Skip to main content

No Sleep...

I periodically do this thing where I decide that it's just not worth it to go to bed.  It's a bad habit, and I'm perpetuating that bad habit once again tonight.  I'm no longer in school.  The need for all-nighters has passed, and yet I still pull them, and mostly because of OCD.

This is how I ended up making the decision tonight:  I have an appointment at 8am.  Before I go to that appointment I'd like to shower, which means that, even though I have gotten my shower time down to under 30 minutes, I should probably be sure to be up and about by about 5:30 to make time for all the other OCD shenanigans that usually end up taking place before/after my shower and while I get ready.  That way I can be ready to leave by about 7:00/7:15 for my 8am appointment.  Woo.

Still not really a reason to stay up all night, right?  Well, there's more.  I woke up late today and had to head out to my office session without showering, which is something I like to before leaving the house for any reason.  This means that once I got back, I had no time limit, no hour that I had to shower by, because I didn't have to be anywhere.  And because I have grown to dislike showering so strongly, I just put it off and put it off and put it off, along with all the other activities that I felt like I couldn't tackle til after showering.  So as it gets later and later, the idea of having to shower, go to bed, and immediately shower again just seems pointless and daunting.  OCD says I can't sleep in my bed unless I shower; it also says that I should shower before my morning appointment.  And I don't want to take a second shower in the morning for virtually no reason other than OCD.  So I decide not to sleep.  Because I can't lie down in my bed until I have showered, but having to shower now and then again in a few hours seems like more than I can bear.

Oh, and I forgot to mention - in order to really actually sleep,  I have to take my Seroquel.  But it's hard for me to wake up in the morning if I do take it, especially if I have to get up really early.  So taking the Seroquel seems ill-advised if I want to make it to my appointment on time in the morning AND get ready beforehand.  So even if I could lay down in my bed, I probably wouldn't be able to fall asleep...

So here I am, writing about my OCD-induced all-nighter, while kind of wishing I could just lay down to relax my muscles and rest, even if I can't sleep.

I know that I will probably regret this tomorrow.  I will be tired and when I am tired my OCD gets worse.  I am at my best when I have a fairly normal schedule and go to bed and get up in the morning at a decent hour.  It's when I let things get all out of order like this that things get harder to manage.  Day and night begin to blend together, and I begin to use compulsive activity as some sort of artificial and unhelpful substitute for the structure that I'm missing.  

So here's a goal for this next week:  I will try harder to maintain a more normal schedule each day so that I don't end up in situations like the one I am in now.  When tempted to procrastinate showering, going to bed, or getting up the morning, I will try to remember what happens when I do this - a downward spiral of compulsivity and disrupted scheduling...
Labels:

Comments

  1. Pure O CanuckNovember 13, 2010 at 12:37 PM

    There is NO WAY I could regularily go all night without sleep. I guess this is another form of avoidance hey? Damn OCD - we have to be so regimented and clever in order to fight this disorder. I get frustrated with that. I mean EVERYONE avoids things sometimes. I wish I could have that leeway.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AbigailNovember 13, 2010 at 3:10 PM

    Wow, sleep is one of my favorite parts of the day (and yes, serequel gives me wonderful help in prolonging the sleep). I agree Serequel makes it hard to wake up. Like shower-really-fast-and-still-be-almost-or-slightly-late-for-work hard to wake up. But my OCD wouldn't like me to miss a dose of medication (or something terrible might happen - what, I don't know) and I only shower every other day (because I procrastinate showers. My bed is not considered germ free, so I can still sleep by my OCD's rules for today). It's funny how many different rules OCD gives to so many people. Good luck with more sleep and un-delayed showers.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousMarch 30, 2011 at 3:27 AM

    I am up at 5 a.m. in the morning desperate to sleep but sleep will not come to me. By the way, can you sleep on the couch and then wipe it with clorox? It's one option. I so want a cure.

    ReplyDelete
  4. AnonymousJanuary 12, 2012 at 1:31 AM

    OCD why do you ruin my life,
    controling me like crazy dyke,
    because of you i get no sleep,
    damn where are those fukcin sheep,

    but seriuosly i wish i didnt have OCD 0_0

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

"Post"-OCD Life

The title of this post, I am well aware, is very much a misnomer.  OCD is still a living, breathing part of my daily existence, and always will be, to a certain degree.  However, I'm starting to feel as though I've entered a new stage in my recovery, one where I have to figure out that troubling and very confusing question:  what now? For a solid three years my goal was to tackle my OCD.  Year one started with my life falling apart shortly after I graduated from college.  School had always been my life and provided a certain amount of structure and sense of purpose.  As I started my first year of work post-college the following fall, everything seemed to fall apart as one compulsion lead to another until I was having a hard time making it through just a single day at work.  This was followed by the search for help.  I was lucky in that I relatively quickly stumbled upon the name for my disorder and found an excellent treatment provider, one w...
6 comments
Read more

Frustration with "Normal" People

Bad advice is everywhere when it comes to dealing with OCD.  Today I ran across one of those yahoo question/answer deals where someone described taking extra long showers with a great big helping of compulsive avoidance.  This person asked:  how can I make my showers more pleasant?  What can I do?  I never answer those sort of things, but as I read the answers that had been provided so far, I quickly changed my mind. The answers angered me.  And it's not the fault of those answering - they just don't know better.  Answers like "try listening to music to relax yourself," "dance in the shower," or "maybe take a bath instead so even if you don't want to touch certain parts of your body to wash them, they are at least getting a little bit clean."  These are the kind of answers that I got from the first therapist I saw when this all began.  Answers like, "Why don't you try to do some deep breathing exercises to reduce your stress?" o...
8 comments
Read more

Tired in a Good Way

I'm tired and a little down this evening as I relax after a full day of intensive treatment and then work.  I want to go to bed but I also want to get my exposure work done.  I'm dreading doing the dishes in a way that I haven't normally lately - it probably has something to do with the fact that I have been putting them off several days and have started doing some new exposures that make me feel a bit dirty to be doing them.  Other than that I need to shower - 10 minutes is the current goal.  I took a 12 minute shower the other day and a 13 minute shower this morning.  Those are the obstacles (or opportunities, I suppose) that await me before going to bed.  Last night I put off showering for so long that I ended up not sleeping in my bed and not taking my meds (which make me sleep much better than I would otherwise).  And the night before that I only got about 5 hours of sleep, so I'm a bit run-down and tired.  Mostly I just feel like there's an ...
5 comments
Read more