Germaphobia: When the World Catches up With you
I was a germaphobe long before it became the trend. I’m not sure exactly when it began, but at some point over the last decade I really upped my hygiene game.
For the most part this has been a solitary struggle, defined by holding a sullied hand in a slightly unnatural position - as if that helps - until soap or anti-bacterial gel could save me.
But occasions of germ-avoidance awkwardness were numerous in a pre Covid-19 world. I would forgot how many hand sanitiser bottles I had, buy more, then end up in airport security with 80% of my liquid allocation represented by ‘han-san’, as I forget other people don’t call it. I was an early hoarder.
My girlfriend would pretend she didn’t know me as I took unusual measures to avoid holding handrails on public transport. In fairness, this would often immediately follow my refusal to hold her hand - presumed contaminated. But let me explain, and provide some citizenly advice in the process. If you spread your legs wider while stood on a moving train, you adjust your centre of gravity, improve balance and avoid the need for handrails. You’re welcome!
But potentially my most damaging trait was my habit of sanitising shortly after all handshakes. Of course, being familiar with fictional TV detective Adrian Monk, an OCD sufferer, I realised that you shouldn’t do this in front of the shaker. Best to wait till they are out of sight.
However, imagine my shame when a colleague witnessed me shaking hands with somebody, who happened to have a different ethnicity to me, before I reached for ‘han-san’ 30 seconds later. For the emphatic record, I carry out this practice without discrimination, but, admittedly, it didn’t look great in isolation.
On the flip side, because I feel like the aggrieved party in most matters of hygiene, I have witnessed plenty of despicable behaviour. Let’s linger for a moment on that most wretched of characters, the unnecessary handshaker.
Almost always a man in my experience, and normally in an office, these awful people feel the need to shake your hand several times a day, just because they happen to be walking by. This is utterly unacceptable conduct, and enough to make me change route, or potentially, jobs.
Another tip: Where contact is apparently compulsory, the fist pump at least protects the business end of the fingers. Even better, if you can manoeuvre for an elbow pump, take a bow. The apprentice has become the master.
And don’t get me started on those monsters who fail to keep soap of any description in their own bathrooms. There’s no defence for this lot, but suddenly carrying six bottles of ‘han-san’ on you just looks like good sense. Obviously in normal times only though when supplies are vast.
Office bathrooms can be just as traumatic. I’ll never forget walking in just as a colleague exited a cubicle holding a bowl of Weetabix he was halfway through consuming. Sure, a solid choice of cereal, but unforgivable conduct. When our eyes met, he had the audacity to look at me like I was the oddball! He went straight on my special list; the one reserved for characters to be avoided at all costs. Titled ‘Absolute wrong’uns.’
Bathrooms in restaurants without soap…guess what? I’m not a fan! My mind immediately goes to whether these are the same facilities used by the staff, and the withering answer always seems to be, ‘of course they are’. In a previous job I had a favourite Japanese takeout. That is until I heard they scored 0 out of 5 for food hygiene. In reality, what the score is out of becomes something of a moot point once you’ve heard the zero.
To make all this worse, the poster boy for germaphobia in recent years has been Donald Trump. That feels a bit like being obsessed with the removal of dental plaque, and finding out that society’s most famous flosser was Stalin. Yet, a quick Google search reveals that Jennifer Lawrence and Cameron Diaz are long-time hygiene freaks, like me. Perhaps germaphobia is about to get sexy. Finally.
So here we are in a new era of extreme caution. The rest of the world is catching up with the social imperatives of Jennifer, Cameron and myself. But I still find myself adjusting to the current climate; why is it so hard to stop touching my face? Habitually, we operate with a self-touch reward system. Scientifically speaking, you can’t argue with C-tactile afferents, so don’t even try.
These nerve fibres operate in such a way that the merest suggestion not to touch your face makes you more inclined to do exactly that. Unhelpfully, stress makes us double-down on that impulse. But luckily, these needy little afferents also exist in our upper arms meaning we can reap the benefits of self-touch more safely by redirecting our strokes towards the shoulders.
In stark contrast, there is no scientific justification for shaking the same hand umpteen times a day, or for taking your cereal to the toilet, even outside of pandemics.
Originally published at https://www.simonballou.com on April 1, 2020.
