OCD Reflections

With tempting and shiny promises of "just one more step...and then another..." OCD lures me on down its path of "sacrifice for the sake of sacrifice."  Often refusal or resistance to doing exposure seems to be equated with an unwillingness to tolerate discomfort in the area of life that OCD affects.  Sometimes I squirm under under this assumption.  I want to say, "Wait, but being able to tolerate discomfort is what I pride myself on - my ability to force myself to do things when I really, really don't want to do them, especially things like compulsions.  Yes, compulsions can make things seem 'right.'  But often I really, really just don't want to do them, and yet I feel like I 'should' or 'have to' and I do them anyway despite the inconvenience they cause, despite their extremely onerous nature, and despite all the time and sacrifice they require.  I do this not so much because I don't want to deal with the discomfort...

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...

I'm about a week and a half into my intensive therapy program and I am feeling tired .  There are things I would like to write about but I've been kind of exhausted as of late and also haven't had that much time to just sit, reflect, and write.  However, hopefully I will have time for all that again soon...in between all the home visits, therapy sessions, and exposure homework.  It's going well, but I think that constantly feeling "off" and slightly anxious exhausts me more easily than I expected or am used to.  Just as I start to adjust and get comfortable, it's always time for my next session, time to climb the next stretch up the hierarchy of the many challenges ahead of me. I'm still here.  Just spending more time than ever battling my OCD.  I'll keep chugging along and hope to have more time and energy to write here and comment on others' blogs soon!

UGH. UGH. UGH.  I hate how OCD can lead me to rage almost instantaneously sometimes.  Of course that rage is misdirected.  I should be getting mad at the OCD, but instead I get mad at the person who unknowingly got between me and my compulsive avoidance.  When I take out the trash, I avoid touching door handles.  Before getting the trash ready to go, I go downstairs and unlock and open the door so that I won't have to touch the door handle with my contaminated trash hands when I actually carry the garbage out of our house.  I did this as usual after doing my regimen of exposures that I have started attempting daily as part of my new intensive CBT program.  So downstairs I went, passing the girlfriend of one of my housemate's along the way.  As I passed her I thought, "She better not have closed the door!  I opened it for a very specific and deliberate reason..." And of course, like most normal people would probably do when they see an ope...

Whew!!  Clearly I am not used to having daily commitments because I feel super busy keeping up with my daily therapy appointments.  OCD is used to having all the time it wants, just about anytime it wants, and that's beginning to change.  Sorry OCD, don't have as much flexibility in scheduling to allow my entire life to revolve around your whims... I've been meaning to recap days #2, 3, and now #4, so here goes: Day #2:  The Protective Shield of Novelty Begins to Wear Off My second day of intense CBT treatment began with me waking up in a state of confusion, which I wrote about here .  The novelty and exhilaration of breaking all the rules had worn off considerably and I was left to face the reality of the consequences of my actions.   But I survived despite the fact that I felt really "off" and like I needed to somehow undo all the exposures that had taken place the day before.  I didn't do any "undoing" and I went on to get up and go about m...

This morning, I woke up not knowing how to proceed.  I was overwhelmed by the feeling of being "off," of not knowing exactly how I had violated all my rules and how to compulsively solve them.  Normally my solution to this problem is to mentally and physically wipe the slate clean by taking a shower and washing whatever I am wearing.  In my mind, showering washes away whatever OCD transgressions I committed so that I don't have to sit there in vain, trying to remember each an every one.  I can let go if I can just shower, and condemn whatever I am wearing to the dirty laundry.  It's my mental restart button, and it seems to reset my life and my ability to discern what is clean v. dirty. Once I am myself "clean" it is easier to think clearly and start fresh.  I feel like the world has been returned to its "right" state at that point.  I feel like "myself" once I have performed these compulsions and I feel "clean enough" to go...

Well, it's that time.  Operation "Destroy My One and Only Pristine Sanctuary of Cleanliness in this Dirty, Dirty World" is well underway (go here for further explanation).  Here's a recap of day one, in my therapist's words: Touched bed with unwashed hands Stripped bed, put bedding on floor, then remade bed Dumped dirty laundry on bed Removed bedding from bay window and placed on bed Confiscated sanitizers and bag of hoarded receipts Sat on floor Briefly touched toilet seat and handle, then returned to bedroom Touched items in "condemned corner" Walked on bed in bare feet Touched clean clothes with unwashed hands, touched clean clothes to dirty clothes, touched clean clothes to floor and put away with other clean clothes Ate dried fruit with unwashed hands Touched flute with unwashed hands (esp difficult) Touched all areas of bedroom in no particular order with unclea...