There’s a name for that

It’s no secret that I’m a word snob. Whether you’ve known me for 10 years or 10 minutes, chances are pretty good you’ve been corrected, glared at or snubbed if you’ve used an incorrect word or mispronounced it in such a horrific manner it’s caused me pain.

Think I’m kidding? Ask my niece. She posted this on Facebook earlier this week: “I don’t want to go back to school tomarrow!” My response: “You need to go to school as least as long as it takes you to spell ‘tomorrow’ correctly.”

No one is exempt. I’ve mentioned this before, but the truest example is the poor soul who dared date me and then proceed to explain that he’s an aff-eh-KON-dee-oh of weapons. Huh? He meant aficionado, of course, but he looked at me, confused, when I giggled (I couldn’t help myself) and then proceeded to use the word again – three more times. That was our last date.

I’ve taken my fair share of taunting and ribbing, had several friends chide me when some silly person thought “ginormous” needed to be a word and I launched a verbal campaign against its use, and have even been scolded by my teenagers who, by default, have become word snobs-in-training. I’ve tried to relax, I really have.

Today I have been given justification – if not vindication – for the aforementioned word snobbery. It’s a disease.

Well, not a disease as much as a disorder. It’s called migraine disorder and it’s a lot like OCD, apparently.

I was visiting with a neurologist this morning to determine whether I had a much more serious disease (I don’t, thankfully, but spent the last two weeks thinking I did, thanks to an overzealous ER doctor and then family doctor) and learned that I do have a migraine disorder.

The doctor’s first question in making the diagnosis: “Are you a perfectionist when it comes to things like spelling, words, numbers?”

Um …

(Actually I thought he was kidding at first – I had corrected the physician assistant when she made a typo when entering my history, and I thought they got together to pull a prank …)

Take a look at my apartment, my desk or, God forbid, my car and you’ll see the OCD is not “Monk”-like – I do get bothered by a messy kitchen or newspapers strewn about, but right now my bedroom looks a bit like an episode of “Hoarders” (I blame that on the craziness of the weather – what do you pack away when it’s 55 degrees in January?). As the doc explained it, my OCD has more to do with words and letters and math and having to know why everything happens and how do you feel about it? My friends who have accused me of having to overanalyze everything will totally get that part …

So feel free to mock me all you want when I ask you to use the proper “your” or “you’re” when writing or beg you to remember that “could’ve” is a contraction for could have, not could of. If that makes you feel better, then have at it.

But I’ll still point out the error and give you a correction.