until my hands felt okay again. It was all about the feeling, because if they didn't feel clean, I kept going until they were. I once did this for over an hour and drained a FIFTY GALLON HOT WATER TANK AT THE SINK. Think about THAT one. During this time in college, I could go through a 250mL (not sure what your measurement system is, but that's equivalent to roughly 8-10 fluid ounces), which is RIDICULOUS, considering the average person would go through one of those in about 3 or 4 weeks. Even now that I'm done college and rarely go out due to my phobia, I still go through one of those in about a week, which is still abnormal. I have to keep stocked on refill bottles, and every few months, I'll get a new bottle altogether due to my perception that the germs on the outside will inevitably get inside the bottle and ruin any of the effect the antibacterial soap would've had.

So yeah, that's my story.

sleepysparrow said:

I feel this way about bars of soap too. I don't like using them more than once, because of germs. Instead of using bar soap, why don't you use liquid soap out of a bottle so you can squeeze out as much as you need and then the dirt won't get into the rest of the soap? I always thought I was paranoid about it as well, then I started using liquid soap and I feel much better.

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This really is the way to go. Get yourself a bottle of antibacterial soap (bar soap is absolutely useless at "cleaning" anyway) and keep it for yourself.

afterforever said:

3) My first task after practically sterilizing my hands is to wash my hair. I'm well aware of two things - one, the people who stock those shampoo bottles at the store are likely filthy (in my eyes), and two, other members of the household use it too, making it even more dirty. Therefore, using one hand, I open the shampoo bottle, squeeze the amount I need into my other hand, and slap that into my hair, and because of the thickness of my hair, I can actually let it sit there for a given period without it leaving the same spot, as long as I don't move the wrong way. Getting back to what I was saying, I put the bottle back down with the one hand, and proceed to again wash that hand (usually just the finger tips because that's the only place I handle it with) either 3 or 4 times, or until it feels better and void of whatever was on the bottle. I then go through the normal routine of washing my hair.

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Not only will the people in the store have unclean hands, the shelves are usually dirty and certainly the conveyor belt is.

The way I get around this is, after buying a new bottle of shampoo/shower gel, I take it home and rub it over with antibacterial soap. Then I wrap tissue paper around each bottle, so it's quite thick and even when wet (as it will become, when you use it in the shower) it won't disintegrate and you won't be able to actually feel the bottle. Alternatively, you could wrap the bottle up in clear sticky tape. Sticky tape covers up all nasty things, it's the ultimate "sweep it under the carpet" method and can work on just about anything.