On yesterday’s Oprah, we met six individuals suffering from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, also known as OCD. Though, if you really have this disorder, you know it should be referred to as CDO, so the letters are in nice, neat, alphabetical order.

Dr. Mehmet Oz and Dr. Jonathan Grayson took these individuals to OCD Boot Camp, where they were forced to deal with their anxieties. Most of them had an aversion to being touched and to germs, so Dr. Grayson started them off with a group hug, so they could cross contaminate each other.

Then Dr. Grayson had everyone get down on their knees, put their hands on the floor, and lick their fingers.

Meet Brian. Brian was so afraid of germs that he constantly kept his left hand in his pocket, and he was so scared to sit on the toilet in his own home, that he would go to the bathroom in his yard. Dr. Grayson thought this wasn’t normal behavior and explained Brian’s course of therapy was to rub his hands along a toilet seat, and then lick his fingers. Because that is normal, and Brian needs to get on the right track. As you can see by the look on his face, Brian clearly wanted to stay on the wrong track.

Next, the good doctors took the six people into Philadelphia where they found two sticky and smelly trash cans. One woman said they contained a mixture of cat feces, old food and vomit. Mmmmmmm. Dr. Grayson had Brian touch the inside of the trash can, then…you guessed it…lick his fingers.

After the Boot Camp the participants said they felt much better, but they strongly felt that Dr. Grayson needed to get some help.

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After a lot of occupational therapy to get over some serious sensory issues, my six year old son is no longer afraid to touch anyone. He’s also not real shy about it. When his sister started playing soccer and softball a few years ago, I would take him to practices where he would approach any Mom who paid him any mind and would begin rubbing her legs or arms. Not to mention, he would inevitably try to rub her chest as well.

Thanks to some good fortune, last week our family got a Wii. What does a Wii have to do with chest rubbing? Well, I’ll get to that.

Aside from the fact that we warned the kids not to hurt themselves while playing their new video games…okay, that was after I pulled a shoulder muscle while bowling…we also told them never to touch buttons if they don’t know what they mean. Because, so help me, if someone wipes out my Guitar Hero standings and I have to start over, it’s not going to be pretty.

So, back to the chest rubbing…

Tonight, when I was folding laundry, my son saw one of my bras and asked, “Mom, is this for boobies?”

I replied, “Yes. Yes, it is.”

Then, I realized we stressed being careful with the Wii a little too hard when he said, “And, I never, ever, ever touch private parts like boobies…and I never, ever press reset on the Wii either.”

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Almost a month ago, my six year old son’s fingertip was smashed in a door and cut off. He was taken to the hospital, where the tip was reattached and we were told there was a 50/50 chance of it taking. It didn’t.

Last week, after the doctor told us the tip would eventually fall off like a big scab, I explained to my son that his finger may look a little funny when all is said and done. He seemed a bit freaked out by the word “scar”…thanks a lot Lion King…so I had to think fast to reassure him.

I pulled up my left pant leg and pointed to a scar on my shin, where thanks to a menacing 7th grade bully, I had the most painful wound of my life.

I had just entered 8th period science class, and was approaching the teacher’s desk which was perched on a stage with metal trim all around the top edge. As I was passing said bully, he stuck his foot out and tripped me. At the place where two metal pieces joined together to form a perfect point, my skin was pierced. I fell, shin first, into the corner of the stage. The hole it left went nearly to my bone.

I then showed him the bottom of my foot. My family had been tearing down my Grandmother’s garage, when I stepped down onto a board that had a long nail sticking out of it. The nail went through the sole of my shoe, right into my heel. My cousin and I went to the emergency room together, because shortly after I pulled off my bloody sock, she swung an axe directly into her shin.

After that, I displayed the mark on my right forearm where I once slashed myself with a wallpaper scraper. It left quite a scar, because instead of going for stitches I wrapped up the wound with paper towels and duct tape.

I explained to my boy, that although these things hurt at one time, the scars they left behind don’t hurt me at all now. But, by the look on his face, I don’t know if I reassured him or frightened him even more.

Because I like to twinge in discomfort…tell me folks, what was your most painful injury?

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My daughter is begging us to take her to the new Narnia movie, but unfortunately for her, we rarely go to the theater anymore.

My husband and I used to go to the movies all the time before our kids were born. Sometimes, two or more a week. Now we’re lucky if we see that many in a year.

Given the fact that I could buy five days worth of groceries…or for crying out loud, ONE tank of gas, for what it costs to take our family to the theater, we tend to just buy the DVD and stay home to watch flicks. You know…where the screen is smaller, but the floor is just as sticky.

It’s not only the money. I also like to stay home because I am a bit of a germophobe and I have a hard time sitting within the vicinity of someone coughing or sniffling.

Plus there are talkers, and seat kickers, and people who need to get out of their aisle saying, “Excuse me. Excuse me.” There are popcorn munchers and wrapper crunchers, and occasionally some buffoon who forgot to set his phone to vibrate.

But despite all that, there are some movies you just have to see 40 feet wide. The shark in Jaws, or the boulder rolling after Indiana Jones…well, they just don’t look the same on a TV screen.

One such movie was Saving Private Ryan. I will never forget the silence in the completely sold-out theater during the first scene. Twenty-four excruciating minutes of well-portrayed violence detailing the U.S. invasion of Normandy.

Everyone’s eyes were glued to the screen and it turned out that was a good thing, because my husband made the biggest movie faux pas I’ve ever seen. He put the munchers, crunchers, and seat kickers to shame.

As he stared wide-eyed and straight ahead, he picked up a Coke and drank it. Only it wasn’t his Coke…and it wasn’t mine either. And, when I leaned over to tell him he was drinking some stranger’s soda, he simply slipped it back into the cup holder, and the stranger was none the wiser.

Considering the price of the tickets, I was actually glad he got a free drink out of the deal.

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