OCD and Due Diligence

I'm an engineer by training and, therefore, I'm well aware for the need for due diligence when making decisions and completing projects. My OCD, however, was causing me to take due diligence to an extreme. Rather than completing a satisfactory search for codes and design information I would perform an unending amount research. These checks and rechecks began to degrade my efficiency as well as my quality of life.

One weapon that I developed during cognitive therapy was to determine what a "normal" amount of checking would be and then adhere to the norm. One day my therapist asked, "When normal people write a letter, how often do you think they re-read it for edits?"

I was somewhat put-off by the term "normal people". In actuality, I would check a letter and then recheck a letter more than once, even if I never found anything to edit in the first place. I answered with, "I don't know what "normal people" do. Maybe they will check once?"

I now strive to fulfill the norm, but I still catch myself re-reading twice or more sometimes. I find that I am most successful (in terms of cutting down the number of rechecks) when paying very close attention during my first edit. If I expend a lot of effort and attention on the first check, my brain seems to be satisfied enough with that effort that I will not give into the temptation to read and re-read again.