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Oh, I'd be gone. I've wallowed in that possibility for a long time. It would be really hard, though, and I'd probably go straight back to dating like four guys at once. The EMDR guy said that we could treat the whole psycho possessive ex relationship as a trauma, especially since I completely spaz out if Michael uses phrasing that reminds me of him or something.
It's like...I was trying to explain it to Michael. I'm not constantly comparing the two of them. It's that I'm terrified of Psycho, and I guess on some level I feel like he's going to come back to get me through the people who are close to me.
Edit: What's funny is that I have his credit card information and home address. And I'm still convinced sometimes that he doesn't actually live there, or that....secret double life.
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But do you recognize it as paranoid behavior, or do you logically dismiss the notion of the double life even though emotionally it worries you?
Posts: 5462 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Depends. Sometimes I'm like, this is a silly, paranoid fear. And then I'm fine.
But especially when I don't get to talk to him for a while, especially if he says he'll call and he gets too busy to do so, then I start wondering. What if?
And of course, it's even worse if he uses the same phrasing as Psycho when talking about something. He did that last week...it was just...the way he said something, one key phrase, and I completely lost my mind. It was the worst feeling in the world. It was like the psycho was back, reincarnated. Or channelling. Or something. It was awful. I cried and cried...and I felt so terrible for crying and for getting so angry with him, I mean, he did give me reason to be angry, but not....as utterly distraught as I was.
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Good luck! Try remembering how hard he is working and how much love and support he needs when he finally gets a few minutes off.
Try focusing on him and the things he is going through and what he has to deal with. Try making that better however you can. Maybe it will distract you from your own worries.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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But that's the thing...he doesn't even talk about it much. Even when something happens that I know is really hurting him, he doesn't react to it. At all. So I make him lunches (because he doesn't eat, like, anything at work...and stew out of a vending machine isn't food)...but it's like, I don't know. I sometimes wonder if the burden of dating me gets to him, except that whenever I think I've totally crossed the line, he always tells me that it's okay, he's not mad.
I mean, allow me to explain why this is only my second serious relationship...
Dating me is hard. I know this. Because I'm really nice, I really am, but...I have all these eccentricities. Like if there's a roach in my house, I have to drop a heavy object on it, and then I can't touch the object or the roach until someone comes to throw them away and clean the floor for me. Because of the GERMS. And when I get anxious, I call compulsively. And I insist on being able to hang out with guys one-on-one, in what any other situation might be seen as a date. And also, I feel like I can't decide if I'm...like, I find it difficult to think about the future (he doesn't bring it up; he's not the pushy type, but my shrink does)...because I'm afraid that I'll start feeling trapped. And when I feel trapped, I feel all this pressure in the relationship, and it's bad.
I mean, on one hand, I'm a really thoughtful, sweet girlfriend. On the other hand, I have really bad OCD. And to tell you the truth, he's the first guy who hasn't tried to turn it into a contest of who's crazier...or who hasn't tried to "fix" me, like somehow I'm some bargain run-down house that he can fix up until it's everything he dreamed of. He tries to help. He likes to help. Help, not fix. Not tell me what to do.
Gah. I'm just very much spazzing out. And it bothers me that I haven't met his parents; it contributes to the secret double life theory. I was hoping his mom could take care of Count Elmer if we ended up going on our trip. Maybe he can just give me her cell number or something. I just really do need to meet her and see their house. Because what if he's secretly got like a family or something, or he lives with a stripper, or....in a cardboard box?
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What if he lives with a family of strippers, in a really big cardboard box?
Honestly, though, I've never gotten the impression that you're driving him crazy with all your, ahem, eccentricities. So I wouldn't stress it. I know that you don't totally have control over whether you do, but to the extent that you can control it, I would be secure in the knowledge that he's a good guy and your relationship is on solid ground.
Posts: 5462 | Registered: Apr 2005
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But what if I'm not driving him crazy because he has someone else to not drive him crazy? If that makes sense....
I dunno. I just wonder sometimes if his work timelines jive with what I look up about the whole space shuttle thing. But...I do think I read something about them needing the tank ready like this week, so I guess it makes sense for him to be sleeping in his car in their parking lot for like an hour at a time all weekend.
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I have to admit that I'm not thrilled by the idea that people doing crucial, detail-oriented work on the space shuttle aren't getting enough sleep and are napping in their cars.
I'd rather they launched late with numbers produced by well-rested individuals, frankly.
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pH, you have to trust him. If you love someone, you have to trust them! Your distrust is eating away the relationship you wish to preserve.
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How long is an "extended period of time"? What would be a rational time to expect to hear from him, and what is too much?
Posts: 1522 | Registered: Nov 2005
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Like, I was completely freaking out when he went to Arizona or New Mexico or whatever the crap cactus place and could only talk to me for about fifteen minutes in an entire week. But at the same time, he'd told me that that would happen.
What gets me is when he says he's going to call and doesn't. Or when he doesn't say anything at all. So right now, it's both. And I think it's weird to not hear anything from him for two days.
Especially when we were supposed to meet his parents this morning.
Have you talked to him about the whole "not calling" thing? Different people have different ideas about how much communication is necessary. My boyfriend used to be the same way until finally I told him that if I went 24 hours without hearing from him, I would implode into an anxious ball of fluff. Maybe your guy is just the kind that likes alittle more space or maybe he hasn't clued in on how much communication you need.
If you're in New Orleans, we should hang out. My boyfriend is moving there sometime in August and I'll probably be staying with him for the occasional holiday and long weekend.
This has been such an amazing read. My only exposure to OCD comes from Dateline specials and the like. About two years ago, I went through a bad time of depression. Didn't sleep, didn't eat, didn't go to school. About that time I became pretty paranoid and that widened the gap that held back my anxiety. I got over my depression with therapy, alittle medication, and a housing change (my old roommates were the worst bunch of backstabbers.) Unfortunately, my anxiety hung around. The worst part about the anxiety is that it causes irrational behavior as it builds. I've always been a counter and when I'm stressed I'll count by touching each finger to my thumb. The more stressed I am, the longer I'll do it, building more and more complex patterns and I can't stop until it "feels" equal which is unfortunately never, simply because of the pattern I use. I remember getting into a fight with my boyfriend one night and being so out of my mind that I walked around the room in a daze touching each wall, around and around until I had done it right. But I think the worse is the whole notion of doing things to prevent "bad things" from happening. I have this philosophy that the worst things in life are unexpected, so if I can think of everything bad that can go wrong, it won't happen. Every morning during my drive to school I would imagine gas leaks, fires, busted water pipes, robbers, and anything bad that would happen to my apartment. And I'd do it for everything. Before I went to the store, before I went out with friends, etc. When the bad things I imagined didn't happen it was like affirmation of my behavior. And when bad things did happen, I felt guilty because I hadn't been thorough enough in my thoughts. It was like a constant state of punishment.
Thankfully, by managing my stress early and heading off the majority of my anxiety, I can keep most of my irrational behavior at bay. I still finger count when I'm tired and I still imagine bad scenarios, but it doesn't consume my life and I'm learning to discount my irrational "knowledge." My biggest battle will be writing my thesis this year while maintaining a long-distance relationship. Since school and my boyfriend are two of my five biggest anxiety set-ups, I'm not sure how well I'm gonna cope but I've already got some strategies and plans in place to help.
I think its amazing how well you function despite your challenges. You're in school, you're in a relationship (which is good despite its kinks), and you're doing what you can to improve the state of your condition. Its inspiring and educational to hear your story!
Posts: 1733 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:When the bad things I imagined didn't happen it was like affirmation of my behavior. And when bad things did happen, I felt guilty because I hadn't been thorough enough in my thoughts. It was like a constant state of punishment.
That is EXACTLY how it feels. And I have talked to him about not calling, and he tries to be good about it. But he's at work so much that usually, he's calling from work, so I guess that limits when he can get in touch. He hasn't even logged into Myspace since Friday, and he'll do that if he has like thirty seconds free, so I guess he's really busy. He did call Friday evening though, around his "lunch" time, because I'd asked him earlier in the day to do that and mentioned that he hadn't been doing so. What's worse is when I start getting relatinship-related rituals, which get worse the longer we're out of contact. I remember when I was fourteen, right before I stopped speaking completely, I had this boyfriend (you know, the "oh, we held hands!" kind of boyfriend you have around that age...and my first kiss!)...I would start, if I was walking and had to turn in one direction or another, I had to spin in clockwise circles a certain number of times, which somehow related to if/when he called and how long we were going to stay together. I ended up breaking up with him after 8 days, but still.
I do a bit of that now. And I have trouble talking about the good parts of our relationship or our vacation plans because I feel that if I talk about them, they won't happen.
I think that lowering the general anxiety level might be the best thing. I'm a lot better than I was a year ago. I'm not sure what made it happen. I mean, I used to swear up and down to my shrink (even after he put me in the hospital) that there really WERE demons in my head because I couldn't possibly be thinking such thoughts. And I was so concerned that my rituals were going to affect the afterlife for me and those I knew. I don't know what happened. Maybe something just snapped in my head. It still bothers me every once in a while, but for the most part...my focus has changed. I don't actively address the concept of the afterlife in the same way. It's like, all of a sudden, I just felt like...first of all, I've already lived in my own personal hell for quite some time, and secondly, I think a carrot/stick focus when it comes to faith is completely counterproductive.
Maybe that's one of the reasons I'm so interested in philosophy and ethics.
Good luck with your relationship! Long distance can be tough, but we can definitely hang out when you're in town. And if you want to talk about our various anxieties sometime, let me know. Thanks so much for the encouragement.
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Some of my friends have worked for NASA and NASA related companies. One of my roomies in college did and still does something with satellites (she's on the black side so does not discuss work more than that). What I learned from her is that normal schedules are a joke. If they need you at 2am, you are there at 2am. If I didn' see her for a week, well, that was normal. And calling from work is always awkward. People who have my work number understand that they are not supposed to actually use it.
Posts: 1001 | Registered: Mar 2006
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I've spent most of the day in this weird, half-asleep state. Where you're lying down with your eyes closed, but vaguely aware of your surroundings, and you start to have dreams that you can control to a certain degree.
I know I'm just avoiding the issue, but I can't really confront the issue when...I can't get ahold of him. When I can talk to him, okay. When he hasn't spoken to me since Friday evening...I'll just sleep.
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So I did finally get to talk to him, and he was completely surprised to hear that I thought he was never going to speak to me again. And that, since pretty much everything I have to do outside the house involves our vacation on some level, I didn't do anything all weekend because I was afraid that if I did, he would just not speak to me for a while, then finally call me back and tell me to go [bleep] myself and never see me again.
I really do fear that's going to happen at some point. I mean, the psycho broke up with me ON the day we'd been together four months...while I was driving him to the Oakenfold show for which I'd gotten us on the guestlist. And he didn't understand why I didn't want to go to the show after he told me. He's the only person who's ever broken up with me. I know most people get dumped at least once in their lives, but it was just so out of the blue...is it usually out of the blue like that?
So anyway, the point is that I worry, when I don't talk to my boyfriend for a while, that he's woken up one morning at decided he doesn't want to be with me anymore. Despite his claims that he doesn't "work that way." I mean, for all I know, he could dump my ass in Mexico. Or right when we get back.
I should not be awake this early. I require Burger King, stat.
quote:I've spent most of the day in this weird, half-asleep state. Where you're lying down with your eyes closed, but vaguely aware of your surroundings, and you start to have dreams that you can control to a certain degree.
I love that. Great fun. One of the only ways you can fly, and really just enjoy unlimited freedom. I also get it sometimes in the middle of normal dreams, when I suddenly realise it's a dream, but don't wake up. On the other hand I also get sleep paralysis, which if any of you have ever suffered from, you'll know is really really shit. It's when you're half asleep, and start to wake up, but your muscles are still 'deactivated' like when you're dreaming. So you're essentially paralysed. I tend to get it when I'm exhausted and trying to sleep somewhere uncomfortable like a bus seat, often with a crick in my neck, and it's indescribably awful, you can't do anything, you just want to shout out to someone "Help me! Move me! I'm going to die!" but all I can ever control is my breathing rate. Which doesn't do anything.
I do have a question though. Not one that you'll be likely to actually give an authorative answer on; but you'd certainly be in a position where you'd have some special insight.
I have a good friend who has some OCD, now it's not as strong as yours, or at least he hasn't been that open yet, and he is very good at 'passing' as he calls it, without anyone having a clue what he is putting up with. He and I also share a sense of humour that is, essentially, no-holds barred. The only things that we find offensive are things that are actually offensive, through intention, or revelation of certain attitudes that are offensive in themselves. Thus we make what some people would consider as being edgy jokes. And they are funny. He's also a very, very controlled person. Logical, precise, and etc. Unlike me who's all over the place in most respects, but by choice, since I hate the idea of actually not being in control.
That's background. What I'm wondering is two-fold. Firstly, where would you feel joking about the condition ends, and rudeness begins. I'd avoid actually chucking a handful of dirt at him, because that's about the only thing that I can think he'd actually react badly to, but apart from that it all seems ok. He's a hard guy to offend. As far as I know. But for example I riff on things like how long he spends in the shower, that he won't leave the house without showering, that he's too 'wimpish' to jump in dirt, that voices in his head control him Like A Robot, or other related things. These are funny from my perspective, and he laughs, and makes his own controversial jokes, but is there a secret line I'm crossing?
Secondly, and much more relevant, since the first question would depend immensely on his personality, but this one less so. He's a very controlled person, but he still does all these things (it's cleanliness for him rather than anything else). Now I have an almost pathological dislike of being 'irrational' or 'out of control', I make sure I don't fall into any avoidable traps, and I have with other friends, for example, helped them overcome a stupidly paranoid fear of fire. (She'd never lit a lighter before, and excluding a brief moment when I set her jumper on fire mildly, she's now A-Ok with all aspects of it, to the level of being able to ignite lighter gas trapped in her hand as a mini-fireball. She still won't fire-breathe though). And I've talked a lot with him about various things, and suggested some times that he should 'resist' or just see if he can not do it. Now I accept (though it seems so... frustrating) that in full blown OCD there's just no way to resist, but he's never been diagnosed, and controls all outward symptoms, and I'm interested to see if he could. But he isn't. He just can't be bothered. And if I push the issue (we're good friends) he becomes adamant, then starts being funny (as in amusing). Which derails the conversation. So, is this an attitude you recognise. If it is, is it becauseperhaps, what I said is something everyone says, which he's tried, failed and doesn't want to bother with again? Am I crossing some invisible boundaries here? Is there a chance I'm making him feel bad by suggesting he try to resist (remember, he doesn't neccesarily have it, though it sounds much like it, he may just be on the pathway there) when he can't? I know that I'm on the same spectrum for this sort of thing, but way up the line, and where things have become 'habitual', 'obsessive' or 'ritualistic' and illogical, I've resisted, and they've faded. Which is an absolute possibility in mild cases. Am I being deeply insensitive?
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Those are some really good questions. The joking really depends on the person. I, personally, am offended when, say, mental illness is misrepresented in the media (like that movie Me, Myself, and Irene, which showed schizophrenia as a multiple personality disorder).
As to the second, here's the thing. You say:
quote:He's a very controlled person, but he still does all these things (it's cleanliness for him rather than anything else). Now I have an almost pathological dislike of being 'irrational' or 'out of control',
What you need to realize about OCD is that it's an issue with the desire for control. In other words, you want to control your surroundings, and you need to have things "this way." It's a way of exerting control. People who have OCD are very, very disciplined. It's sort of a contradiction. You don't have a lot of control over the rituals, but in performing the rituals, you feel that you're gaining control over some other element of the world.
OCD also causes a lot of shame. I kept mine entirely hidden for six years because I didn't know what was wrong with me, and I was afraid that people would thnk I was weak or crazy. Y'see, people with OCD are generally perfectionists and pride themselves on the appearance of control, and most of them are really ashamed of what they do, ESPECIALLY if they haven't been diagnosed and don't have any experts around to tell them that what they're doing isn't insane. And the thing is, I've found (and my current therapists/doctors recommend) that reducing the general level of anxiety is often much, much more useful in reducing the overall severity of the rituals/compulsions than addressing an individual ritual by itself. On top of that, suggesting that he just resist could be causing more shame and make him even less likely to seek help. People with OCD can be a handful for doctors to begin with; we're some of the least likely people to stay on medication because we resent the idea that we can't make ourselves better. So I'd say yeah, maybe you should back off a little because believe me, if he could stop, chances are that he would.
And it's not uncommon to control rituals a lot in public. I've kept mine hidden to the point that there are people who've known me for a while who wouldn't believe me if I told them about it. Sometimes you can perform rituals in public that look pretty innocuous, like blinking or tapping, which help to reduce anxiety without "outing" you as having OCD. But if you notice this kind of thing, don't mention it to him. He'll probably get really embarassed. At least, that's what happened to me, especially before I saw a doctor.
Does that help? There are some books I've been reading that have been pretty good for understanding it, too.
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Hey pH, I don't know a whole lot about the world and it's situations, certainly can't fathom how hard this must be for you. I do have an idea though, if you haven't already come across it. Way back you mentioned that you were going to try writing down all of your rituals, and it seems to me like that's a good idea. Have you ever considered concentrating on writing as a means of controlling your OCD? Take your frustrations and random thoughts and set them into a tangible form; something you can control. Notice a new ritual? Write it down, and try to be concious of it the next time yo udo it. Again, I have ZERO medical background and no credibility whatsoever, so take this with a grain of salt. I really like what you've done with your forum posts here. And it sure seems to me that you have a supportive community of people here rooting for you. Keep up the posts! You're doing great!
Posts: 97 | Registered: Jul 2006
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kaminari, I've noticed that it helps a lot just to get it out in the open. Well, sort of the open. I don't think I'd be comfortable doing a ritual in front of anyone, but...it helps just to mention it. I'm getting to the point that...I don't know if "control" is the right word for what I want to do. Maybe "direct." Or "focus." Because I do think that to a certain extent, OCD has been beneficial to me. Sort of. I mean, I learn things very, very quickly, and I think that's a function of intuition. And I kind of feel that OCD is intuition gone terribly awry, which is maybe why I felt so strange and "wrong" when I was on certain medications (especially SSRIs). But I do still need to make that list. I've been putting it off; I think I'm a little afraid of seeing it in a tangible form. That's been an issue with me for a while though; I've had trouble writing/saying certain things in case that somehow made them "real."
At least today, I got some validation for the hell of high school. My therapist pretty much said, "You're not paranoid if they're really out to get you." 'cause y'see, the shrink at my high school (to whom I was dragged against my will) declared me paranoid...and apparently, too self-absorbed because clearly, it was absolutely ludicrous for me to believe that the administration was picking on me (which my parents and therapist completely believe, so I guess they're paranoid too) or that they had meetings about me...despite the fact that a teacher had accidentally sent an email concerning said meetings to ME instead of to the guidance counselor. Or "dean of students," or whatever she was called. I think that contributed a lot to my supposedly being out of touch with reality. I mean, I'm not going to deny that I'm probably pretty out of touch, but it's kind of hard to figure out what's real and what isn't when you have people denying the existence of cold, hard evidence.
Anyways. The point is, I'm not paranoid. And it felt really good to hear someone agree with me on this (my parents had never come out and said it to me, but apparently they told her about it because she's the one who brought it up). And it also felt good to hear someone agree with me on this whole school shooting crap.
quote:What you need to realize about OCD is that it's an issue with the desire for control. In other words, you want to control your surroundings, and you need to have things "this way." It's a way of exerting control. People who have OCD are very, very disciplined. It's sort of a contradiction. You don't have a lot of control over the rituals, but in performing the rituals, you feel that you're gaining control over some other element of the world.
...sometimes you hear/read things that just make so much sense...
My biggest trouble, the source of all my irrational thoughts and behaviors, is a need to control the world around me. I hadn't realized it until someone pointed it out to me a year ago. When I accepted it, my whole perspective changed.
Posts: 1733 | Registered: Apr 2005
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pH, I've never had OCD, except for a few very mild symptoms, like thoughts that recur spontaneously that aren't too troublesome (every time I crossed a bridge for a while I would look down to see how far down it was, and whether there was water there or oncoming traffic or what, sort of planning for the bridge to collapse). But SSRIs made me feel very very strange, too. At first they were great, kicking me right out of the spiral of depression, but after a couple of months I began to feel less and less like myself and more and more like some robot or alien had taken over my body and I was just an observer of the scene. It grew intolerable. I can't describe how awful it was. So I quit taking them and luckily by then the depressive episode was over and I was fine without them. I've found since that as long as I uphold the four pillars of good mental health (regular exercise, regular and sufficient sleep, good nutrition, and sunshine in the optic nerve, in other words being outside for at least 1 hour daily), then I do just fine. The fifth pillar is prayer, and that's the most important for me of all. Also, I avoid any psychoactive substances like alcohol or caffeine because they adversely affect my brain chemistry.
Anyway, just wanted to let you know that you aren't the only one that can't bear SSRIs.
Do you take meds to manage the anxiety? I am curious what is available. I don't have anxiety but I know someone who does, who might benefit from them.
Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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pH: It's interesting to me to hear the ways that OCD has helped you. I don't think I've ever been told of the benefits of OCD. It's great that you recognize both sides. Good for you. I'm very impressed with your cognizance. You're far more developed in that field than I am.
Have a nice day today.
Posts: 97 | Registered: Jul 2006
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Ooh, Tatiana, I have such an issue with bridges too. I used to make plans for how I'd save myself if I went over the edge, until I had kids and realized I couldn't plan a way to save them all. Now I get very anxious and have to really distract myself to get over them, which surely isn't a good thing (to be that distracted when you're driving).
(Not trying to derail, pH; I've been following your thread with interest. I just haven't had much useful to add.)
Posts: 1522 | Registered: Nov 2005
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JennaDean, I was afraid my hyper-bridge-awareness would progress until I couldn't bring myself to cross bridges at all, and had to plot routes to various places that didn't involve bridges, which would be pretty hard to do. Luckily that never happened, and I just became less bridge-aware naturally without having to work on it. I think my brain may finally have gotten bored with those thoughts or something.
It didn't help that my state actually does a very poor job of maintaining existing bridges, and that several were discovered in an advanced state of disrepair that threatened their safety. As an engineer, I'm perhaps a bit too aware of the limitations of our technology, and how it doesn't work right unless we do certain things that we sometimes neglect to do. Posts: 6246 | Registered: Aug 2004
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Crap. I had a very long, well-thought-out post typed, and then I hit something and the browser went back and deleted it. Give me a little bit, and I'll retype it.
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Tatiana, I get really nervous around bridges, too. When I'm driving over steep ones, I worry that a wind will blow my car over the side.
As for medications, I take Wellbutrin on a daily basis. Actually, I take Wellbutrin XL and regular Wellbutrin (not sustained or extended release). It helps a lot to reduce general anxiety and improve mood. I think it's interesting that Wellbutrin is also used to help people stop smoking...I'm not sure how that works, but maybe it suggests that this particular medicine can help with habits. Doctors generally jump straight to SSRIs, and if one doesn't work, they'll just keep switching you to different SSRIs, which sometimes helps, but I think they should be more open to the possibility of other kinds of medications.
I also take ativan on an as-needed basis. Ativan is really helpful because you only need to take it when you're really anxious or upset, and it works in 20 minutes. It slightly relaxes you, sometimes makes you drowsy, and overall gives you a subtle sense of well-being. It can be habit-forming, I'm told, but I've never had a problem with that myself. It can last up to 12 hours, and a lot of times, within that time period you can figure out how to more constructively handle the issue, so when it wears off you don't get all freaked out again. It's really useful; a lot of times I have trouble doing things that I'm anxious about, even though not doing them makes me more anxious (like paying bills, finishing assignments when I really care what the professor thinks, and so forth). I had a class one semester before which I almost always took ativan because I was so, so worried that the professor would think I was stupid (he was also my advisor, and I was worried that he'd realize that I wasn't as intelligent as he said I was). It's a little extra boost when you need it.
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The one time I took Ativan (for an MRI because the doc SWORE it would relax me) it had the opposite effect. (<-- is it effect or affect? i'm going with effect as in cause and effect) Then again, I didn't want to take it in the first place so who knows why that happened.
pH - Do you research for yourself all the medications you're taking? I'm the type that shies away from them if at all possible. That being said, it seems like someone's consistently suggesting drugs and then different drugs and then more drugs if they don't work for you to get through your rough spots. Do you think you're able to get to the root of your symptoms through the many changing meds? Not meant confrontationally, just inquisitively.
Posts: 1355 | Registered: Jul 2006
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cmc, "affect" is the transitive verb, as in "x affects y" or has an impact on y. It always takes an object. Effect is a noun. Something has an effect on something else. Notice "an effect" is a thing, or a noun.
There's another sort of stilted verb "effect" which is used in sentences that usually sound rather pompous, and in official reports and stuff. When you want to effect a change (meaning bring it into effect), you can use "effect" as a transitive verb as well. It means something different, though, than "affect". "Effect" used this way means to bring about, whereas "affect" means to have an impact on.
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That definitely helps, thanks Guys. Especially since the best explaination I'd had was that the way to rememeber which to use is that effect is usually more of an emotional outcome - e/e. I've got lots to learn.
Posts: 1355 | Registered: Jul 2006
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Well, I'm definitely the type to do serious research on medications before I'll take them. Unfortunately, in a lot of cases, psychiatrists can be really pushy, and when you tell them that you want to stop something, they just tell you it's working, keep taking it.
Hence, I have many, many times quit medications (and eperienced withdrawals) without doctor supervision. The last one was the most terrible; I was taking a combination of Prozac and Geodon. I didn't want to be taking it; it made me absolutely miserable. The whole time I was on it, I was....a complete mess. But without the Geodon, I couldn't sleep (which is what freaked me out so badly about it). And the Prozac made me shake really, really badly. But he wouldn't help me stop taking it, so I had to do it myself. The Prozac was easy, but the Geodon was horrible...I didn't sleep for days at a time.
So anyways, the answer is yes, I research my medications very, very thoroughly, and I ditch psychiatrists who don't give me the freedom to choose my own or to choose whether or not to be on medication at all.
What you have to realize is that while I've been on a crapload of medications, it's been over the course of seven years. So it's not like I have a bad day, and someone says, "Here, take this instead."
I always find it interesting when people talk about the "root of the problem." People always want to think there's some reason for this kind of thing, like your mother didn't hug you enough, or you were beat up in kindergarten...that's the thing. I don't think there IS one single root of the problem. I have OCD, and that's a physical difference in my brain. The way that the OCD manifests itself has been shaped by my experiences. I doubt I would be so fixated on certain anxieties if I hadn't had the same experiences or been exposed to the same media. But the real root of the problem (if it can even be considered a problem, which I don't think it is at all times) is my brain. So in this case, getting to the root of the problem would require brain surgery (yes, they do this to people with OCD), which doesn't sound like a very productive option to me.
I'm not saying that to be mean. I just mention it because...it's something akin to asking a clinically depressed person what made him/her depressed. A lot of times, there isn't an answer that's as simple as, "My puppy bit me, and a bird crapped on my head." I mean, it's perfectly natural for people to ask those kinds of questions or look for those kinds of things, but a lot of times, it just doesn't work that way.
I mean, after all, what do I really have to be upset or anxious about? From an outsider's perspective, very very little.
I was not at all going to mention this in this thread let alone on this forum, but here it is... I do know what you mean, pH. I was diagnosed as manic depressive or bi-polar or whatever the cool terminology for it that particular day is when I was 18. I spent 6 years running from the diagnosis because I KNEW that what I had was an eating disorder. Not so. The eating disorder was a manifestation of the <insert current term here>. I couldn't control anything but what was going into or coming out of my body, so that's what I did.
During those 6 years I psych shopped, learned as much about the diagnosis to be smart enough to hide any obvious symptoms and give all the right answers to be functional. I played the games of renewing prescriptions at all the right times but taking them only when I thought I needed it. Those were some of the 6 crappiest years of my life yet the whole time I thought I was doing myself right.
It came to a head when I was dehydrated to the point of needing a catheter and to be hospitalized for the fifth time for me to wake the funk up and realize that whatever I was doing before was just not working. I gave in and listened to the doctors, medical and psych, at least to hear their words. Prior to that, I pretended to listen all the while knowing that what I knew about myself was right and that I alone could solve all of my problems.
I was wrong. It took a while to get used to that fact. It took even longer to accept that my own body wasn't producing the right minerals to keep my own brain in check. Not cool realizations to come to but the past three years since it ‘clicked’ have been better than I could have imagined. I'm not saying I'd go back and make myself have listened sooner - I wouldn't be who I am now without that. But I will say that playing games with meds or doc shopping are not good alternatives for facing your own demons.
I am in no way trying to say that your problem mirrors mine, I'm just saying that I see similarities and appreciate what you're dealing with.
I said it before and I'll say it again, I hope you find some of the same type people I did because Life does not have to be so much work.
Posts: 1355 | Registered: Jul 2006
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At the same time, though, there sometimes comes a point where you DO need to tell your doctor to go screw himself. I take daily medications daily, and I take as-needed medications as needed. But there is no reason whatsoever that I should ever have been on so many drugs that my eyes wouldn't focus. I'm lucky enough to have found a group of doctors/therapists now who aren't afraid to say, "No, what that last doctor said was total crap, and you shouldn't have to take anything you don't want to."
What landed me in the looney bin was that I became obsessed with a very terrible suicidal image. I didn't want to CREATE or CARRY OUT this image, but I couldn't get it out of my head. Shrink #2 decided that my fixation on this image meant that I was going to kill myself. He didn't take into account that a big part of OCD is being fixated on terrible thoughts and being unable to get them out of your head. So off I went to the mental hospital, where I was put on antipsychotics, which made my head eerily quiet, which made me cry. This was decided to be a victory, despite the fact that I hated, hated, hated, hated the way I felt. Because hey, I don't have all the noise in my head anymore.
Well, people are supposed to have thoughts. And like I said, I don't think I want to be THAT "in touch with reality" ever, ever again. During the year that I was on that crap, I drank a lot, tried the occasional drug...mostly to get to sleep because I couldn't sleep without the antipsychotic, and said antipsychotic cost about $600 a month...so sometimes, I just couldn't get it the day I needed it. I put myself in a LOT of dangerous situations and did a lot of terrible things, and I was absolutely miserable. I do not, ever, ever want the universe to feel that "real" again.
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Yes, I agree! They will say things like "you feel normal, and that feels bad to you, so you want to quit taking the drug". They don't have any idea how you feel, or even what normal is. It's essential that the patient always retain control of the situation, since there is just so much room for abuse by well-meaning idiots.
I totally agree that doctor shopping until you find someone you trust and like, and choosing your own best course of treatment with the doctor's input and advice is the way to go.
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When talking about doc shopping I wasn't implying that anyone should just blindly listen - more saying that it's a good idea to listen to them AND you. Not only one or the other.
Posts: 1355 | Registered: Jul 2006
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cmc, I think my biggest problem with that is just that, like Tatiana said, they really have no idea what they're talking about when they talk about "normal."
I was seeing a psychiatrist the entire time I was on the geodon/prozac combination, and as I said, I was doing terrible, awful things. Did the shrink even NOTICE? No. Because he wanted to believe that he was helping and because I'm the kind of person who doesn't like to disappoint. So even though I was absolutely miserable, getting into unhealthy relationships, and doing bad things, as long as I showed up at his office with a robotic smile, he didn't notice. Or maybe he didn't care...after I got out of the hospital, our sessions, which used to be an hour long, started to get shorter and shorter. It got to the point that I was showing up at his office, he would ask me if I was having any side effects, I said no, and he sent me on my way (with a $200 bill, of course). When I told him that I hated the medication and was miserable, he didn't believe me.
What amused me before that, when he first put me on the medication, was that he'd leave me on something for two weeks and say, "Oh, this isn't giving me the desired effect. We need to raise the dosage." Which of course, is exactly what happened with the geodon.
No one in the world needs to be taking 180mg of that stuff. It could knock out a horse. I got into a car wreck because when I took the geodon, I had to sleep 12 hours before the grogginess would wear off. I fell asleep in my morning classes. But oh, it's helping, right? And of course, I'm the one who's out of touch with reality, so clearly I can't judge for myself.
Sorry, not annoyed at you, just annoyed at...Shrinks 1 and 2.
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I'm becoming increasingly disenchanted with group therapy. I think I need to be in a group made up of other people who also have pretty bad OCD. Because the thing is, I feel like I'm the craziest person in the group, and half the time, I can't figure out a way to word myself so that anyone understands what I mean, even after trying many times. I just sit there with the overwhelming urge to go off on someone, and while my therapist encourages this, I'm not sure if she really understands that I'm not always a nice, friendly, charming individual. And I don't want to get into a "crazier than thou" contest with anyone. I just feel like I have no way to express myself in a manner that the other people there can understand.
I'm trying to find an OCD specialist in the area, somehow. They have to exist. They would know.
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pH, so, previously you believed the OCD commands were coming from outside yourself, ala what your church taught you, and now you know they are coming from yourself?
There is certainly a civil war going on inside of you. Your dominant self makes you do things that keep you in a form of debasing servitude. The other fights her back with medication that immobilizes her, even to the point that she can no longer speak and it is completely silent inside your head (the anti-psychotics at the mental hospital). This is a civil war. It sounds like you have accepted that this is just the way you are wired and you have no choice but to live the rest of your life in internal conflict. I haven't accepted that.
I understand about chemical imbalances and that medication suppresses one chemical or supplies a needed chemical to achieve the proper chemical balance. But what is the body? It is a chemical factory and processing plant. It makes its own chemicals and removes bad ones. Feelings are chemical reactions, just a complicated form of the high school test tube experiments that turned liquids from one color to the other. Thoughts are chemicals and electrical reactions. Gut reactions are chemicals. Intuition is chemicals. Sixth sense is chemicals. Joy, pain, misery, pleasure, everything is a chemical reaction. We are chemical machines. Nothing happens in our bodies without some form of chemical reaction.
It is a scary thought that our bodies are so irrelevant, just a bunch of chemical reactions. But something inside of us makes decisions, something dictates what we do, which ultimately leads to the chemicals reactions that produce our thoughts and feelings. I think that part of us non-chemical. It is our soul. I really do believe that it is non-chemical and that it continues to live once the body dies. And I think that we have multiple decision makers inside of us. Anyway, souls or not, it doesn't matter because something makes decisions inside of us and that is what you need to focus on.
Ok, some people really have bodies that are messed up. Mentally handicap people are the prime example. But look at how they behave. They have a different dominant personality than everyone else because some parts of their decision making self isn't as able to work with the body. They exhibit a side effect of not having internal conflict. Their fears of social acceptance are way lower than ours. They make funny noises and shout and sing in public. Some have picture perfect memory. Some can hear a piano performance once and then sit at a piano and duplicate it with perfection. I think they can do this because they are uninhibited by the internal conflicts that we experience. And I think they are uninhibited because some part of them has lost the connection with their body. When you talk to a mentally handicap person, you are talking to only one side of their soul. The other part is just barely listening and probably wont ever respond to you.
I don't think your body is broke. I think you have been taught to punish yourself with OCD behavior. You are punishing yourself by flooding your brain with chemicals that forces you to feel feelings and think thoughts that make you miserable and will not go away until you submit to some task. In a way, you are doing this with your boyfriend too when you ask him repeatedly if he is mad at you or whatnot.
In spite of your dominant self's behavior, I don't think she is the enemy and I don't think she is dispensable. Your boyfriend's behavior shows he thinks this as well.
She behaves the way she does for a reason. I think this is why so many doctors think that going back to "the root cause" will fix you. It often fixes "2 brain" problems. But understand why it works.
People with "2 brain" problems have these problems because of what they learn, lessons like: standing up and giving the pastor the middle finger in the middle of church services leads to a HUGE discomfort. So no matter how hard you try, you will probably never be able to do that. I doubt few people could. Perhaps the only people who could do such a thing are either full of hatred, screaming for attention, or spoiled so badly they don't suffer the consequences of their actions. So again, these types of lessons determine what we decide to do later in life.
Going back to the roots fixes people because it corrects teachings. For example: being scared of something. As an adult, to correct the problem, the person learns that the thing is no longer scary. Most people do this automatically because they are constantly learning new lessons. But if someone is traumatized enough, as you (and I) have been, you QUIT learning. You shut down the channels of communication.
So you have to do 2 things. You have got to go to that girl inside of you and tell her that everything she learned as a child was wrong. Somehow you have got to open the channels of communication. Pacing helps me. Singing helps me too. I love to sing. Walking to think is lame but it is the only way I can force the random "where did that come from" ideas that make a difference in my life. Sometimes I have to pace for hours.
You may have to go through everything you learned one by one and disprove them too. It sounds like you have already started with the church teachings. But even though you know it, are you sure the one inside of you has? You have to make sure she listens and starts learning.
Unfortunately, no matter how much you convince her what she learned is wrong, she may still decide to do what she is doing. I know I have this problem. If this is the case with you, no matter how many root causes you find and effectively communicate to her, she isn't going to let up. So the second thing you have to do is convince her it is worth her while to behave. The medication is a big tool to help you do this because it essentially breaks her ability to force you to conform. It is like creating a form of the physical handicap that plagues mentally retarded people. My guess is that it infuriates her when you take medication but until she lets up, you have no choice. When she starts to let up, then your doctor will give you smaller doses until eventually she is civil and fair to yourself and you can trust her and can quit taking medication. That should be your goal: no more war.
When I think of you accepting a life of medication I am distressed. I don't think you are permanently wired to live this way, nor do you deserve it.
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My obsessive-compulsive behaviors began far too early for me to have taught myself to punish myself for anything. That's the thing. I was younger than 8 when I began experiencing these thoughts. It happened to me before I was strongly involved in the church. And the thing is, the doctors AREN'T looking for some underlying root experience or thing that caused it.
I think you're misunderstanding my acceptance of my condition, and there are many, many people who think the same way that you do. First of all, as I said before, it bothers me to no end when people believe that I should be able to overcome OCD through sheer force of will and who believe that the fact that this sort of elimination of the disorder isn't my goal means that I'm hopeless or using it as a crutch. Everyone has obsessive thoughts at one point or another, and most people learn to let them go, which is what makes it so difficult for me to be in a group therapy session in which I'm the only person with severe OCD.
Here's the thing: if I decide that I should be able to eliminate this through sheer force of will, that alone will become my obsession. On top of that, when it DOESN'T go away, or when it goes away and comes back, I'll feel ashamed that I couldn't fix it.
My mind isn't as split as it used to be. That's the huge difference, and I think that's what made my OCD so scary for so many people at first. I couldn't recognize, until a very short time ago, that everything really did happen within my own mind. Separating the two parts and trying to control one with the other would just reintroduce this schism, I think. In all honesty, OCD has helped me in a lot of ways. My mind is used to being active all the time, which means that I can split my attention to an insane degree. Some people think that it's not just a chemical difference, but a physical difference. That a certain part of the brain is shaped differently, or that the brains of people with OCD have more "gray matter" and less "connective matter." Whatever it is, I was miserable when it was entirely gone. That's why I don't take "ocd medications" or antipsychotics. I value the ability to make far-fetched connections, and I value the ability to live in a way that many would probably say is a bit out of sync with whatever is actually "real." I don't really know that it would be a good thing for it to entirely disappear. I just want to learn to use it even more to my advantage. It's like...I remember these thought exercises they used to have me do when I was young (because I was extremely bright) that were supposed to help your logical and creative sides work together better. Which is actually one of the reasons why I can halfway write ambidextrously (although I still write like a first-grader with my right hand).
Here's another thing: okay, so I'm no longer afraid of something. It will be replaced with a new thing. I had a very good example written out, but it would make me uncomfortable to post it. It's not that my mind has stopped learning and is fixated on old things or old fears. It's constantly evolving.
On top of that, I really don't think it's productive to discourage people from using medications that help them. I've encountered far too much of this from my family, who guilt me because of course, they're the ones paying for it. I chose, on my own, to take Wellbutrin. I like it, and I feel that it helps. I choose, on my own time, when I should take Ativan, and believe me, my general existence would be much more unfortunate if I didn't have that to help me. I think it's sad that many people view the use of psychiatric medication as some sort of weakness. Is it weakness to take penicillin for a bacterial infection? Or, for something more similar, is it weak for an asthmatic to take medication and use an inhaler when he/she needs it? I don't think so.
Don't get me wrong; I do think that there are many drugs that are overprescribed (i.e. Adderall), and I know first-hand that many doctors push medications on patients, but that's no longer the case for me. Maybe I'll decide to stop taking Wellbutrin one day, or maybe I'll want to switch medication, but I don't see anything wrong with my using it. It doesn't give me a mental handicap. It doesn't silence my obsessions. It gives me a ltitle boost and keeps me from getting depressed. Being stressed and being depressed generally aggravate OCD to a frightening degree. But I think I need to be a little scatterbrained; it's part of what makes me so intelligent.
And speaking of being scatterbrained, I'm rambling now.
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That most reminded me of the ep. of Scrubs where Michael J. Fox played an OCD surgeon/resident. He said something similar to what you just said, that he used his OCD tendencies to his advantage. Turned his compulsions towards medicine and learned everything there was too learn.
I was almost jealous of his OCD, if that gives you any indication of how compelling he made it.
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And yes, pH, I'm glad you've learned to ignore the many well-meaning people who will tell you that you don't need medicine, you don't need treatment, you just need to think yourself out of it. While it's true that training your thoughts into better channels can be somewhat of a help, it's totally only one piece of the picture. How big of a piece varies from one person to the next.
All that "get over it" stuff does is add guilt and self-hatred to other problems as you wonder why it is you can't just get over it, and you mentally kick yourself for being a whiner and a wimp, and so on. That's very much the wrong approach, and will make you worse instead of better, yet well-meaning people who know nothing about what it's like to be you, will tell you that again and again. It's as though an ophthalmologist gave you his own glasses to wear, and then wondered why you still can't see since they have always worked great for him.
Also, many people will decide it's willful on your part, that you enjoy these things and prefer to be this way, for the attention or drama or something. The reason they do this has nothing to do with you and everything to do with them. It's because they are weary of your troubles, (which is understandable) and yet they would feel bad if they abandoned you or lost sympathy for you because of something that's not your fault. Therefore, they decide it's your fault so they can go on to congratulate themselves for disliking you.
These are the sort of patterns that repeat over and over. It's not that anyone is to blame. It's just human nature. Understand and try not to ask people for more than they can give, or want to give.
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Tatiana, what I think is funny is that the people who are most likely to claim that I'm using it for attention or something are the people who are least affected by it. There are very, very few people who are even in a position to be the brunt of it: a small handful of friends and my boyfriend. My family doesn't live close enough to see it on a daily basis anymore. I think most of the people who've been negative about it like that are sort of a third party...as in, I have a problem with something, I feel the need to talk about it, this uninvolved friend is available to talk, so I talk to her about a problem that has absolutely nothing to do with her and does not affect her life at all.
The OCD article on Wikipedia (of all things) pointed out that "obsessive-compulsive" is often used to describe someone who is very meticulous but that obsessive-compulsive disorder isn't the same. I think that's a good point, actually. There's a huge difference, and I think when I say I have OCD, a lot of people interpret that as my saying that I'm "obsessive-compulsive" in the "I vaccuum every Saturday" kind of way.
And you're right about the uninvolved friends. Realize that you asked too much (however miniscule) of them and let it go. Most of all, know that it's not a reflection on you at all, but just the way these circumstances play out sometimes.
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Good luck! Try remembering how hard he is working and how much love and support he needs when he finally gets a few minutes off. ![[Mad]](mad.gif)
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And if you want to talk about our various anxieties sometime, let me know. Thanks so much for the encouragement.![[Wink]](wink.gif)
