Wednesday, January 21, 2015
When you start designing your life around OCD
Real short post and topic today. This is something I've been thinking about a lot lately. Many of you who read the title of this post will get this right away....."Designing your life around OCD". Basically we are enabling ourselves to continue to live this way. It's finding little detours around the OCD, rather than facing the fears head on. I am very guilty of this. Although I've made a lot of progress with many of my OCD issues, I have really started designing my life around OCD. What does this mean, you ask? I will give one good example. I have the ability to work from home, so I do. I don't think my job necessarily wants me to work from home, but I am allowed to because they are typically short staffed and my work status is "casual"--meaning less than part-time. If they don't schedule me, then they don't have enough staff for the day, so they allow me to do my work from home. I decided to do this last summer, with the intention of it only being for a few months...until my OCD got better in control. But here we are in January, and I don't have any plan to stop this anytime soon. The work place is a horrible contamination trigger for me. Working in a pediatric office...sitting on office chairs, walking through hallways where people are coughing, wearing headset phones that other people wear, just being around a lot of people everyday. So many things, that I find it easier to avoid. I had to work in the office this weekend (because then they require me too) and I felt so dirty when I left each day. Just wanted to get home, hop in the shower and relax. I don't want to start feeling like that everyday again, going in to work. It's easier to work from home, and I'm able to do it..so I do. But then I am enabling myself, to allow myself to feel more comfortable. And that is not really helping me in the whole scheme of things, to get rid of this OCD. I also design my work schedule, the hours that I work, around my OCD. A little later start time, so that I have time to stop at the grocery store during non-peak time, after I drop my daughter off at school. Lots of examples that I could give. I suppose a good word for all this is still avoidance....one of the biggest OCD compulsions. What do you all think? Do you have any ways that you feel you design your life/routines around OCD?
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Excellent post, which I think you sum up by the sentence..."I find it easier to avoid." While those of us without OCD can do our best not to enable our loved ones with the disorder, we can't control how those with OCD will live their lives. I think the fact that you are so aware of it is great.........good luck as you move forward in fighting your OCD :)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Janet! I'll keep pressing forward! :)
DeleteHi Hopeless. This is an excellent insightful post. I like to think of it as a last attempt at self preservation from the ocd monster...this is exactly what I have been doing now for the last few months as my contamination ocd spirals even further into the abyss. Only, I find myself also designing my children's lives too...it's now more convenient to not sign up for more floor hockey (because of course people bleed in that sport and I am tired of panicking and compulsively cleaning his shoes, stick, etc). And forget ballet. Have you ever seen a ballerina's feet all bloody from point...and they are constantly taking their slippers off and walking on the dance floor with their bloody feet....the same floor they have my 5 yr lie on to stretch). I too will wait to drop my daughter to prek late so to avoid the crowds of people rushing the school and to hide my ocd rituals ftom them or avoid the uncomfortable hugs and handshakes other mothers approach me with. I have actually now become extremely agoraphobic the last 3 months. I fear that if my children miss the bus, they will have to stay home the day as I can't imagine driving them in. I avoid getting the mail...it will sit in our mailbox for weeks until the mailman rings our bell to threaten to return it all. In an embarrassing moment I blurted out that I had been too sick to clear it daily and he took that as was battling cancer. How I wish ocd wasn't so stigmatized because I am sick of living in disguise and always being made to feel weird when I am the only parent at my child's school holiday celebration that washes her hands after cleaning up and before cleaning up and during cleaning up. I hate the awkwardness of making up lies why I won't hug an acquaintance who approaches me with open arms and whom I make feel rejected. So, I have learned to avoid going places which has caused and positively reinforced my new agoraphobia AND like you, I have learned to design my life around ocd. This medical condition is so cruel.
ReplyDeleteHi anonymous, thanks for your comment. Sounds like we have ALOT in common....I have a lot of anonymous posters on here, have you commented before? You bring up a very good point in your comment. I hate to admit it too, and sometimes I am in denial about how much this is is a problem...but I too, am very guilty of designing my daughters life around my OCD too. Last summer she hardly ever left the house. I had her drop out of Girl Scouts which was really the only activity she had been involved in. She used to do dance, but dropped out of that for reasons unrelated to OCD. She used to sing in the choir at school, but then I felt that was too much close contact with other kids, and she didn't like it much anyway, so I allowed her to drop out. She does violin at school right now and I did not let her participate in their winter concert because I didn't want to sit in an auditorium full of people, and risk people brushing up against me, hugging family members that were there, and being coughed or sneezed on by others around me. She is in middle school now, but she was in elementary I stopped volunteering at her school, and meeting her for lunch there, as well as stopped participating in school parties because it was all too much for me. It pains me so deeply that this affects her life so much. You are absolutely right. OCD is a monster. And I am so, so deeply sorry that is wreaking havoc on you and your family as well. Are you receiving any treatment right now? You say that you are spiraling down further. I know that feeling. I was spiraling down into my rock bottom about a year ago. I am starting to come out of it, but I know that this will always affect me. I just don't see a way to get out of this deep OCD a lot of the time.
ReplyDeleteHi Hopeful. Yes I left one previous comment regarding my husband being at the end of his rope with my OCD. Just like you, my marriage has been in trouble well before the contamination ocd monster arrived. We are both professionals and are both very strong willed, so my ocd presents a unique twist to the relationship in that he is constantly feeling like I am having the upper hand in this relationship by trying to control everyone's activites. He must abide by my ocd "rules" in order to avoid setting me off, which means unbelievable arguing and swearing and me having an ocd meltdown via hours of washing/cleaning the entire house to undue the contamination. It makes me angry that his disregard to one simple matter, ruins my joy for absolute hours trying to quell the anxiety (via washing) caused by his disobedience. It is mentally and physically exhausting to keep up the rituals. And when I appear to have a "good" day....meaning I didn't outwardly freak out in front of anyone, he thinks that's his green light to start living normal. I can never catch a mindful moment from him. He is type A and cannot stay home or sit still...always needs to be on the go. I totally understand and actually cry reading about how u dropped out of being involved in your daughter's life via school volunteering etc. I have done the same. I have missed every holiday party and event since just before this Thanksgiving. It doesn't help when my husband adds to the guilt by saying thr kids just want a normal mommy or the best is when he says that the family would be better off without me.....yet the next breath he says he loves me. I actually resent him now but am so dependent on him for our basic needs....grocery shopping, getting the kids places, going to the required school activites, etc. If i was well, I'd be out on my own for sure. You asked about treatment. I have been suffering contamination ocd for 6 yrs. I have never sought treatment for a couple reasons. 1) the fear of stigma and having to disclose on a job application that I had been treated for mental illness (I too am in health care and they always ask that). 2) felt like there had to be another reason for this sudden onset and that an ssri wasn't the way for me right off the bat. Plus I had some crazy hope of having more children and didn't want an ssri in my system if i got pregnant. However....I am living in hell right now. So I reached out to holistic provider a month ago and through muscle testing was found to have increased pyrroles (pyrrole disorder), depleted levels of zinc, b6, b complex, toxic copper levels, under methylation issues, wheat intolerance, salicylate intolerances, high histamines....and was placed on dietary and nutritional regimen along with treatment. My provider had successful treated ocd in others by getting their brain chemicals in balance to allow the serotonin to be generated sufficiently. I recently added inositol myself last week. I also started to try some self erp but it seems all my fears are 10s. I can't face them easily. How about you?
ReplyDeleteHey there-I just wanted to add a little to hopeful's comments. I am the one she mentioned below who sent her the info on supplements, and I find it so interesting what you have mentioned above as far as the things you are low/high in, as in my research on supplements, I came up with some very similar findings. I have pretty severe contamination issues as well (and there have been so many of hopeful's posts that I feel I could have written myself!!). No kids, so that has not been an issue/concern for me, but I did have a lot of struggles in my marriage as well before the OCD came along, and once the OCD started kicking in, it was a long downhill battle, and unfortunately, my marriage did not survive it. It still breaks my heart, as divorce is something I never imagined I would be facing, ever. While I was still married, though, I also ended up seeing a naturopath who did a hair mineral analysis on me and came up with some interesting things from that, so we did try some supplementation for a little bit, but things were getting so bad with the OCD and my marriage, that I ended up no longer able to follow up with him, and then shortly thereafter, my husband decided on divorce, and I ended up moving away to be closer to my family again. Now that I am living in a different state and smaller town, I do not really know who to go to as far as a naturopath-type doctor, so I have been doing TONS of research on my own, and what you mentioned above, the low B6, B-complex, high copper (found earlier in my hair mineral analysis) are all common links in OCD which I find highly interesting. And I love that you mentioned inositol! That is something that I just kind of stumbled on, and the more I read about it, I was amazed I had not heard of it before, and it makes me crazy that more docs aren't trying things like that with their patients!! Like you, I am highly reluctant to take medications, but I do believe it is possible to restore brain chemistry via other methods. Have patience, though, as from what I have read, it can take a year or more to correct imbalances. And because like you, I did not grow up with this (in many ways, it seemed to come on rather suddenly), I feel there has got to be a reason. I do believe other therapy is going to be absolutely necessary, but my hope is that with the supplements and other methods (eating regular, quality meals, plenty of sleep, generally taking care of myself which can be difficult when you have OCD) can help to calm my mind enough to allow therapy to work, which is really the goal of taking the medications. I would also encourage you to look into magnesium and potassium, as they also tend to be low in most everyone, and can have a calming effect on the mind, and it's almost impossible to get enough from food.
DeleteAlso, I haven't started it myself yet, but I was feeling really discouraged when it came to therapy, as for years, I have felt like I didn't really know where to go or what to do for it, but I recently came across two workbooks which have given me hope for actually being able to tackle this stuff on my own (as I don't currently have money for the kind of therapy that I need)...one is called "The Mindfulness Workbook for OCD" and the other is "The OCD Workbook". I like that they both have very detailed, step-by-step methods for doing therapy on this on your own, something that is difficult to get from just reading informational books on OCD.
DeleteMy heart breaks for you reading about your struggles with your marriage. I know, I've been there. I know what it's like to be accused of manipulating things, of having to control everything, even after pleading desperately with them that it is not that way at all, it is just so hard dealing with this, and it is a sickness. It is not something I want, any more than I would want cancer or any other form of disease. When he would give in on something that was absolutely freaking me out in the worst possible way and being told that he felt like I was just having a tantrum because I couldn't get my way, when for me it felt like absolute survival, like I wouldn't survive what it was he was wanting to do. That is not winning. That is not getting my way. None of that was my way. It is the most awful form of hell and self-imposed torture imaginable, and it is a terrible thing to basically feel abandoned by your spouse. I have many times said (and felt) that it would be easier if it was an actual physical illness, but that is easier for people to understand, relate to and feel compassion for, but OCD is something you cannot possibly understand unless you've lived it. So take heart, you are not in this alone. I have had many conversations with hopeful and am so grateful for the chance we have had to talk some of this through, because it is so easy to feel alone, like no one in the world could possibly understand what this life is like. But you are not alone, and I really believe we can figure out a way to beat this thing eventually!! Robin
Hi there again anonymous! So, I'm just trying to look back as I've had a few commenters write about their spouses recently. Are you the one whose husband threatens you and/or the one who you said "my 7 year old has more insight into the disorder than my husband does". Just trying to figure out some background information! Anyways, wow...hearing some of the issues in your marriage really resonates with my marriage too. My hubby and I are both very much type A and stubborn and strong willed, so we have actually this conversation before too. He often tells me that he has to "live by my rules", and I get the same feeling that whenever I have a better day, he seems to think that my OCD has somehow turned a corner and I'm starting to come out of it or something. My hubby is very much on the go too, and can't sit still. He is gone often, and he does not like to communicate in general, especially about the OCD...so I don't know he expects things to change in regard to him, when he is not willing to talk about it. I feel really angry at my husband too, and there is high high walls of resentment there. I just hoped that he would be more of an encouragement to me. A motivator or cheerleader. Someone to stand by my and recognize when I make accomplishments...instead of focusing on the things I can't do. I don't know if you feel the same way, but I feel like my husband only mentions the OCD when it affects him in some way. It's like it doesn't matter how it affects me otherwise. He rarely acknowledges any progress I do make, but blows up sometimes when I do have problems. So, you are in the health care field. What is your job? Are you able to work right now, or you are pretty much at home due to the OCD? I guess I didn't realize that you have to disclose on a job application if you have been treated for mental illness? You don't have to tell me exactly where you live, but general whereabouts? I have been in the same job for almost 15 years, so I wonder if that has changed?
ReplyDelete(This is part 2, it wouldn't let me fit everything into one comment!!)
ReplyDeleteI also fear the stigma associated with mental illness. That is very interesting what your holistic provider told you. I met another friend on this blog (who I now associate with outside the blog) who shared a bunch of information regarding supplements with me. I think the inositol sounds very familiar. I find it odd too, that we didn't have this disorder as children. I have done so much research on OCD, and I have read oftentimes that emotional trauma (such as marriage distress) could be the trigger for OCD. But ultimately if we have OCD we do have a genetic predisposition to it. I feel like I try to take better care of myself, but when you are living with OCD and stuck in that cycle with depression, it gets so hard. The self ERP has really helped me a lot so far though. If you would like more information on how I got started on that, and what I did, I would be happy to share with you. In fact, if you would like to e-mail outside of this, let me know and we can exchange e-mail addresses. I thought my fears were all 10's too...and I think that the thought of ERP treatment is terrifying....but so is the thought of living with OCD for the rest of our lives too. In a nutshell I looked at all my problems and thought if I absolutely have to face one of these first, what would it be. I started one place and I started checking things off the list. If you would have told me a year ago that I would have stopped many of these rituals, I never would have believed it. I promise you that it is not as bad as you think. I move at a snails pace, because many of the things I don't want to face. I think I would do better with a professional, but I just can't do it right now either. Many of the things I thought I would have a terrible time facing, really werent' that bad after I did them. And then it was an afterthought that I realized, they probably weren't a 10 to begin with. I don't think it gets any easier to face. I think as long as we are stuck in this cycle, it becomes more ingrained in our brain and gets harder to imagine stopping them. But then I think of debilitating home bound OCD sufferers, and I can not let that happen. I think of my daughter, and she is my biggest motivator to get better. I want to live a more normal life so that she doesn't get caught up in these patterns too. She doesn't have OCD, but she is definitely more aware of germs and things than she should be at her age. And honestly sometimes I feel like I have brainwashed her to a certain extent, and that tears me up inside. I would really like to stay in contact with you. I hope to hear from you soon.
Hi Hopeful + Anon:
ReplyDeleteGwen here - I've been thinking a lot about separation. I feel like I need to live alone and to have my own space. I feel he triggers my OCD so much - he tries hard to do things "my" way - but I know logically it is not possible for him to fully understand.
Have either of you/other readers felt better after living apart?
HI Gwen! I can't really offer any advice on living apart from my husband, because we have continued to reside in the same home. We have never lived apart during our marriage. Don't get me wrong--I often think about how much easier it would be with the OCD, as my husband is my biggest trigger. There is definitely some emotional contamination going on with him too, in addition to the classic contamination that I have. I am planning to post in the next couple of days specifically about that emotional contamination and what I feel is going to happen in our marriage, so please come back and visit for that update. In a nutshell, I can say that I feel much better when he is gone. I spend most of my time anymore protecting my space at home. I am unable to leave the house when he is here, because I am worried what he will touch or get into. It has really affected my happiness, because I have a lot of resentment toward him because of all of this. On top of this he has a lot of anger which feeds the disconnection and the OCD and I don't see how this will ever stop. I think when our spouses are big triggers, it limits so much freedom for both people. Both people feel like they are living in a prison, and there is no way out. Some marriages can get through this with communication. My marriage has suffered immensely from the OCD, and it sounds like you are at your wit's end as well. Again, I will get into much more detail about this in my upcoming post! And your sentence about them never fully understanding....you are exactly right. They never will understand, and that is what makes it so so difficult. :(
DeleteHi Gwen-I will admit that is a difficult question to answer. There were a couple times in my marriage that we were living apart due to my contamination issues and because I was cleaning the house for hours at a time at that point (frequently going all night long into the next day even), and he went to live with friends because it was just too hard. Then, the several months before our divorce we were living apart, again for the same reason, and he just decided he was done. It is really a double-edged sword. Living apart/alone is more peaceful, as it can give you the space to try to quiet down some of the triggers/ compulsions. But it also works to just separate you even further, and for a marriage that is already rocky, that is really dangerous territory, as you get used to living alone, and HE gets used to living alone and basically living as a single guy, and it becomes just about impossible to come back from that. I didn't want the divorce, he did, but we were in very different places at that point. He had been living on his own (with our friends), was very angry at me because of everything that had happened with the OCD and all, and he just reached that point where he was done, and had no interest in even getting back to that place where we could try to live together again. Of course, since you have children, that becomes a much more difficult situation, as you would need to decide whether they would live with you or not or whether you would want some time just living on your own to try to deal with the OCD.
DeleteHonestly, if there is any chance of saving your marriage, I would highly recommend against it. However, one idea might be that if there is somewhere you could go for a short time (like an intensive treatment clinic or similar) to be on your own with the idea of getting intensive therapy, that would be a way to kind of have your space for a bit so to speak with the goal of getting help so that you can come back and then be able to focus more on healing your marriage (ideally with a counselor who is familiar with OCD and how it affects relationships, although I realize those are hard to come by, especially depending on where you live).
Robin
Hi Robin, Hopeful:
ReplyDeleteGwen here -
We spent the last weekend apart. He has been trying his best to do what he can to help me - ultimately, he knows and I know that my OCD was directly triggered by him and in many ways I wonder if I am (subconsciously) trying to punish him for his wrongdoings. I'm punishing him and I'm punishing myself because I was stupid enough to fall for him. No matter what he does now, theres a part of me that will never get over the wrongs he caused me.
I had 2 days to myself and all I did was clean. I cleaned his washroom for 8 hours straight until I almost passed out. It still bugged me so I cleaned it again and again. My OCD is to the point where Im so exhausted that I cannot keep up, but if I dont do it, things just dont seem right. My brain wont let me function normally. I cant sleep or eat or work until things are "perfect".
The minute he touches anything, I get so resentful because I feel he does things to hurt me so I have to clean. and when I mean clean - it isnt just clean up that object - it means start from Point A and clean the entire house (hours and hours) - and anything that touches me or I touch, I have to reclean.
Sigh....
Oh Gwen...I am so sorry. This honestly sounds so like me. (and I apologize for not responding sooner, I have not been able to successfully subscribe to comments to I have to just remember to come back on and check for responses). Anyway, yes, the cleaning for hours and hours on end is something I have had a HUGE problem with. At its worst point, I would actually go for upwards of 24 hours (and a few times even longer, like 36 and once even almost 48 hours) straight. And I mean straight. I would start in the morning, go all day, then through the night and finally be "done" the next day. I was barely eating during those times (for a variety of reasons, including not wanting to stop what I was doing but also because the kitchen felt dirty because that's where I was washing my hands but at the same time I didn't want to make anything else dirtier by making something to eat so it was easier to just keeping pushing on and not eat, so crazy!!), and not sleeping, because I had to have the house completely clean before I could carefully peel off my dirty socks, carefully get in the shower and then finally fall into bed, knowing that I was clean and the house was completely clean. And I would do this 3-4 times a week. It was truly awful. And yes, the whole thing about "anything that touches me or I touch I have to reclean", yes! It's like sometimes I don't know what I'm more worried about-me making something else dirty, or that item making me dirty! Because once I start cleaning, I feel icky from head to toe. Throughout the cleaning process, I would wash hands up to my elbows so that I could feel like my hands were clean, but if I brushed up against anything with any other part of my body, it was like I was making that thing dirty again. It's all just so crazy, and there was a several-month period that I was doing that. We had 2 cats at the time, and they were such a huge trigger for me that I finally had to find them a new home so that I could calm some of that down. Since then, I have done a better job with managing the housecleaning so that I am not going all night long with it, but I think that is going to be a huge part of my therapy is learning how to clean the house but doing it in a way that is not perfect and learning how to be okay with it. My heart really goes out to you, as it seems like even a lot of people with contamination issues even don't necessarily spend as much time excessively cleaning as I (and you) do.
DeleteRobin