As someone with OCD, I can understand this trigger and the anxiety. Door locking is not a current OCD fear of mine but it is one I’ve experienced and at that time, this would of been so hard to cope with in terms of anxiety levels.

As far as whether it’s a valid reason or not to stay home from work, I would try to think of it from the perspective of navigating what level of anxiety is manageable while working and trying to take care of young children. I also think that even without having an OCD trigger from this, it would make sense given the circumstances and just todays world to not want to leave your home unlocked all day.

Maybe there could of been other options to work through the situation, such as driving to bfs work and getting the key to lock up and then go to nfs, if possible. Or asking a family member/friend to help with that. But maybe those aren’t possibilities for you and it’s also hard to think about a situation and try to figure out how to navigate it when we are experiencing the kind of anxiety levels that an OCD trigger causes.

I hope that you’re able to have some relief from the anxiety and it sounds like you have understanding employers, which is great. OCD is really hard. I have most definitely had to call out/leave early/etc before because of mental health reasons.