'Obsessive counting' is very annoying, but counting is part of normal development and everyone counts. Counting shows something is given and something is taken away. Obsession shows that something is bothering a person, precisely because we count trivialities. The trivialities that we count are not the worries -- just a substitute for them. Substitutions like this make worries more manageable in some ways, at least. So, the obsession is an attempt to master a problem; but the problem is really strong.