Caution - Do Not Touch

Think of the person with the most extreme OCD that you know or have ever met. If it's you, then that's fine, you're doing great. You've got nothing to worry about. Carry on as you were. As for the rest of us, in this time, we could all learn a thing or two from such people.

Last winter, we were honoured to host, for several months, a very special person afflicted with the most extreme Obsessive Compulsive Disorder that I have ever seen or go to know.

She appeared outside our house on a very stormy night, very weak and cold and with nowhere to go. Galit, being the good hearted person that she is, invited her in to get warm, have something to eat and get some rest and shelter.

At first, the woman, who's name is Zipporah, was very reluctant to take up Galit's kind offer. Though she could barely stand because she was so ill and weak, she wouldn't allow anyone to touch her. She recoiled in fear if she was offered a hand or if someone came too close.

To her, everything was dirty, contaminated and threatening. To her, everything and everyone was covered in all manner of invisible but deadly toxins, germs, parasites, bacteria and viruses. Her greatest dread was of hospitals, because they are full of sick people.

She was so fearful of catching something and getting ill and having to go to a doctor or hospital that she would go to extraordinary lengths to avoid coming into contact with anything that could cause this.

Even if a person had been in contact with someone who was ill in any way, she would only talk to them from across the room. She was especially fearful of people who had been to India or other such countries with poor levels of hygiene. One friend who often came to visit at that time had just returned from working in a hospital in India. Zipporah would go and hide when she came around, pacing her room, muttering all sorts of prayers and incantations. She was very superstitious too, and very religious in her own particular way, blending all manner of unspeakable fears together into an exhausting, unique, obsessive cocktail.

After any kind of contact with any contaminated surface or person, she would go through a long and elaborate routine of washing herself. This was made more complicated by her being unable to touch any water taps because our house (as she saw it) was a breeding ground for invisible threats, being as it is, full of children and cats. She loved the children but hated the cats, though both were spreaders of germs as far as she was concerned. She was also unable to open and close doors, except with her feet..

I could go on and describe thousands of her strange habits and ways, but I think by now you get the idea.

Sometimes you get a visitor in your house who just won't leave. I'm sure we've all had them. In Zippora's case it was hard to throw her out as she really had nowhere to go. It was the middle of winter and life on the streets, or in hospital (her only two options) would have been unbearable to her with her condition. She'd lived on the streets of every city in Israel for 25 years and dreaded that life almost as much as she dreaded hospitals. Nothing could convince her to set foot in any city. She preferred to stay close to nature.

All she really wanted was a little place of her own where she could close herself inside, receive no visitors, keep every surface absolutely clean and go through her extended, complex rituals in peace. Unfortunately, that's not an easy thing to attain when you've got no money and a severe psychological disorder.

Anything which had touched the floor could not be touched. All water taps and sinks had to be meticulously cleaned before use. She believed that germs could somehow climb up running water from a dirty sink into the tap. No food could be eaten if it or any of the utensils used to prepare it had touched the kitchen surface. Nobody could mention sickness, madness or death..

Zipporah wouldn't sit on any of the chairs in the house, so we got her a lightweight plastic chair which became her throne that she could carry from her bedroom to the living room and which only she could sit on. She'd place it in the middle of the room (far from the dusty edges and corners where cats, spiders, scorpions and other unspeakable dangers might be lurking) and tell story after story of her strange, hard, yet often miraculous life.. the good people she'd met along the way and also the bad ones. Some stories which would make you believe in a good and merciful God watching over everything and everyone, even the most abject and destitute. Other stories of complete abandonment and cruelty would break your heart.

Eventually of course, Zipporah had to go. As it was, she stayed until the spring when the weather got warmer, by which time Galit and the children were completely exhausted from catering for her completely over the top requirements, irrational fears and superstitions.

At this time, I fear for all the homeless, mentally ill and vulnerable people in our societies who fall through the net and have nowhere to turn, but to the few kind hearted people out there who are willing to go out of their way to help them.

At this time too, it would do us no harm to be just a little bit more like Zipporah.. in some ways, at least.