Another OCD Sufferers View.

The following article was written by my fiance about OCD. I thought I would share it with you all.

This article was inspired by an OCD support group I am part of.  It is intended to help people with friends and family who suffer from OCD better understand the disorder.  After hearing countless stories of people being judged, bullied, teased and ridiculed as well as experiencing it myself on a day to day basis, I wanted to outline the best I could the key differences between OCD and normal human quirks and habbits.  People with OCD need a lot of support and understanding however their symptoms and behaviors can be confusing for non sufferers which leads to uneccessary conflict and hurt feelings.

I'm going to start off using a scenario.  A group of friends are hanging out together at one of their respective houses.  One of them, lets call him Bill is admiring the impressive DVD collection on display in the living room.  He reaches out to grab one of the boxes when all of a sudden he hears someone scream "NO!" from across the room.  The owner of the house, lets call her Kate, runs over to interupt him.

"Could you not touch my DVD's please.  I know it sounds a bit weird but I just don't like people getting near them." says Kate.

"Why not?!" replies Bill with a puzzled look on his face.

"Oh!  I'm just a bit OCD about my DVD collection that's all".  Kate says.

I can't tell you how many times I have found myself in the above scenario, where someone tries to pass off their "quirks" as a case of obsessive compulsive disorder.  Kate does not have OCD, not unless the idea of someone touching her prized DVD collection also brings about extreme levels of anxiety, intrusive thoughts of bad things happening if someone does touch her DVD collection and the relentless urge to perform meaningless rituals or compulsions in order to rid herself of anxiety and negative thoughts.  More than likely Kate is just a bit particular about her DVD's.  Sure it sounds irrational but everyone has their own odd little habbits, most people even have their own rituals but nothing like suffering from a severe anxiety disorder like obsessive compulsive disorder.

People with OCD go far beyond having "quirks".  The key differences between Kate and an OCD sufferer is how much distress real sufferers go through.  Sure she may have shrieked in horror but the thing about non OCD sufferers and their "quirks" is they are able to put troubling thoughts behind them.  Lets change the scenario a little and say to Kate's horror that Bill had actually picked up one of her DVD's.  She'd have been annoyed no doubt but the the threat would quickly pass in her mind and she would be able to forget about it.  For an OCD sufferer who has an obsession with orderliness it can dominate their entire lives as they spend hours arranging things in specific patterns and numbers, repeating the process over and over again until it feels "just right".  When an OCD sufferer performs a compulsion to relieve his/her anxiety they often look inside their own minds for feedback while scrutinizing every single detail of their obsession.  Imagine your were helping someone hang a picture on a wall and they were adjusting it to line up straight.

"A bit more to the left, now right a bit.  Slightly more left and... THERE!  Perfect!"

It's a bit like that for an OCD person.  A feeling of things being out of place or "wrong" even though they may have arranged it the exact same way 100 times already that day.  The first 99 times the feeling inside their own heads may feel "a little too far to the left" and they will repeat their compulsions until it feels "perfect" however looking for this kind of feedback in your own mind when your prone to feelings of anxiety, panic and dread at the slightest hint of imperfection can be an exhausting process.

"So you are essentially all a bunch of neat freaks?"

This is a statement I hear a lot.  The example I used above of someone with an orderliness obsession was purely for comparison purposes to give you an idea of the difference between Kate and a genuine OCD sufferer however OCD is limitless in terms of what a person could potentially obsess about and the majority of sufferers have more than one obsession in their life time.  When we start to dig a little deeper things become far more disturbing for an individual as their OCD progresses.

A common obsession and one I have suffered through personally is the fear that if I don't do things a certain way until they feel "just right", that bad things will happen to my family.  Usually this manifests itself by my OCD telling me I need to repeat an action such as closing a door a certain number of times or a horrific tragedy will befall my loved ones.  It's at this point I feel I need to clarify how a thought feels for an OCD sufferer.  You may be thinking "but why would you repeating an action have anything to do with what you just described?"  The short answer is nothing but to better understand it from an OCD stand point let's ask the professionals.

"It is well documented that the great majority of people with OCD are aware that their rituals are meaningless, yet they still experience a tremendous urge or impulse to escape the irrational threat by engaging in these rituals. Recently, it has been established that OCD's locus in the brain is in the brain stem, specifically the limbic system. This system is found in the primitive part of the brain and is responsible for regulating sleep cycles, appetite, and the "fight or flight" response to anxiety or stress. A person's ability to reason is located in the brain's outer surface, the neo-cortex. It is important to understand that the brain does not function as a singular, harmonious unit. Various parts of the brain present different levels of priorities or experiences of urgency. This duplicity of experience explains a key phenomenon: as the primitive part of the brain is misfiring biologically, the reasonable neo-cortex is confused by the false alarm. No experience carries a greater sense of urgency than a perception of imminent threat to one's self or to a loved one." - Dr. Steven Phillipson

So we all know that our obsessions are irrational but when key parts of your brain are sending false signals telling you that you are in extreme danger it's easier to understand why someone with OCD may feel compelled to perform these actions regardless of rational thought.  I'd like to highlight the "fight or flight" response mentioned by Dr. Phillipson as this is something we can all relate to.  We all know what it is like to feel like we are in danger or that a loved one could be at risk.  That instant feeling of anxiety and panic.  When you feel like the life has been drained out of you and replaced with feelings of dread.  This feeling is common in day to day life.  When you find out someone you care for is seriously ill or you feel like someone is following you while you make your way home at night.  Well, imagine you carried those feelings with you every day and meaningless little thoughts suddenly bared the same significance as being in serious danger.

Imagine being a new mother or father and being terrified that you will harm your own child against your will?  Imagine feeling like you will suddenly lash out and kill your entire family?  Imagine thinking that if you did not do things a certain way your loved ones would die and you would be the one to blame?  Imagine thinking that person you accidentally bumped in to in the street has given you HIV?  Imagine that the more you tried to push these thoughts away, the more intrusive and relentless they become and despite all rationality all these things feel as real as the air you breath as if they are really happening?  And finally imagine you felt like that 24/7?

"So whats the difference between real thoughts and intrusive ones?"

You might be asking yourself wait, surely if a person thinks about murder all day that they must be dangerous and avoided?  Well for an OCD sufferer it's very important to understand that these thoughts conflict with their very nature.  They do not genuinly enjoy these thoughts or want them to be there.  OCD is a cunning devil, you may hear a sufferer say things like "it felt like I had the urge to..." or "I thought about it and it feels like I would enjoy it..." but these urges and feelings are infact part of the illness and they form after intense scrutiny of ones own feelings and constantly second guessing how a person "should feel" about a thought.  When the brain constantly sends you false signals, a lot gets lost in that but for an obsession to take place there has to be resistance within the mind.  These thoughts go against the nature of the individual suffering from them and thats why they cause so much distress.  They do not fit in the core reality of who that person is.

"But my friend has OCD and all he/she does is wash their hands."

I've been involved with OCD communities for over a year now and in that time I've heard many stories of sufferers struggling to get their close friends and family to understand what they are going through which is often met with raised eye brows and "your being over dramatic" type attitudes.  For this next point I'd like to share a story a gentleman private messaged me on a OCD support forum.

He has been struggling with his obsessions for many years now and as a result had lost his job.  His family inparticular had become very frustrated with him as he seemed to just spend more and more time indoors, obsessing and performing rituals and compulsions.  One day his cousin came to visit and it didn't take long for anger that had been bubbling inside her for a long time to show itself.  She began insisting that he "snap out of it".  When he tried to explain that it wasn't possible for him to just do that she attempted to call him a "faker" due to a friend she knows who has OCD who doesn't behave anything like he does.

Like any disorder OCD habbits can range from mild to severe.  In severe cases people become disabled, often unable to leave their own homes.  In some cases I have even heard of people taking their own lives, however this is a question I also faced personally with my own family too when someone compared me to someone else they knew who also had the disorder.  My response to them was "well have you actually asked how he feels about his OCD?".  The reason I said that is because OCD sufferers are often masters of disguise.  They may appear normal on the outside but inside they are suffering severe torment from the constant thoughts.  It was for this very reason that I personally lost my place at college last year.  Theres many reasons an OCD sufferer may hide their obsessions.  Guilt, fear or shame are common ones.  This is why it's very important for people to understand OCD sufferers.  With the right support and understanding it can give them the confidence to share their worries with people without worrying about being the subject of harsh judgement and name calling.  The more and more we ignore someone with mental illness and pass their symptoms off as being "over dramatic", the worse it inevitability becomes for us and the people around us.

To finish off this point I'd like to highlight that the World Health Organization ranked OCD in the top 10 most disabling illnesses of any kind.  The scope of how much this disorder affects it's sufferers has been completely lost on society, leaving it's millions of sufferers to be the subject of harsh name calling and judgement.  OCD is under reported due to how many people feel guilt and shame over discussing their symptoms with friends, family and even health professionals and those individuals are suffering in silence.

Do you still think I am a neat freak?