{"id":1235,"date":"2013-01-24T07:00:25","date_gmt":"2013-01-24T14:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thisrestlesspilgrim.wordpress.com\/?p=1235"},"modified":"2021-07-14T11:05:03","modified_gmt":"2021-07-14T18:05:03","slug":"ocd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2013\/01\/24\/ocd\/","title":{"rendered":"OCD: Curse and Blessing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier this week I produced a <a title=\"Squishing Ants\" href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2013\/01\/22\/squishing-ants\/\">summary of a paper<\/a> written by Dr. Daniel G. Amen about combating Automatic Negative Thoughts. I decided\u00a0that\u00a0today I&#8217;d add something of an addendum to that post and talk a little bit about my experiences with\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Obsessive%E2%80%93compulsive_disorder\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/ursis-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/ursis-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"269\" height=\"230\" \/>\u00a0\u00a0<\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/ursis-2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/ursis-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"269\" height=\"230\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>OCD is an anxiety disorder in which the sufferers have repeated, unwanted thoughts which compel them to perform certain actions which provide relief from the unwanted thoughts. This relief, however, is only temporary and the feelings,\u00a0unbidden, soon\u00a0return. \u00a0The OCD mind then demands that the actions be performed once again. \u00a0The actions quickly become\u00a0ritualistic, increasingly elaborate and need to be repeated over and over again with increasing frequency in order to relieve the sufferer&#8217;s mind.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<h2>Public Consciousness<\/h2>\n<p>Although I have no data to back it up, I would suggest that in recent years OCD awareness\u00a0has increased. Growing up, I never recall hearing it mentioned but it now appears to be part of common parlance and often (incorrectly) used to describe anyone who is detail-oriented or perhaps even just a little quirky.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"470\" height=\"265\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/tnzz-eFmKaw?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;start=81&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/10\/ocd.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"473\" height=\"104\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The subject of OCD has even featured in several films. For example, although I have not seen it,\u00a0I am told that there is an OCD sufferer in the newly-released movie <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt1045658\/\">Silver Linings\u00a0Playbook<\/a>. If anyone has seen it, please tell me what you thought of it in the Comments section below.<\/p>\n<p>An older film you may have seen is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0119822\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">As Good As It Gets<\/a>, a really enjoyable and generally lighthearted movie starring\u00a0Jack Nicholson. The movie uses the OCD of Nicholson&#8217;s character as a source of comedy which I think was quite a gutsy thing to attempt, but in my opinion it was executed quite well.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Lj5_FhLaaQQ\" target=\"#\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-17134 alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/silver-lining-playbook.jpg\" alt=\"silver lining playbook\" width=\"150\" height=\"222\" srcset=\"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/silver-lining-playbook.jpg 214w, https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/silver-lining-playbook-202x300.jpg 202w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=8lOg8PzEaWs\" target=\"#\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-17132 alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/as-good-as-it-gets.jpg\" alt=\"as good as it gets\" width=\"150\" height=\"222\" srcset=\"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/as-good-as-it-gets.jpg 214w, https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/as-good-as-it-gets-202x300.jpg 202w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=zikFDK4cuQA\" target=\"#\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" wp-image-17133 alignnone\" src=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/the-aviator.jpg\" alt=\"the aviator\" width=\"150\" height=\"222\" srcset=\"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/the-aviator.jpg 214w, https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/01\/the-aviator-202x300.jpg 202w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">It is Leoardo Di Caprio, however, who I think truly gives the audience a sense of the\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=vaR7D3STrzs\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">torment<\/a>\u00a0experienced by the Obsessive Compulsive in his movie\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.imdb.com\/title\/tt0338751\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Aviator<\/a>,\u00a0which tells the story of the\u00a0legendary director and aviator Howard Hughes. I thoroughly recommend it.<\/p>\n<h2>The Curse<\/h2>\n<p>I personally developed OCD during my teenage years although, looking back, I can see traces of the tendency earlier in my life. I remember as a little kid being afraid of\u00a0burglars\u00a0and, because of this, I quite often went around the house after everyone had gone to bed in order to check the locks to make sure that my family and I were safe.<\/p>\n<p>However, it was during my stressful teenage years that the OCD really started to manifest itself. It began slowly. I began double-checking the doors before going to bed or leaving the house. I then started triple-checking&#8230;and then quadruple-checking. I started checking the windows too. As the number of checks grew and grew, the time it took to leave the house grew longer and longer. It is hard to explain how debilitating and exhausting it is having your mind torment you into acting this way.<\/p>\n<p>As bad as the lock checking became, the obsession which really troubled me was the issue of cleanliness,\u00a0especially\u00a0hand-washing. Like the lock checking, it grew over time. I began by washing my hands more thoroughly than I had previously. I then started to not just wash and dry my hands once, but several times over. I increased the temperature of the water to the point where the heat really began to hurt my hands. My skin became dry, cracked and really rather gross. Anything which I felt that could possibly contain germs would only be handled with facial tissues.<\/p>\n<p>All this I managed to hide from my friends and family with great effectiveness. This, of course, only served to\u00a0exacerbate the problem as it isolated me from those who cared about me and would have been able to help me.<\/p>\n<h2>The Healing<\/h2>\n<p>It took a long time for the tide to turn on my OCD and I would have very much benefited from the advice of Dr. Amen found in my <a title=\"Squishing Ants\" href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2013\/01\/22\/squishing-ants\/\">earlier post<\/a>. I had to spend a lot of time rooting out the emotional issues which had caused the OCD to flourish in the first place. This took time, a lot of time. The Lord brought good friends into my life who helped build up my sense of self worth and confidence in myself, which helped a great deal.<\/p>\n<p>Like someone quitting smoking, I slowly cut down my habit, reducing the frequency of my\u00a0repetitive\u00a0actions bit-by-bit. This wasn&#8217;t easy. Rather than washing my hands multiple times I would just breath deeply for several minutes.<\/p>\n<p>The big lesson I had to learn was that my thoughts and feelings did not necessarily reflect reality; sometimes they lied. In an effort to counteract these shadowy whispers in my head\u00a0I would have to look at myself in the mirror and then, slowly and deliberately,\u00a0say out loud\u00a0<span style=\"color: #000000\"><em>&#8220;Your hands are <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">clean<\/span>. Everything is <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">fine<\/span>&#8220;<\/em><\/span>. I would then quietly repeat <em>&#8220;Come Holy Spirit&#8221;<\/em> until I was completely calm.\u00a0 I would touch my hands to my face very clearly prove to myself that my hands were not covered in some mysterious contagion.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">As I grew stronger I started to put myself into situations in which I would have to deal directly with germs or uncleanliness. I would\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/truthandcharity.net\/10-things-i-learned-as-a-janitor-at-steubenville\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">clean toilets<\/a>. I spent time around the homeless.\u00a0I would visit friends who were sick. I began to confront my fears directly to prove to myself that they were illusionary and unfounded.<\/p>\n<h2>The Blessing<\/h2>\n<p>The effect that all this had on my spiritual life was ultimately extremely beneficial. Having OCD made me more sensitive than I otherwise would have been to the issue of mental health. For this I am grateful. It turns out that, that like other unpleasant things which I&#8217;ve experienced, it has helped form me and make me who I am today. I would not like to be have been without such experiences.<\/p>\n<p>The other effect of having OCD is that it forced me to reach a point where I had to admit that I couldn&#8217;t just <em>&#8220;pull myself together&#8221;<\/em>. I had to admit that I was weak, that I needed help, that I needed God. He\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.devinrose.heroicvirtuecreations.com\/blog\/2012\/07\/11\/will-god-heal-your-anxiety-disorder\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">didn&#8217;t just zap me<\/a> and take away the OCD though. Instead, it was a day-by-day journey, I had to keep trusting Him, regularly praying <span style=\"color: #000000\"><em>&#8220;Come Holy Spirit!&#8221;<\/em><\/span> and asking for His strength:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><span style=\"color: #993300\"><em>But he said to me,\u00a0\u201cMy grace is sufficient for you, for my power is\u00a0made\u00a0perfect\u00a0in\u00a0weakness.\u201d &#8230;<\/em><\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"color: #993300\"> &#8211; 2 Corinthians 12:9<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The OCD has never gone away completely. I actually don&#8217;t think it ever will. Having said that, I no longer obsessively wash my hands. I don&#8217;t constantly recheck locks and windows. However, when I&#8217;m stressed or overtired, it begins to return. You might think that this is a terrible thing, but I actually view it as a blessing.<\/p>\n<p>As soon as I notice my\u00a0symptoms\u00a0return, it is like an early warning system, my body letting me know that something is stressing me out, either consciously or unconsciously, and needs attention. More importantly though, this early warning system drives me back to prayer. It reminds me not to trust too much in my own ability or strength but to listen to the <a title=\"Sunday Lectionary: Oh that today you would listen to His voice\u2026\" href=\"http:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/2012\/01\/25\/oh-that-today-listen-to-his-voice\/\">Voice of Truth<\/a> and trust in the Lord.<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><span style=\"color: #993300\"><em>&#8230;Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ\u2019s power may rest on me.<br \/>\n<\/em><\/span><span style=\"color: #993300\">&#8211; 2 Corinthians 12:9<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"860\" height=\"484\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/WC3KxlraTFQ?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Earlier this week I produced a summary of a paper written by Dr. Daniel G. Amen about combating Automatic Negative Thoughts. I decided\u00a0that\u00a0today I&#8217;d add something of an addendum to that post and talk a little bit about my experiences with\u00a0Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). \u00a0\u00a0 OCD is an anxiety disorder in which the sufferers have repeated, unwanted thoughts which compel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[1955,1960,2969,1961,1959],"class_list":["post-1235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith","tag-automatic-negative-thoughts","tag-depression","tag-featured","tag-mental-health","tag-ocd"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1235"}],"version-history":[{"count":58,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1235\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82098,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1235\/revisions\/82098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/restlesspilgrim.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}