needle ocd (hiv)

[worriedman0]

hello. Im one of the most hypocondrical person's on the planet and now I cant seem to shake off my worry over a situation at my work. I work at a industry in sweden and 3 weeks ago we recieved some industrial materials from africa which were packed in styrofoam in a crate. After i had unpacked all materials i threw the styrofoam trash pieces in trashbags, 2 bags which were completely new. THen as i was trying to push one of the trashbags into a crate i applied my arm on the bag and could feel a sharping feeling under my elbow (like something could have pricked me).

I carefully examined and did not see any blood, wound etc on me so did not think more of it.. but now i have ofcourse convinced myself that it was a needle a african worker accidently droped in the crate then pricked me. Even tho i did not see any needle while i was unpacking the materials or when i was throwing the storyfoam in the trashbag. I even went back the day after and examined the trashbag's conent and did not find any needle..im not 100% it was the correct trasbag ..I mean someone could have switched places on the 2 trashbags.

Well while writing this i feel crazy. Probably it was a broken styrofoam piece or wooden piece but do you think there could have been any chance of infection in this case? or is it just 100%  ocd ..I asked in another part of Medhelp and Teak said that i should seek help for my ocd. I just want some more ppls opinions, thanks for taking your time helping!

[lola099]

OCD makes us do these types of things.

I agree with JGF25 and say that there is NO risk here at all.

If you think of the probability of the situation through the OCD, you will begin t ofeel better.

What are the chances that a needle was dropped into that box?
What are the chances that needle had HIV blood on it?
What are the chances that the needle (if it was there, remember those chances) picked you.
If a needled with HIV infected blood has a 0.03% of infection, what do you suppose your % is based on the low probability that these things happened in perfect harmony to infect you?

Relax, breathe. It's OCD, not HIV and you are just fine :)

[JGF25]

I'm glad you are feeling better.  Take care.  

[worriedman0]

thanks for the reply JGF25 . very very much apreciated. You describe my way of thinking very accurately.
I have been a hypocondrical person as long as i can remember, being scared of different diseases but it was not as bad as this hiv fear which started this year. It helped a little once i became a blood donor (figured i could do some good and also prove to myself that i was not infected)
but some anxiety still remains as seen here. Reading through your comment on about how ppl with OCD think etc really made me realize and its starting to feel like i can put this "incident" behind me.

[JGF25]

Hi there.  Yes I think it is your health anxiety as well.  You took what you thought was a needle stick and ran with it all the way to checking the trashbag and when finding nothing coming up with the scenario that someone could have switched the bags.  That is what people with OCD do.  We catastrohpize and then we want closure and even when we do go back (which we should never do by the way because that is just giving into the irrational thinking) we don't believe what we see and go on to further make up scenarios.  Teak answers questions in the HIV forum.  Is that what you are specifically keying in on right now?  

What have you done for your OCD or Health Anxiety?  I'm not sure what you have really but I'm guessing OCD.  

IMO there is no chance of you being infected with anything at all BTW.