Time after Time

Innocuous household item or ultimate source of terror?

One of my major OCD fears is about cheating people out of money.  I really do not want any money that I don't deserve.  I mean don't get me wrong, I'm very pro-lottery and other instant influxes of cash... I  just don't want to get overpaid at my job or steal from anyone.

For this reason, I am very scared of clocking in and out at work.  Yes, I am afraid of the clock.  Dun dun DUNNNN! 

Getting to and leaving work can be a stress fest.  I always want to make sure that I get there at least a couple minutes before I'm scheduled to begin and leave at or after my scheduled time.

Yesterday night I was released early, so I left work at ~7:27 pm instead of 8:00 pm.  I know because I texted my sister and have a time stamp (and I did this specifically because I knew I would worry about marking my time sheet wrong because of this deviation from the normal schedule).  

So when I got home, I naturally marked my time sheet for 7:15 pm.  Totally logical!

Why did I cut out those 12 minutes?  Maybe because 7:27 is a weird in-between number.  For sure because if I texted my sister to say I was done, I wasn't working anymore at that moment.  I was texting.  So when did the work really stop?  

See, I can feel absolutely sure I was still at work at 7:15.  And there's nothing better to assuage anxiety than absolutely sure.

What exactly am I worried is going to happen if I get paid for a few extra minutes?  I can tell you what I'm not worried about: getting fired, going to jail, going to hell.  This isn't a fear of punishment at all: the anxiety just surrounds the idea of being a dishonest person.

Cheating myself to assure that I didn't cheat someone else is something I really need to stop.

But probably not today.  Thinking about changing my time card to say 7:27 pm or even 7:20 pm makes my insides cringe.   

Today is the tragedy of 12 minutes.