Marz

[PT: What kinds of posts trigger moral & checking OCD (and psychosis)? /End PT]

So many people write and reblog posts that have very direct triggers towards folks with moral & checking OCD. Here are posts NOT to make/reblog.

To get the terminology out of the way - moral OCD is a condition in which a person becomes obsessed about doing something "morally wrong", and develops compulsive behaviors over it. Checking OCD is a condition in which a person becomes obsessed over checking over their own (or others) actions, as to avoid a perceived disaster, and develops compulsions around it.

Do NOT make/reblog posts with phrases such as:

"Reblog/donate/share or else you are letting me/someone I know die/suffer." "Reblog or else you're [insert bad thing]"/"Reblog if you're not [insert bad thing]"

^If it is an urgent donation post that you feel deserves to be shared, at the very least, add "tw reblog bait" and "tw OCD trigger."

"Reblog/like/comment/share or else [insert creature] will find you/stalk you/come into your house/etc" "[Insert thing] is coming to your location. You cannot stop it. It will be outside your window soon"/"[Insert thing] is in your walls."

^These ones can also trigger hallucinations, delusions, and paranoia in people with schizospec disorders/psychosis! It may seem like a "haha funny meme" to you, but to people with OCD or psychosis, they could fret heavily over this, and wonder if they are going to be in danger if they don't reblog/like/comment/share.

"It is illegal to be/have [insert thing here]." (Example: "It is illegal to be nonqueer during pride month", "it is illegal to have internalized ableism during disability pride month", etc.)

#my old phone looks like this on my shelf lmao #im too scared to touch it to throw it away #idk what trash this even goes into when its at this point

The pillow-shaped object here used to be the phone’s battery. It’s not a battery anymore. Now it’s a balloon full of corrosive, pyrophoric chemicals and hydrogen gas and it’s one puncture away from burning your house down. I am 100% serious. You should be scared to touch it.

But you gotta touch it, because you gotta get it out of your house before the pressure builds up to the point where the balloon pops. This isn’t going to happen soon – there is no need to panic – but it will happen eventually.

And, indeed, it doesn’t go in the ordinary trash. You put this in the ordinary trash and you’re gonna set the garbage truck on fire. Don’t do that to the garbage collectors, their job is hard enough already.

The first thing you need to do is get a fireproof container. The most common household item that qualifies as a fireproof container is a cast-iron cookpot with a cast-iron lid – often sold as a “Dutch oven.” Any other cooking container that’s unreactive, has a very high melting point, and has a lid made of the same materials will also work: enameled or stainless steel, Pyrex with glass lid, etc.

However: Do not use a pot with a PTFE-based non-stick coating. If the battery does explode, the fire will probably be hot enough to degrade a PTFE coating, producing toxic smoke. (Not that you should breathe the smoke from the battery fire either, but PTFE breakdown products are worse.) Do not use a pot made of aluminium or copper. The fire might even get hot enough to melt those.

Whatever container you use, you might have to throw away along with the phone, so don’t use your good Dutch oven for this. Go to a thrift store and buy a cheap one.

Once you have the fireproof container:

Gently pick up the phone and put it in the fireproof container. If possible, gently tape the phone to the bottom of the container to prevent it from bouncing around. Don’t put any padding in there, that’ll just make a fire worse if it does happen. Put the lid on and tape it shut.

Put a label on the container, something like “DEFECTIVE LI-ION BATTERY – FIRE HAZARD”.

It is now reasonably safe to move the container around. However, if the battery does explode, the container is very likely to leak smoke and get hot, so keep it in a well-ventilated area and away from things that will be damaged by heat. Don’t leave it exposed to the weather, either.

You need to find either a hazardous waste disposal site, or an e-waste recycler that will accept defective Li-ion batteries. I can’t help with that because I have no idea where you live.

However, your local fire department, if you have one, will probably be happy to help. Call their non-emergency number. Nothing is on fire yet, so this isn’t an emergency, but things that can easily start a fire are still within the fire department’s responsibilities. Tell them you have a phone with a bulging lithium-ion battery, you put it in a fireproof container, and you want to know how to dispose of it safely.

If the fire department tries to tell you this isn’t dangerous or it’s okay to throw it out in the regular trash (with or without fireproof container), hang up on them and write a cranky letter to your local government representatives, then keep looking for a proper disposal site.