Do I have OCD? Am I on the “Spectrum”?
What my brain sees when it scrolls through my feed here.
Let’s start with me
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) features a pattern of unwanted thoughts and fears known as obsessions. These obsessions lead you to do repetitive behaviors, also called compulsions. These obsessions and compulsions get in the way of daily activities and cause a lot of distress.
Ultimately, you feel driven to do compulsive acts to ease your stress. Even if you try to ignore or get rid of bothersome thoughts or urges, they keep coming back. This leads you to act based on ritual. This is the vicious cycle of OCD.~The Mayo Clinic
Okay, so maybe not if that’s the case. I keep thinking about that movie that Jack Nicholson was in. The one where he had to turn his door locks back and forth a certain number of times to feel safe; constantly washing his hands; not being unable to step on cracks in the floor, etc. I have noticed that I need the towels in the bathroom and kitchen hung a certain way but wouldn’t that be more of a quirk since that’s the only thing that bugs me? And I don’t have to hang them x number of times. I just want the ends even that’s all.
But then I saw this…
Obsessions often have themes, such as:
*Needing things to be orderly and balanced.
So, okay, maybe I am a little OCD. Can you be a ‘little’ OCD or is it an all-in/all-out kind of thing?
So then I asked Google to “define autism spectrum disorder” and this is what its AAI gave me:
The word “neurological” is what stood out to me. Ever since I had a stroke in July 2022 my brain hasn’t functioned the same. It affected to a small but noticeable degree, the part of my brain where speech is located. I’ll know I know a word and have used it all my life, but for that same life can't remember what the word is. It’s frustrating AF. Not just as a writer but in my everyday speech as well.
But as I think back, no that isn’t it. Not the stroke anyway. A few years ago I was an editor for multiple publications here what was showing up in the queues as ‘ready to publish’ was pissing me off then too.
Just now “neurodivergent” popped into my head. I know I’ve Googled it a million times but still can’t seem to get the definition to stick in my head. *long suffering sigh here*
Google’s AI Overview Definition:
Neurodivergent means having a brain that functions differently from the average person, or “neurotypical” person, in one or more ways. This can include differences in how people learn, communicate, perceive their environment, and have social preferences. Neurodivergence can range from mild ways that most people wouldn’t notice to more obvious ways that cause people to behave differently than is typical in society.
So maybe that’s it. By this definition I’m neurodivergent…?
Or maybe… just maybe…
It ain’t me, it’s you
My response to posted pieces here literally causes a physical reaction in me. My body has a noticeable reaction to what passes for writing on here. Wanna know what makes it worse? See a post with all kinds of errors in it and by errors I mean platform rule violations, and that it was published in a publication. This means that not only did the “writer” violate a platform rule (platform rules usually equate to US laws) but the editor and or publisher missed it as well.
ACK UGH and FUCKBALLS
This morning I blew through 30+ saved posts in my reading list. I read only a fraction of them. Why? Because one by one I pulled them up and saw or didn’t see the following:
- No credit was given to the image you used
- Improperly formatted title and/or subtitle
- Each “paragraph” was a single sentence
- Sentence case used in the title/title caps used in the subtitle
- Punctuation used in the title (hint only a question mark)
- “How To” type titles that ended with a question mark
- The quote format being used without stating who you’re quoting
- Quotes that are common knowledge being cited as ‘unknown’ or ‘anonymous’
And that’s just off the top of my head. Last one first. I’ve done simple Google searches just to make sure I’m not misremembering and lo and behold, nope. It really is a well-known quote from Yogi Berra.
“It ain’t over ’til it’s over.”
Even if you didn’t know who said it you at least thought it was a famous saying or why would you be quoting it? You got the line from somewhere. You know you didn’t just make it up so why not attribute it to the source where you saw it or heard it? As for the rest of it? It’s been written about all over the internet including here ad nauseum so why is it still happening? Two answers come to mind. Laziness and the uneducated.
“PhD”.
“47x Top Writer”.
“Editor of x number of publications”.
If you have a doctorate it doesn’t matter in what field of study you still had to write papers so surely you above all others should know how to format the written word.
So you figured out the code to work the algorithm in your favor. Take that “skill” out in the real world and get back to me.
So you started your platform publication. SAA
I’ve said it before but I’ll say it again.
Being a typist is not the same thing as being a writer.
So maybe it isn’t the algorithm. Maybe it isn’t the publication. Maybe it isn’t… maybe it isn’t… maybe it isn’t…
Maybe it’s you.
Casey Botticello has a legitimate (almost) 19K followers, not that F4F scheme that also violates the platform’s rules, but actual followers.
That’s a link to his Lists. Scroll through it. Know what your weaknesses are first. READ what applies to you. Save it to your Read folder so you can refer back to it. Here are a few more links you may want to save while you’re at it.
Did you know that there are three different styles of formatting in the real world? Can you name them? How do you know which one to use for what?
Exactly.
Once upon a time when I signed up on this platform nearly four years ago, there were publications that would specify on their ‘Write for Us’ page that they used MLA, APA, or Chicago style and would only accept submissions that followed the specified format. Nowadays publications publish posts with copyrighted images in them or allow you to refer to the MPP as the ‘medium partner program’. If you don’t see what’s wrong with the latter it’s a proper pronoun and should be capped.
How to get your account suspended
(I’m not even going to mention that he didn’t cite the image.)
Now you see why I have the profile pic that I do.
