Doubting having impurity on clothes as result of OCD

3-1-2018 | IslamWeb

Question:

Assalaamu alaykum. I often put some toilet paper on my private part to prevent urine and Madhy (pre-seminal fluid) from getting in my clothes. However, some urine passed and left that paper wet, and it was torn into little pieces while I was moving. I fear that while taking my clothes off, some pieces with impurity on them got on my floor. At the end of the day, I found a very small white piece under my sock, but I could not say if it was a piece of paper or cloth. Can I assume that piece to be pure according to the rule that certainty cannot be removed by doubt? Please note that I have been plagued by OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder) for more than half a year. May Allah bless you.

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Answer:

All perfect praise be to Allah, the Lord of the worlds. I testify that there is none worthy of worship except Allah and that Muhammad, sallallahu ʻalayhi wa sallam, is His slave and Messenger.

We ask Allah to bless you with perfect recovery and wellbeing. You should know that the remedy for obsessive doubts is to ignore them and not pay any attention to them at all. Letting yourself get carried away with them leads to grave evils. If you doubt whether you have discharged any impurity or not, then the basic principle is that no impurity was discharged. If you know with certainty that you have discharged an impurity, you may follow the opinion of the Maaliki scholars, who held that it is not obligatory to take precautions (to prevent the discharge from spreading onto your body or clothes) in such a situation.

As for the toilet paper in reference, the basic principle is that it did not fall on the floor, and, in principle, this piece of paper that you found is pure. So always follow this principle, act upon it, and do not do otherwise so that you do not cause yourself extreme inconvenience.

Allah knows best.