Just Stop Doing That

     Just stop doing that. Just don't think like that. You don't have to do that.  All those statements sound so simple and so easy to comply with. Of course, it's so simple to just stop doing an action or a task if you don't like that action or task or if it makes you feel ashamed or if it doesn't make any sense. I even say these things to myself when I realize I've done a compulsion, and I get frustrated with myself. It's easy to just stop doing a thing...unless you have OCD and the action or task is a compulsion.
     Something happened with me earlier this week that had become a rare occurrence. I was already having more trouble than usual with my intrusive thoughts, but I was dealing with that. I wasn't doing any of the thought neutralizing in my mind or behaviorally. I was just sitting with them, which is something I have grown used to since I've been in treatment. I have cut way done on the mental rituals to neutralize my thoughts, and that's been going well. Then my cat spilled nearly a whole cup of coffee on my bed by jumping up on my table, and I almost said a "bad" word, a particular curse word, and a word that frequently clangs around in my mind as an intrusive thought, which is something that hadn't really happened before.
     Cue the fear. I was terrified that some divine punishment was about to fall upon my head. I was afraid I was going to fall over dead and be sent straight to Hell. I was afraid our house would burn to the ground. I was afraid my mom was going to die in some accident as punishment because I love my mom. I was afraid something was going to happen to my cat because I love her. All because I almost said a certain curse word that was then repeatedly flitting through my mind as an intrusive thought.
     So, what did I do? I prayed about it, but not just the one time. I had to pray more because what if God was so angry with me for that one slip up that God wasn't listening to my prayers? What if God didn't think I was sorry enough because I didn't pray for forgiveness enough? I had to pray for forgiveness every single time I thought of the bad thing I had almost said. In other words, I had to do a compulsion to neutralize the fear caused by my actions and intrusive thoughts.
      I knew my thoughts and repeatedly praying for forgiveness didn't make a whole lot of sense, but I still couldn't stop until I got a grip on reality and realized it was OCD. I logically knew that after praying the first time and meaning that prayer in which I apologized, that I had been forgiven because that was what I learned from religious teaching, but I felt like I couldn't risk the certainty of being forgiven so I had to make sure God knew I was sorry by praying more. The OCD part of my brain had to be certain that I was forgiven to keep everyone, including myself, safe.
     After the third time I prayed for forgiveness in the first hour or so, it clicked in my mind that I was doing a compulsion and that the fears I had were OCD-related. So, after the third time I prayed, I said I wouldn't pray about that one instance anymore. But, it was hard. I was still afraid that something terrible would happen. So, I sat with that fear. I didn't medicate with my L-theanine or my Ativan. I sat, and I broke out in cold sweats. I felt sick. I wanted to cry. I felt like I might panic. It took all of my willpower not to pray and pray and pray about the one thing or to ask my friends or my mom for help (reassurances).
     I sat like that for around five or six hours. It was torture. I was sure bad things were going to happen, and those bad things were going to be my fault. Then I talked to my therapist in my weekly appointment, but by that time my anxiety had dissipated enough to be at my usual levels because I had spent so much time just sitting with it and habituating myself to it.
     So, why can't people with OCD stop doing compulsions, even though the compulsions don't make sense or cause feelings of guilt and shame? Because the stakes are too high and the fear is too great. The fear tells us that we are a bad person for not doing anything we can to protect our loved ones because we just know something will happen to them because of us. I felt like my own soul and the lives of my mom and my cat were at stake, and it was my responsibility to protect those loved ones with nearly constant prayers for forgiveness so God would know I was truly sorry and wouldn't hurt someone because I made a mistake.
     I'll end with this: People with OCD can't just stop doing compulsions. OCD can out-logic every logical argument your brain makes just to keep you doing the compulsions. The dangers that we need to do the compulsions to protect people (including us) from feel terrifyingly real. If you love someone with OCD, keep those things in mind instead of commanding that they stop without help. Stopping a compulsion can be terrifying, and it takes a lot of work that anyone that isn't a therapist or an OCD-sufferer might not understand. And yes, slip ups in which they still do compulsions are going to happen, even as they're working with a therapist to get well.

More Than Treating Symptoms

     Sometime, I go to my weekly therapy session, and we don't talk about my OCD or do any exposure exercises. Sometimes we talk about my writing and how stressful it can be for me. Sometimes we talk about my relationships with family or friends. Basically, in therapy we talk about life in general instead of only the one piece of my life that is OCD.
     I always feel a little guilty when therapy talk drifts away from my OCD. I feel guilty because any time spent in my session on my part, talking about something that isn't related to the mental health condition with which I was diagnosed feels like I'm wasting my therapist's valuable time. To me, it seemed the same as going to my primary care physician for a cold, but then telling them all about a sprained ankle instead of telling them the actual problem for which I made the appointment in the first place.
     I told my therapist about that idea this week in my session, and she said something like, "You know, therapy is about coping in general." What she meant by that was that therapy isn't just about treating the symptoms of a mental health condition. It's about learning coping skills that can make life a little easier to deal with as well as treating the mental health condition. That statement makes sense now that I've heard it spoken out loud.
     Stress can  make the symptoms of mental health conditions worse, so of course you have to learn coping skills for life's stress to improve life with your mental health condition. She also made a point to tell me that I wasn't wasting time. Therapy is also a place to process traumatic events like the death of a beloved pet or family member, or any other traumatic life event. She has even asked about the book I'm writing, which was definitely a more pleasant topic of conversation.
     I guess I still had an expectation for the way I thought therapy would be. I thought the only thing that I should talk about was the mental health condition that I had been diagnosed with. I thought my everyday life and struggles outside of what was impacted by my OCD weren't on the table for discussion. The truth is that everything about your life is on the table for discussion when you walk into a counseling session, even the fact that you might have made a spur of the moment change to your hair.
     I'll end with this: Therapy isn't just about dealing with the symptoms of a mental health condition. Therapy is also about  learning to cope and to process things so that after therapy we can maintain our wellness. Just because you aren't talking about your symptoms every single time you sit in the chair doesn't mean that you aren't working on getting well or that you're wasting time. Sometimes, therapy needs to be a place to process life in general, and that's okay.

Double-Edged Sword

     Some months ago a good friend of mine added me to a couple of those Facebook OCD support groups and discussion pages. I left the groups as soon as I was added to them. Then I sort of felt like a snobby jerk for not wanting to be part of a group whose main purpose is to provide a support network for people just like me who live with OCD.
      I also avoid those online OCD discussion forums, unless I just want to check and make sure that someone else is dealing with the same weird new obsession that I may have developed, which isn't often these days. (I do that because if someone else is experiencing the same types of intrusive thoughts, that means it's more likely to be treatable than just a fluke that no one is going to know how to deal with.) After I find a post like that, I immediately leave the group, and I don't go back. I also avoid those sections of Tumblr and all the other social websites out there. (I have, in the past, browsed the stigma tags on Tumblr to find information for a couple of blog posts, but that is the only reason I checked the mental health side of Tumblr.)
     I'm not avoiding the online support groups and discussion forums because I'm a snobby jerk or because I'm a loner who doesn't think she needs a support system. I avoid online support groups and discussion forums because my only observable compulsions are confession and reassurance seeking. (I have stopped confessing and seeking reassurance, but I still have to put quite a bit of effort into it every time I'm troubled by intrusive thoughts.)
     In theory, I like online support groups and discussion forums. In theory, online support groups are a good place to share experiences and recovery stories or even tips and techniques you may have learned from therapy or self help books that other people might also find helpful. In practice, however, online support pages and discussion forums for mental health conditions like OCD can be a double-edged sword. Yes, the groups and discussion forums help people feel less alone and provide a distant support network. Those groups and forums also feed the OCD loop by providing some people with a way to confess and a pretty constant stream of reassurance that people often feel compelled to seek out. (I could so easily slip into being one of those people in an online support group or discussion forum.)
     Online support groups and online discussion forums can so quickly become a thing that feeds a person's reassurance seeking compulsion as well as the confession compulsion. I browsed a couple when I first got diagnosed with OCD, and pretty much all I saw were people pleading with the entire support group or discussion forum to reassure them that they weren't actually going to do whatever obsessive thing they were worried about or that their thoughts were only thoughts. No one likes to see their fellow humans suffer, so the people of the Internet would rush in with reassurance to make them feel better. The reassurance seeker might be fine for a few hours or a few days, but then they would come back asking for the same reassurances the group or forum provided before, which just feeds the OCD loop and made it worse.
      The people in the forums and the groups have no idea they're feeding someone's OCD loop when they provide reassurance, even if they have OCD themselves. They just want to help, like any decent human being that sees someone else suffering. So, I find it best to avoid those things altogether in order to maintain and continue my wellness.
    I used to do the same reassurance seeking with my mom (and anyone else I could get to talk to me whenever I was in the throes of OCD). When I figured out that the reassurance seeking was a compulsion I had to remind my mom over and over again not to give me any reassurance, and it was really hard for both of us because she didn't want to see me suffer like that. I had to just sit and deal with it, even if I had a panic attack. Eventually I was able to stop, but every time my intrusive thoughts get loud enough to bother me, I have to really work to not give in and call my mom at work to confess my intrusive thoughts and then get reassurance that I'm not an awful person.
      The problem with the online groups and discussion pages is that everyone on the Internet can just come in and make a post. You can't tell the whole Internet to stop giving you reassurance when you ask for it. Somebody is ALWAYS going to be online to feed that confession and reassurance compulsion, so the OCD loop is just going to keep circling and getting more and more severe as the OCD brain finds ways to out-logic the reassurances somebody just received from the group.
     I definitely don't want to discourage anyone from finding support in an online support group page or through an online discussion forum. I just want people to be wary of tumbling into a reassurance compulsion or of providing reassurance online and feeding someone else's OCD feedback loop. I know everyone (the OCD suffered and the reassurance provider) thinks that providing reassurance helps, but it honestly doesn't. It can make OCD  more severe in the long run.
     I'll end with this: Doing whatever you need to do to maintain and continue wellness isn't rude or snobby, and if that means avoiding certain people or websites/online chats that is okay. In theory online support groups and discussion forums are a great part of your support network, but in practice, we should all be more careful with how we use and sometimes abuse them. If you're one of those people that goes into the support pages/discussion forums seeking reassurance, I can agree with you that not getting the reassurance feels like the end of the world and it makes life hell for a while, but I can tell you that you can eventually get to a point where you can stop seeking reassurance if you work really hard at it over time. (Although, you might want to enlist the help of an OCD self help book, therapist, or a person you trust if you want to try that.)

Common Ground

     As many of us know, explaining a mental health condition to someone that doesn't have any experience dealing with a mental health condition can be difficult, and sometimes downright weird, especially if we don't know the person we're trying to explain something to very well. I encounter this problem when I have to explain my OCD to people that I'm not related to or that aren't my Facebook friend. Sometimes they get confused. Sometimes I get confused. Sometimes I make it sound way worse or way more "crazy" that it actually is, and then I end up backtracking and saying, "It's not as bad as I just made it sound, I swear."
     I can't refer everyone to my blog so they can read the way I have explained my mental health condition in writing. (I always write better than I speak.) I generally use lots of examples when I try to explain something, but with mental health conditions the examples can make it seem worse than it is or the examples can make people uncomfortable, if I deviate from the contamination OCD examples they see in the media (which I always do).
     I was discussing this issue with my therapist in my weekly session this week, and she suggested that I try to find common ground to make people understand my mental health condition when they ask. By that she meant, that I should make them think about some time they might have been preoccupied with thinking of an issue and unable to get it off their mind (maybe like a college student around the time of finals or someone worrying about a medical test result). Then explain to them how the obsessive part of my disorder is similar to that, but magnified to the extent that it can be debilitating. Then maybe they could understand without horrific examples that make them uncomfortable, and I wouldn't end up making it seem worse than I intended.
     I think the idea of trying to find common ground can also be applied if you're dealing with someone with a mental health condition when you don't have a mental health condition yourself. It gets rough. You don't understand what's happening. The other person can't find the words to explain what's happening. Look for common ground, and then try to empathize with the struggling person. You don't have to fix it, because a lot of the time, you can't fix it, but you can find common ground and empathize with them and then ask how you can help. The other person might appreciate the effort.
     I'll end with this: Explaining your mental health condition to someone is never easy. It also isn't easy to understand when someone tries to explain something like that to you when you don't have personal experience with a mental health condition. Find common ground with them instead of getting frustrated or angry because someone can't adequately explain or understand. Draw a similarity between a common human experience (whatever human experience is similar to life with your mental health condition) and go from there, so that you are meeting each other sort of at a ground zero of shared human experience.

Focusing on Love and Acceptance

     Since starting ERP again last week, my therapist and I have talked about the root of some of my religious obsessions, and a lot of the root of my problem seems to stem from the fact that my early religious training and religious dialogue were fear and guilt driven. My therapist has remarked time and time again that I carry around a lot of guilt for someone who is objectively considered to be a good person by most people. My other therapist called it the Catholic guilt, from my time in the Catholic Church. I don't care how you label it. All I care about is the fact that this guilt is heavy and that it plays a HUGE roll in the compulsive part of my disorder. I will do anything that I think might get that guilt off my chest so I can breathe. Hence, the compulsive praying for forgiveness and the reassurance seeking.
     My grandmother's main idea about her Baptist faith was that everything and pretty much everyone was bad on some level. Hellfire and brimstone everywhere all the time, throughout my formative years. Example: I was told I was going to send my soul to Hell around the age of 8 or so because an aunt had me repeat a curse word (to say that someone was pissing someone off), even though I was only doing as I was told by an older adult, even though I didn't mean the words. I was also told that certain sins were absolutely not forgivable. (My intrusive thoughts fell into that absolutely unforgivable category when I started to have intrusive thoughts.)
     In other words, my grandparents weren't big on the unconditional love idea and the idea that God accepts us as we are, in all our brokenness and darkness because God knows we are human and humans are far from perfect. As a result of that teaching, for years, I have carried around guilt about the idea that my OCD made me unacceptable and most definitely undeserving of unconditional love from God. I finally started to feel the guilt lessen when I started receiving treatment and I realized that I had a mental health condition that wasn't my fault, which also meant that the intrusive thoughts weren't my fault.
     Starting ERP has brought all those feelings back up. I knew that was a possibility, but I'm still surprised that it happened. I know that logically I am acceptable to God, but emotionally, I'm still in a place that is guilt-riddled, a place that still makes me feel unacceptable and undeserving. My therapist is actually having me work on that this week by visualizing that I am acceptable, and its more difficult than it sounds. I'm working it in to my meditation practice. I know my emotional brain will eventually catch up to the logical parts brain. I just have to redirect to focus on love and acceptance until that becomes the new pathway routed through my brain.
     I'll end with this: I never realized how much things from my early years could impact my mental health later in life. My early years planted the seeds for what would later turn out to be my first OCD obsession, so please, be mindful of the things you are saying to your children. I also didn't realize until today that I was still carrying around, buried somewhere, the feeling that my intrusive thoughts meant that I was probably the only person on the planet to which God's unconditional love and unfailing acceptance did not apply. I said it in my first post, and I'll say it again. If you're like me and you're worried that God doesn't love you because of something you've done, said, or thought, and you feel guilty, ashamed, and undeserving, please don't hold onto that. God's love is unconditional. God accepts us for who we are imperfect, broken, and all.

Exposure and Response Prevention

     For the past couple of weeks, I have been discussing exposure therapy with my therapist. I decided this week was the week that I wanted to dive into that part of my treatment. Diving in might not be the best way to describe it because I had to do some prep work before I could try it out again, but, to me, it felt like diving into the deep end when I did the exposure exercise.
     I mentioned before that therapy, especially something as potentially traumatic as exposure therapy, is taken at a baby steps pace. Before I could try out exposure exercises again, I had to make sure I remembered my relaxation techniques. I also had to make sure I had a place in my mind, like a safe area, that I could retreat to in distress. I actually had to construct a happy place in my mind. (I hadn't previously done that, so I had to do that the week before and practice going there.)
     I went into my weekly session this week with my preferred relaxation technique and my happy place at the ready. Near the end of my session, I had to rate my anxiety so we could have a baseline. Then I had to set a number that I thought would be okay for my anxiety to jump to. (Think of it like judging pain on one of those ER pain scales.) A two point jump is all my therapist will allow, and I'm totally fine with that.
     Then came the time for the exposure exercise. Since we are treating my religious obsession first, I had to do something that would deliberately trigger my blasphemous intrusive thoughts, and I couldn't do any compulsive prayer or anything to ward off any consequences of my bad thoughts. My time limit for the trigger was 5 minutes maximum, but I only made it a couple of seconds before my anxiety jumped from a 2 to a 4 and the guilt rushed in. I tried to listen to a Gospel song, and I backed out after at most 3 or 4 seconds of the song. Then I cried. Then I had to practice my relaxation technique and go to my happy place.
     I'm surprised. First, I'm surprised at the fact that I couldn't do the exercise for more than a few seconds. I had expected to get closer to the five minute maximum time limit. Second, I'm surprised at the sheer amount of guilt that came rushing in and caused my anxiety to spike even higher. I hadn't felt guilt like that in over a year, since my diagnosis. In less than 5 seconds, I was right back to feeling like I was such a bad person that I didn't belong in my church with all the good people.
     According to my therapist, you have to deal with leftover feelings doing ERP. I had to deal with guilt that was left over from all those years of sitting in church, with intrusive thoughts screaming in my mind, and then hiding the shame and guilt that came after those thoughts. I have a lot of guilt to deal with after nearly six years of hiding my mental health condition and thinking I was possessed.
     I only needed a couple of minutes to calm back down so I could be logical, and that was also surprising. I had stopped shaking and crying by the time I left her office. My feelings of guilt had also dropped significantly by the time I left her office.
     I had been terrified that doing exposure exercises would send me into a downward spiral that would put me back in a bad place in my recovery. That didn't happen. I was exhausted but fine even after I got home. I still carried around some guilt for the rest of the day, and I was a little bit more emotional after I got home. I did notice, though, that my intrusive thoughts weren't really more intense this time, as they had been the first time I tried out an exposure exercise some months ago.
     How do I feel now? I feel relieved. I feel like I jumped over a hurdle, and I managed to land on my feet instead of flat on my face. I faced a fear and then felt like I could even do it again. Although, knowing that the exposures will become more intense the longer I keep doing them as part of the desensitization to my intrusive thoughts makes me feel a little nervous.
     I'll end with this: Thinking about starting ERP is scary, but going through ERP is definitely a better course of action than avoiding ERP and being controlled by my OCD. ERP is not something to be taken lightly, and it does take some prep work before you can start exercises. I don't like doing the exposures, but I do them anyway because I know that is the way to get well again.

Roller Coaster

     Since I have been forced to deal with my anxiety for the past year, I have realized something. I have realized that living with anxiety isn't just about managing the anxiety symptoms day-to-day; it's also about managing the roller coaster of emotions and mood swings that come with living with anxiety.  I have even noticed (thanks to my mom for pointing it out and making me keep up with it) that my anxiety-induced emotional roller coaster tends to go in a specific pattern.
     My pattern is always the same as far as I have noticed. I get the really high anxiety for a few days or weeks, depending on a number of factors. Then, after the anxiety starts to drop, I get super emotional. I just want to cry, about anything and everything or for seemingly no reason at all, and that lasts for a day or two. Then, after the crying comes the low period. I just feel "blah" and mildly unhappy and exhausted. I just want to curl up and watch TV all day. The low only lasts for a few days or a week, like the really high anxiety, and then I go back to feeling more like myself. (I can go for weeks or even a month now, or this last time a couple of months, without high anxiety, and then the emotional roller coaster doesn't happen. I can feel like myself all the time.)
     Becoming depressed and suicidal is actually one of my Pure O obsessive worries, so you can imagine how much I freaked out when I realized that these low periods were becoming a regular part of my life with anxiety. Then the freak out just caused me more anxiety that would start the whole, overwhelming roller coaster ride all over again. I worried for a long time that I might have Bipolar Disorder because of the ups and downs I experience on a regular basis now. (My therapists both assured me that I don't have Bipolar Disorder, so I haven't been misdiagnosed a second time.)
     In other words, my anxiety can make me feel like I'm all over the place emotionally, and I didn't understand that or know what to do with it. All I knew was that it freaked me out and made me feel out of control. My therapist calls it something like my pattern of getting well (I think). Now that I know that this is a pattern I will likely always live with as long as I live with anxiety, I just ride the roller coaster and hope it doesn't take a long time before I can get off of it and back to myself.
     I can't really change the pattern or force myself not to have any low periods. So, I just cry when I need to cry. When that goes away I treat myself like I would treat someone else who was feeling low. I Pinterest and I watch my favorite movies. I rest. I also hang on to the fact that I know I will eventually feel better if I give myself the time I need to get there. (I also try not to give in to my obsessive worry that I'm getting depressed and I won't recover, but that is a little bit difficult.) It's apparently a pretty common thing for anxiety to directly cause mood swings or to cause so much distress that it indirectly causes mood swings, much like any other stress can make some people moody.
     I'll end with this: Living with anxiety is more than just managing anxiety symptoms day-to-day. Sometimes it feels like I'm unwillingly strapped into an emotional roller coaster. It's okay to cry and be exhausted. You can't force your emotions to always be under your control. Sometimes you just have to ride it out, and that's okay. Feeling like you're riding an emotional roller coaster when you live with anxiety doesn't mean you require a new clinical diagnosis, but if you feel like something else is to blame you should definitely talk to a therapist/your doctor. You won't always feel all over the place.

Hormones and Mental Health

     We all hear about how pregnancy can impact our mental health because of Postpartum Depression. We all hear about how menopause can impact our mental health because a lot of women experience clinical Depression after menopause. We all hear about Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder (PMDD) and how rough the couple of weeks before periods can be for some women.
     The thing I don't see talked about a lot (outside of a couple women's discussion forums) is how normal monthly hormone fluctuations (your period, your lady's days, Aunt Flo, whatever you want to call it) impact an already existing mental health condition. I know that since I've been struggling with severe anxiety since last summer, my anxiety and my intrusive thoughts spike about a week, sometimes 2 weeks, before my period. I get normal PMS, and then my anxiety skyrockets on top of that. It seems like any little thing can trigger my anxiety around that time, too. I even started to wonder if I might have PMDD. I don't, but I was concerned about it until I figured out how common it was for most mental health conditions to be worse during monthly hormone fluctuations.
     I was curious about this because I never knew that my mental health condition could be so closely tied to my hormones. I talked about it with my therapist, and she said it was a common complaint among females with anxiety. I read in 2 discussion forums for women that most women felt like their OCD, Anxiety, or Depression was more severe a week or two before their periods, even when they didn't have Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder.
     What can you do to help when your mental health condition is so closely tied to your hormones? Well, a large number of the ladies in the discussion forums with anxiety conditions said they chose to go on birth control just to level out their hormones. If Depression is the problem when your hormones fluctuate, my therapist mentioned that doctors will usually prescribe Prozac to help. You just have to talk to your gynecologist and/or your regular doctor. Since my problem is OCD, I just take L-theanine (200mg) that my therapist suggested when my anxiety gets higher than normal before my period.
     I also do some other things when my anxiety is high because of hormone fluctuations. I try to stay busy doing things I enjoy. I spend extra time practicing ukulele, and I watch people play songs on ukulele on YouTube. I talk to friends more. I try to write, even when I don't feel like writing because I'm exhausted. I read more. I watch funny shows like I Love Lucy on Hulu. (I also ate a whole bag of marshmallows over a period of a week and a half, which may be a bad thing...)
     My point is that during the 2 weeks before my period, I have to double my coping efforts. I have to cope with the PMS as well as the extra high anxiety. I can't give in to the all the cravings for the extra sugar and caffeine and the junk food like I used to because that would just negatively impact my anxiety. I also can't just give into the PMS fatigue because then my anxious brain gets bored and goes haywire, so I clean things in spurts of energy between rest periods.
     I'll end with this: I hadn't realized that my mental health condition could be impacted by the usual, monthly hormone fluctuations. PMS with an added mental health condition can be an overwhelming combination, and it's okay to talk to your doctor/gynecologist about something (like medication or some extra coping techniques) they think might help. It doesn't even mean that you have PMDD, but if you think you might you should talk to your doctor because PMDD has a specific treatment plan outside of your already diagnosed mental health condition.

Natural Remedies to Help Anxiety

     My therapist and I recently discussed medication, and we landed on my unwillingness to try them because of the side effects that come with certain medications (feeling suicidal, the possibility of worsened intrusive thoughts, more anxiety). I told her that if medications didn't have side effects like that I would be willing to try them. (As in, either the medication works or you don't get anything from it at all is similar to what I told my therapist.) This led her to bring up the topic of natural remedies that have proven effective in managing anxiety symptoms. She mentioned 1 supplement and 2 herbal remedies that could help me with no nasty side effects.

1. L-Theanine (particularly the kind made with Suntheanine): This is an herbal remedy. L-Theanine is found in green and black teas. I consider this one to be the safest because it doesn't have any negative side effects. I ordered myself a bottle of capsules from Amazon. 100mg isn't strong enough to lower my anxiety, so the next time I try it I'll try 200mg. It does make me groggy, but I can still function when I take it. (I also read a study that 200mg of L-Theanine worked better than Xanax. I'll provide a link to that information at the bottom.)

2. Valerian Root: This is also one of the herbal remedies that my therapist mentioned during our session. Valerian is a sedative, and it is often used to treat insomnia, but it can also reduce anxiety. (You shouldn't take it if you take other things that make you drowsy.) I haven't tried this one, and I don't intend to try it since it is a sedative. I need to function normally throughout the day to write.

3. GABA: GABA occurs naturally in our brains. L-Theanine (see above) boosts GABA in your brain, which makes you calmer. The results on taking a GABA supplement for anxiety are sort of sketchy. It's even suggested that it might be better to try L-Theanine or Magnesium, and some B vitamins to help with GABA without having to take a straight GABA supplement. (Link below, at the end of this post.)

     I know there are more natural remedies for anxiety floating around out there, and I would be interested to hear more about some of those if any of my readers have any experience with things I didn't list here. I listed these 3 because they were the ones that I discussed with my therapist and that we researched a little during my session.
     If you feel like you need some help managing anxiety symptoms, but you don't want to take any psychoactive drugs, these natural herbal remedies and supplements might be another great option. You should consult with your doctor and/or therapist and do plenty of research before you try any herbal remedy or supplement.
     I'll end with this: If you don't like the idea of taking medications just yet or you want to save that as a last resort, trying out some herbal remedies and supplements (with the approval of your therapist or doctor) might be an option to try. These remedies and supplements don't have the nasty side effects that make medications so hard to tolerate, but they may not help everyone. Everyone's brain and anxiety is different, and may respond differently to any of these alternative treatments.

Links:
1. L-Theanine: http://www.lifeextension.com/magazine/2007/8/report_stress_anxiety/page-02
2. GABA: http://overcomingyouranxiety.net/naturalanxietyremedies/gaba-for-anxiety/

Labeled: One Year Later

     I'm coming up on the one-year anniversary of my Primarily Obsessional OCD diagnosis this weekend (on October 2nd). I still remember how I felt that day when the therapist I was working with at the time said the words Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. I felt mixed emotions. On the one hand, I was relieved because we had figured out the real problem, and that meant we could actually treat it. On the other hand, I felt scared of the OCD diagnosis, and I felt ashamed because I felt like having OCD meant I was crazy or that something was really wrong with me. A weight had been lifted that I had been carrying for years, but it was quickly replaced with a different weight that felt just as heavy.
     A year ago, I didn't want anyone to know that I had been diagnosed with Pure O. I was afraid people's opinions of me would suddenly change or that they wouldn't see me for who I really was and who I wanted to be anymore. I felt like someone had slapped a Post-It on my forehead, and that the Post-It was all everyone was going to be able to see. I knew about the stigma associated with mental illnesses like OCD, and I also knew that OCD was ranked pretty highly on the list of most debilitating mental health conditions. I was afraid, then, when I had to come face-to-face with all those things.
     I even had a little bit of a freak out. What if I didn't get better? What if this got in the way of my writing and getting published? What if no one wanted to date me because of the OCD? What if someone did want to date me and I let the OCD and anxiety ruin it? Did I still want to have children knowing that I could pass on the chemical imbalance in my brain that had made my life a silent Hell for so long? For some reason these concerns didn't hit me when I was diagnosed with Panic Disorder, but they hit me like speeding bullets when the OCD diagnosis came.
     Now, a year later, I'm in a different place. I'm always aware of my OCD, but it doesn't feel as heavy as it felt a year ago. I'm not terrified of the OCD anymore because I know how my OCD works. I don't feel like I still have the Post-It slapped on my forehead, and I've managed to make some new friends post-diagnosis that don't care that I have OCD. I'm getting back to myself now, after a long and hard battle to hang on to myself with the OCD at its worst. I don't feel crazy (most days), and I don't feel like something is really wrong with me anymore. I realized that I'm just an imperfect  human, and I'm no longer ashamed of that.
     Over the past year, I have also stopped hiding my OCD. I talk about mental health and therapy. I talk about OCD with people when they ask. I mention the Pure O and therapy, if someone asks or brings up mental health, just like I would tell them about a weather report. I treat it like any other topic of conversation, and I mostly don't feel embarrassed about it anymore. (I haven't been embarrassed to talk about my Cerebral Palsy in quite some time, so I don't see why I needed to treat my mental health any differently.) Although, I don't discuss my obsessions with people that aren't my therapist or my mother, but I can talk about obsessions in a general sense if someone asks about them.
     A lot of my questions have been answered over the past year. I'm getting better. The anxiety did get in the way of my writing over the last year, but I have recently been able to start writing the way I was able to write before the anxiety disorder. I still wanted to have children after I realized that I could manage my mental health condition with the right tools and the right help. (Maybe my freak out was a little blown out of proportion now that I look back on it.)
     A year ago, I felt like being diagnosed with OCD was a HUGE deal, and I was afraid that it was going to impact every area of my life in a negative way. My mom even says that dealing with OCD on a daily basis is "something major". Now, I realized that being diagnosed with OCD was a big deal in some ways, but that in other ways it wasn't a big deal. It's a big deal in the sense that it is a chronic illness, and I had to make lifestyle (and cognitive) changes in order to manage it. It isn't a big deal in the sense that I've realized that it doesn't define who I am or what I can do with my life, and it hasn't changed who I am as a person.
     I'll end with this: I wasn't sure I would ever reach this point in living with my OCD. I thought I might lose myself somewhere along the way, and sometimes I felt like I did lose myself in the battles with my mental health condition. Sometimes, all I could see was the label I felt I'd been given, but today, I can see more in myself than just what I struggle with. Coping with the diagnosis of a mental health condition, like any other chronic health condition, can be hard at first, but it gets easier over time. It's an adjustment, and it's okay to be scared. It might feel like your life is never going to be the same again, but that isn't exactly true. I'm surprised at how close to my normal that my life feels at this moment, a year after a diagnosis that I was afraid would change everything.

Another Ah-Ha! Moment

     I usually contribute most of my anxiety to my OCD without looking too deep to see if there might be another problem underneath the OCD. Sometimes I contribute my unease to free floating anxiety that I can't explain. I thought it was impossible to really figure out the things that seemed to trigger my OCD to flare up randomly when I was in the middle of laughing at something or otherwise experiencing life as an average human.
     Then I noticed that, since I added an actual Mindfulness meditation to my daily routine four weeks ago, that it has become easier for me to take a step back and objectively observe my anxiety. I have found it easier to distance myself from my own mind in the past few weeks (with the exception of those days when my anxiety reaches panic attack level). Distancing myself and being objective has also enabled me to find my biggest trigger for my OCD.
     Mindfulness meditation, in the short 4 weeks that I've been practicing every day, has also made me much more observant of my own reactions to things. As a result of that new awareness, I noticed that any time that I wasn't in a neutral or content emotional state, the volume would get turned up on my intrusive thoughts. If I got sad or frustrated or stressed or scared or even too happy, my intrusive thoughts would swirl in like a tornado. I even noticed when I had a brief moment of feeling inadequate over the past week the OCD flared up. As long as I was content or not feeling much of anything (unless confronted with my religious or other triggers in my external environment) my mind was relatively quiet.
     This was another grand Ah-Ha! moment for me. I understood a little bit better. This moment of realization also drove home the point that I'm REALLY not good with all the feel-y things. I talked to my therapist about it, and she seems to think it makes sense considering I've spent the majority of my life attempting to shut down my feelings. (Why did I think that was a good idea?)
     This latest realization has also changed the way I deal with my anxiety a little bit more. In a way, since its easy to spot my triggers, I am more prepared to deal with the free floating anxiety and the OCD. Now, when I notice that my intrusive thoughts are more frequent than usual, or if I notice extra anxiety hanging around when I haven't noticed any triggers in the environment, I stop and take a step back. I ask myself, "What am I feeling that might make this worse right now?" Then I take a breath, and I try accept the feeling and actually let myself feel it. It seems that once I become open to feeling something my mind quiets down.
     Now, as a result of this new realization, I'm also more prepared to deal with the OCD spikes when they happen. I sort of expect them when I'm in a situation that I know might cause me to feel sad or frightened or stressed or too happy. (As I typed that sentence, I couldn't help but to think about how poorly I must have dealt with life up to this point.) When I expect them, it becomes easier to really believe that it is just an anxiety disorder, and I can brush them off. It's a relief any time I avoid the rumination that can take up hours or even days of my time.
     I'll end with this: I never thought feeling things was so important, and I have realized that was a mistake. Hiding feelings, muting them, or convincing yourself that you're too logical for feelings can have long term, damaging consequences. Accepting all the feelings and letting yourself feel them really is the best way to deal with them. If you're distress intolerant like me, I encourage you to check out Mindfulness and try it out.

On Being Highly Sensitive

     I've always felt like I was weird, and not in a good way, like something was wrong with me. I felt like I didn't handle things like disappointment, the death of pets or loved ones, or even something as simple as loud noises and strong smells as well as everyone else around me. I felt like I was too sensitive to things at best, and I felt like I was overdramatic at worst. I hated that the smallest things could make me cry, make me feel so overwhelmed that I needed to shut down, make me anxious, or make me feel terribly sad. I hated that it felt like I couldn't control my own emotions sometimes. Not only did I hate it, but feeling things so strongly tended to freak me out so that I thought I needed to shut it down to be "normal" and sometimes even to survive.
     Then my second therapist had me do some research on Highly Sensitive People. It turns out that I'm not actually weird, too sensitive, or overdramatic. I'm just a Highly Sensitive Person, like around fifteen to twenty percent of the general population. It's not a clinical sort of thing. I don't need fixing because of it. Being a Highly Sensitive Person is just an innate trait, and some research suggests that it may be genetic, (Aron, 2016). (My mom is also a Highly Sensitive Person, and so was my grandmother.)
     I know I've mentioned that I am a Highly Sensitive Person in previous blog posts, but it occurred to me that not many people may know what that really means. Basically, being highly sensitive means that I process things like my emotions and my external environment on a deeper cognitive level. That also means that because I process things on a deeper level, I feel emotions more intensely, and I react to things like being startled or repeated loud noises more intensely than someone who isn't a Highly Sensitive Person. (I'm jumpy, like a cat...) I can also become overstimulated quickly by loud environments, strong smells, lights that are too bright, and even just too many people talking at once while I'm trying to pay attention. I may also get overwhelmed and become anxious when I have too much to do in a rushed timeframe, which is why I was never a procrastinator in school. (That's called sensory overload, and it happens with anxiety disorders as well.) (Aron, 2016).
     What else does being a Highly Sensitive Person mean? It also means that I am more susceptible to experience an anxiety disorder and/or depression, according to a Psychology Today post. I also mentioned in a previous post that I also muted my feelings whenever possible, which may have also contributed to my development of Pure OCD. That makes so much more sense now that I understand that I feel things more intensely. Not all Highly Sensitive People will develop an anxiety disorder or depression, but it does seem worth knowing that being Highly Sensitive might make someone more susceptible to something like that.
     Why do I think it's important that I recognize that I am a Highly Sensitive Person? Because I felt like an overdramatic weakling, like I was too sensitive to deal with normal events before I realized that it was just an innate trait that I have. That was an unpleasant feeling. Realizing that I am a Highly Sensitive Person has also helped me to be more accepting of myself and my feelings. Even just understanding why I'm feeling something in a certain way, and why I have difficulty shaking off my feelings the way everyone else seems to, has decreased my anxiety related to my emotional state.
     I'll end with this: We live in a culture that tends to prize developing a thick outer skin instead of sensitivity, but that definitely doesn't mean that being a Highly Sensitive Person is bad thing. Getting to know and understand yourself is super important, even if you aren't trying to learn to deal with a mental health condition, because you have to know and understand yourself before you can accept yourself. If you're interested in learning more about Highly Sensitive People, or if you think you might be a Highly Sensitive Person, I encourage you to check out the work of Elaine Aron online or to buy her book on Amazon. You can even take a self test.

Sources:
1. Aron, E. N. (2016). Retrieved from http://hsperson.com/
2. https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/sense-and-sensitivity/201210/coping-anxiety-hsp

New Hope

     This past week, I had a sort of Ah-Ha! moment. I'm not sure exactly what made something click into place in my mind, but it happened. I was reading online about mental health topics, and this particular night I was reading about anxiety disorders and intrusive thoughts. (I was having a rough day, and reading about people with similar experiences to my own makes me feel less alone.)
     Intrusive thoughts on any frightening topic imaginable happen with any anxiety disorder. I read about a lady with Generalized Anxiety Disorder that had intrusive thoughts about murdering her children. I read about someone with Panic Disorder that also had to deal with equally catastrophic intrusive thoughts. I was already aware of the OCD intrusive thoughts, but I read about a couple of those recovery stories as well. (You know...if those people can recover and learn to dismiss their scary intrusive thoughts, surely I can do the same.)
     I went to my weekly therapy session, and I discussed the prevalence of intrusive thoughts across the board of anxiety disorders with my therapist. She nodded. Then she said, "Everyone has intrusive thoughts at one point or another." Everyone in the world has thought something blasphemous or violent or something equally frightening and repulsive at least once in their lives, but they choose not to pay attention to that weird thought. I knew that logically, but for some reason that idea just recently sank into my mind that they were able to choose what thoughts they paid attention to.
     I also talked to my therapist about my meditation practice, and I told her that thoughts would pop up about what I wanted to wear the next day, or about my friends, or some scene from a movie. She informed me that those were also considered intrusive thoughts simply because I didn't want to be thinking about those things while I was meditating. I just brushed those thoughts away, though, and went back to focusing on my breathing. I said, "But those don't count. They don't bother me." She said something like, "Exactly. Other people treat the thoughts that you don't like that way and move on, too."
     Then something just clicked, and an idea seemed to take root in my mind. I can actually choose what thoughts I pay attention to. I knew that already, but I had never realized it could happen to me. I didn't realize that I did it every day already with certain thoughts. (I'm not saying that I do that with my OCD thoughts, but I'm saying that I realized that I could get to that point eventually.) I felt like a new, sunshine-y ray of hope had peeked out from behind the clouds.
     For somebody trapped by OCD into being sensitive to certain thoughts and being forced into paying attention to them, the idea of having a choice in the matter almost felt like a foreign concept. I often feel like I don't have a choice but to pay attention to every repulsive thought that rolls through my mind because I hate the thoughts. It's like a lightbulb moment to actually take to heart the idea that thoughts are junk, that they don't matter, and that I can be still considered a good person if I don't freak out about the thoughts that I don't like.
     I'll end with this: Thoughts don't matter. It's how you react and treat the thoughts that matters, and actually realizing that is a big deal. I encourage you to read some recovery stories online if you're having a bad day. If somebody else can recover from something similar to what any one of us has going on in our minds, then so can we.

The Reality of Recovery

     During my most recent bout of extremely high anxiety, my mom and I continued to discuss my mental health. A few of our conversations brought up my recovery from my Primarily Obsessional OCD. We both agree that I have made progress. Yet, sometimes I still am not doing as well as my mom and I both wish. I still have really bad days during which I am either hysterical, medicated, or sleeping with no moments of naturally occurring peace in sight.
     Sometimes, when I'm really struggling, my mom will say something like, "I can't wait until you don't have these thoughts anymore." She may also say something like, "There has to be a way to get better faster." I think the same things sometimes, especially on my bad days. It would be great to just suddenly not have my intrusive thoughts, and it would be great to change the way my brain functions more quickly. I have discovered that those are not realistic ideas or expectations.
     These ideas are pretty common in our society. I know when I went to my intake appointment these were my expectations, even though I studied psychology in college. I assumed the recovery process was going to be moderately quick and moderately painless. I assumed that recovery meant that I would no longer have intrusive thoughts, and that I would no longer experience symptoms of OCD or anxiety. I assumed therapy and medication could be this quick and magical cure.
     The reality of my recovery from OCD is that, according to my research, I could be in therapy for around 2 years, and even then my OCD won't be cured because OCD doesn't have a cure. I will probably always have anxiety symptoms and intrusive thoughts. The goal of treatment isn't even to eliminate intrusive thoughts but to change the way I react to them. The goal is to accept the thoughts and not to become anxiety-riddled, hysterical, and to not get sucked into ruminating on the thoughts. The goal is to treat intrusive thoughts the way I treat other random thoughts, like the non-OCD population does when they have the same thoughts. (Some days I can do that now. Other days I can't.)
     The reality of recovery from any chronic illness, like a mental health condition, is that symptoms may always be present, but managing the symptoms can become easier. There is no quick fix for something like anxiety disorders or depression or eating disorders or PTSD. Recovery takes time because it's actually hard work full of learning, homework, lifestyle changes, and changes to our very thought patterns that we have to intentionally implement. Medication can help if you choose medication as part of your treatment, but the reality of medication is that it is a trial and error process until you and your doctor find the one that works best for you. The process is completely worth it when you find something that enables you to function at your desired level, though.
     The reality of being recovered is that being recovered doesn't mean that I'll be done with therapy (or medication if you choose medication). I may need to go back to therapy throughout my life to maintain my recovery, just like any person dealing with a chronic physical illness continues doctor visits to maintain wellness. (Medication may always be part of maintaining wellness as well, and that is okay.) I may also still have some bad days after being considered recovered, but (hopefully) the way I manage the bad days will make them feel less severe so I can shake them off sooner. (Sometimes I'm in a place where the bad days can be shortened to a bad few hours or something like that, but not always.)
     The reality of my recovery looks a lot different from the ideas I had about recovery when I first had my intake appointment. I can't say that I wasn't disappointed by the reality check my therapist served up, but I can say that I am much better at working toward recovery because of that reality check. I have a better picture of what recovery from my mental health condition looks like, and I think that makes it easier to recognize progress. I also think the idea of recovery that I have now has done a lot to help me not be so hard on myself  during my journey toward wellness and recovery.
     I'll end with this: Recovery from any chronic condition, especially mental health conditions, takes a lot of time and effort, and the process looks different for everyone. Recovery may not look the way that you pictured in your mind in the beginning, but that's okay. You wouldn't expect someone with asthma to never have asthma symptoms just because they were being treated for their asthma, so you shouldn't expect yourself to never have symptoms of whatever mental health condition is part of your life.

No One is a Lost Cause

     My mom and I were talking about my mental health recently. My mom usually says something like, "I wish you would have told me that you thought you needed a doctor." Or, "I wish you would have told me what was happening instead of hiding it so I could have gotten you counseling." She seems to not understand how deeply terrified I was of my own mind at the time it all started and for years after. Looking back, I wish I would have just told her what was happening because if I had, I would be in a completely different place mentally than I am right now.
     I know it doesn't make sense that I wouldn't seek help to most people who have been to therapy for something or who have never struggled with a mental health condition. I also know I only did more damage to myself by not seeking help. I had always been pro-counseling. I even suggested that other people get counseling when they felt like something wasn't quite right.
     When it came to myself and the type of OCD I was (unknowingly) dealing with and the thoughts I kept hearing in my mind, I just couldn't seek help. I felt like no one could help me. I thought whatever was happening inside my mind was my fault, like I had opened the door and let the bad things in, and that no form of modern medicine or therapy would be able to silence the demons I had accidently welcomed into my life. I didn't even think my problem was a mental one. I thought it was a soul problem.
     My mom, throughout my repeated episodes of the worst of the Pure O, asked me, "Why don't you let me make you an appointment for counseling?" She even asked that in my 2015 episode, and I rejected the idea. My primary care physician mentioned therapy for the panic attacks, and I struggled with the idea of therapy for weeks before I finally gave in. (I still have no idea what my mom picked up on to make her realize that something was wrong because I thought I was hiding it pretty well.)
     So, why didn't I just wise up and go sooner? Because I thought I needed an exorcism instead of therapy. My second worst fear regarding asking for help was that I would just be locked away somewhere because I was too dark and evil to be among the rest of humanity. I literally went to my intake appointment at the community mental health organization sure the therapist would turn me away or use some sort of code phrase to signal that I should be taken somewhere without even getting to say goodbye to my mom and my cat, because the therapist wouldn't know how to help someone in my position.
     I felt like I was unable to be helped or saved. I felt like no one in the world would be able to make me less broken or to fix me. I was even pretty sure whatever demon had attached itself to my soul wouldn't be touched by the exorcism because maybe I didn't have enough faith to be able to shake it (since no amount of prayer, hymn singing, church attendance, or Bible reading had taken away the bad thoughts). If I was insane (which I also thought was a reasonable assumption), I thought I was so far gone down the path of insanity that no amount of therapy or medication would be able to bring me back to myself. I thought I was a lost cause, and I was afraid that asking for help would only validate that idea for me.
     When I finally opened up, I was shocked that my mom didn't recoil in horror or disgust. She just basically said, "It's anxiety. Sometimes stuff like that happens to me, too. You just need some medication and/or therapy." My primary care physician had nearly the same reaction as my mother. Then my therapist was completely un-phased by the things I told her. She basically said, "You are definitely not the worst case I have seen, and I can totally treat you as an outpatient. This is a real mental health condition, and it is treatable." She even promised that no one would perform an exorcism, as did my priest, because no one thought I was evil or possessed.
     All the ideas and the fear that I felt kept me from seeking help were also just part of the disorder I was dealing with. They were also due in large part to the fact that I didn't understand anything that was happening (which would have been cleared up if I had just talked to my mom). I did a lot of research (and I still do lots of research) just to understand more about therapy, things that help, and my own disorder. It also turned out that I wasn't a lost cause. That realization brought me tears of joy.
     I'll end with this: No matter what kind of mental health condition you are dealing with, be it OCD or any of the OCD subtypes, Anxiety Disorders, Depression, PTSD, Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia,  Eating Disorders, or Personality Disorders, or anything in between YOU ARE NOT A LOST CAUSE. YOU ARE NEVER A LOST CAUSE. It is never too late to seek help. The right kind of help for whatever is happening in your mind is out there (whether you choose a free App for your phone, the clergy, a crisis line, or face-to-face counseling...it's out there). I repeat: NO ONE IS EVER A LOST CAUSE.

The Two People in My Mind

     I've said the same thing over and over again since I've been battling Primarily Obsessional OCD. I've said to both of my therapists and my mother that it feels like two extremely different people live in my mind. At this point, I have even affectionately named them Anxious Annie and Logical Lucy.
     Anxious Annie personifies the OCD. She is irrationally driven by fear of every thought I have. She freaks out at the slightest thing she labels as abnormal or bad (and she thinks almost everything that isn't sunshine and rainbows is bad). Then when Logical Lucy tries to step in and calm Anxious Annie, Anxious Annie attacks her. (And let me tell you that Anxious Annie is like a trained UFC Fighter.)
     Logical Lucy personifies the rational part of my mind. She knows the whole time that Anxious Annie is being irrational. She is like the calm therapist that tries to talk Anxious Annie out of her anxious tirade. She tries to explain to Anxious Annie that she really doesn't need to be so anxious, and she occasionally has to talk Anxious Annie down from the precipice of a panic attack.
     Almost every day I feel like both of the people that live inside my mind are trying to claim my attention. At the same time I am worrying about something and falling into an obsessive thought spiral, I'm logically myself, too. That means I know the things I'm worrying about and thinking are irrational, but I am powerless to stop myself from doing those things. Knowing something is irrational and silly just makes me feel like a crazy person because, even though I know it's irrational, I can't stop thinking about it.
     Also, as a result of the two parts of my mind being at war, I also feel like I am a non-crazy person being held captive by a crazy person. I realize I am thinking or behaving in a way that my OCD is in control of the situation. I realize that my anxiety has gotten the best of me at times. It feels like Logical Lucy got handcuffed and thrown in jail while Anxious Annie got away with armed robbery of my sanity.
     How do I try to bring Logical Lucy to the front of my mind instead of Anxious Annie? I label my thoughts and practice Mindfulness. If something pops into my mind and it just keeps rolling around so that I have to keep thinking about it, I label it as an OCD thought. Then I try to objectively observe that thought until it stops happening. I may have to do that every few minutes for a while, but my brain eventually lands on something else to think about. It gets easier over time, and then I feel in control again.
     I'll end with this: Sometimes it can feel like your life is controlled by your mental health condition, and that sucks. I still feel like that sometimes after months of weekly therapy visits. It can be scary when it feels like your mind is holding you prisoner. Mindfulness practice helps me greatly. If you haven't tried it, I encourage you to research it and see what you think.

The Anxiety Override Coping Mechanism

     My therapist brought up something in my session last week, and this week I realized that she was absolutely right. She asked me something last week when I told her that my anxiety was still pretty high and my intrusive thoughts were still super frequent. She asked me, "What is your anxiety distracting you from that you don't really want to think about?" I had no answer for her because I was sure that my anxiety was the real problem and not something I didn't want to deal with.
     Then later, after discussion on another topic about being a high sensitive person and feeling too many things, she said something else that stuck in my mind. She said, "You know, anxiety is fear...fear of feelings." I thought I was past that since I had been using mindfulness to work through my feelings and improve my distress tolerance.
     I've been reading online about this idea presented to me by my therapist at the end of last week and the beginning of this week. Many, many people, particularly in Pure O forums and groups said in posts that their Pure OCD spiked when they worried about something or when they were under emotional stress (like dealing with feelings that were overwhelming). I even saw it referred to as some sort of coping mechanism to distract them from whatever it was that was too stressful to deal with. That sounded like an extremely twisted coping mechanism to me.
     I started to wonder how something could be so stressful that the intrusive thoughts, the anxiety, the shame, and the guilt were preferable to the something that was so stressful that our brains would just spin out of control just to keep us from thinking about it. Most mental health conditions will be exacerbated by any stress, but this was a slightly different idea. This was the idea that the anxiety took the place of whatever was actually happening to cause the emotional stress (the strong, overwhelming feelings) so that our brains could just slowly back away from that thing (like a person slowly backing away from a rabid animal in the hopes that it doesn't attack.)
     Then I got first hand experience with the very thing that I previously hadn't understood. My family experienced a loss, and the grief that I felt was so overwhelming and so consuming that I felt like I was drowning in it. One minute I was so devastated that I just wanted to curl into a ball and sob, and the next minute I was so angry that I hated everyone and everything and I wanted to destroy anything I could get my hands on. Too many emotions, all of them happening too quickly, can be a frightening experience.
     So, what happened? My intrusive thoughts (all 3 current categories) flooded my mind, and I could only focus on them. Then I realized that my Pure O was only trying to distract me from the grief (the rabid animal I was apparently too terrified to face). When I realized what was happening so I could mindfully observe the thoughts without focusing on them, more intrusive thoughts in categories I had never experienced rushed into my mind. I was even terrified of going to bed at night and dying in my sleep. I would get so wrapped up in focusing on the intrusive thoughts and mentally checking for them that I wouldn't feel my grief anymore. My anxiety had taken over so that I didn't have to feel the things that were so terrifying to me, and the anxiety almost felt like a relief sometimes, compared to the intense sense of loss that I've been terrified will never go away.
     I'll end with this: Feelings are scary, but I've learned the hard way that I can't hide from them or bury them forever. I have to remind myself every day at the moment that my therapist told me that all feelings eventually pass, even when it feels like I'll be stuck in a certain place forever. I also have to force myself to put more effort into my mindfulness practice at the moment to recognize, accept, and just feel my feelings. Then I just have to keep swimming until I reach a place where the current my grief and other feelings (including my anxiety) isn't trying to drag me under anymore. With grief it's hard to say when I'll reach that place, but I'll get there.

Settling for Okay

     Perfectionism (defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary online): a disposition to regard anything short of perfection as unacceptable (or as I like to call it, one of the many things that contributes greatly to my anxiety). I've always had this personality trait, and it never seemed like a big deal. It kept me out of trouble, helped me push myself to get good grades, and all the other things people usually strive for. This perfectionist personality trait also had some consequences, though, like the fact that when I didn't do as well as I wanted to on something, anxiety set in. If I made a mistake I would dwell on it for what felt like forever and feel terrible.
     Then the OCD set in, and it seemed to amplify my perfectionist personality trait. I had intrusive thoughts that I couldn't control, that I was sure only bad people had. I started to think that maybe to make up for those thoughts, if I just didn't do anything else wrong, if I didn't commit any other sins, maybe those thoughts could be overlooked in light of all the good things I had tried to do. In other words, if I could be morally perfect in every other way, the thoughts might not count as much. Talk about high standards...
     Striving for moral perfection became an obsession. (I still struggle with it a lot). I felt like I had to be 100% honest all the time, 100% selfless all the time, and 100% compassionate and understanding all the time. Anything less than that meant that I was a terrible person, and being a terrible person made me live a guilt-riddled existence. The problem is that no one is capable of achieving any of those standards I set for myself, and I knew no one else could possibly do that. Sounds irrational, then, doesn't it? Logically I know my ideas aren't rational, but logic doesn't always help my anxiety.
     My therapist likes to point out that the things I was trying to achieve were impossibly high standards because I'm only human, and humans are imperfect. (She likes to say that to me a whole lot.) She also asked me what my idea of a bad person was, and I realized that the definition of a bad person that I gave her didn't match anything that I had ever done. That doesn't really get rid of my guilt for my perceived moral infractions, no matter how small they are in reality, though.
     For weeks now, my therapist and I have been working on changing my faulty thought patterns. I've tried to shrug things off, and say, "So what? In the past I made mistakes, but the past doesn't matter as much as the present moment and the future. Everyone makes mistakes." I've also tried to wrap my anxious brain around the idea of settling for being an okay, mostly good, or at the least, an okay, not bad, human. Changing my perfectionist tendencies and my faulty thought patterns is a very difficult thing to do, but I'm trying to be more compassionate with myself than I have been in the past.
     I'll end with this: If you wouldn't hold someone else that you love to such high standards, why do you hold yourself to such standards? You don't have to be perfect to be a good person. Trying your best and being "okay" is perfectly acceptable. Being perfect is impossible. It doesn't mean that anyone is a failure or a bad person for being just an "okay", average human who has bad days, bad moods, and makes mistakes.

Talk it Out

     I've mentioned before that I was a loner who thought she might be too logical to actually have feelings. (Or, at least I pretended to be too logical while my feelings were actually trying to drown me on the inside). I've also always been a very private person, which means I've never felt the need to talk about my worries, problems, and especially not my feelings with another human being. I never minded listening to other people talk about those things, and I was glad to help in that way. If I thought about talking to someone about something like that it just seemed too...mushy and attention-seeking. I had to be tough and logical, always logical. I was afraid that feeling things meant I wasn't logical, so I was afraid of the feelings. (That wasn't logical, now was it?)
     One problem: I have lots of worries and lots and lots of feelings. It is pretty much impossible to be logical when your feelings are all bottled up inside, going all over the place like a toddler hopped up on caffeine chasing a Great Dane puppy around a small apartment. Trying to keep up with all the worries and the feelings to process them all so I could let them go when I wasn't even really allowing myself to admit that I had feelings that I needed to express just turned my mind into chaos. I tried writing about everything in the form of journaling or writing poetry, but that still didn't get me out of my own head so I could take a step back and process all the things. I was still giving the worries and the feelings so much power in my mind, even though I was expressing them in writing, that they were getting stuck and not moving along. So, things piled up and piled up, and I just kept bottling things up. Then the anxiety disorder kicked in.
     Then I went to therapy, and talking to my therapist about all the things helped. She offered me a simple explanation: she said that by keeping everything locked down and pretending I didn't feel things I was giving my own thoughts too much power, the power to overwhelm me and shove me down all these little thought trails of catastrophe because it's impossible to be logical when you feel so overwhelmed and afraid of things. By saying my thoughts and feelings (even my intrusive thoughts) out loud, I was taking away the power I had given them.
     When I heard some of my thoughts and resulting worries out loud, I realized that the thoughts sounded insignificant. I had let my mind blow things up into unreasonably catastrophic proportions, and then I was jumping to the conclusion that all those things were the worst possible things in the world. I just had to verbalize them, and then I could verbally logic my way back to the actual reality where I could realized that my thoughts were just thoughts and my worries were small. Then I could begin to process, and I didn't feel like I was drowning.
     I realized that I couldn't keep bottling things up like I had been. I had to talk about things so I could work through them. Even talking out loud to myself (when I'm home alone on particularly bad days with my OCD) helps me think more clearly and then I can process and move on.
     On issues when my OCD isn't the cause, like I feel weird or I wonder if my reaction to something is a typical, healthy reaction, or if I'm worried about something else, I talk to my mom or a friend that I know I can trust. I talk about any problem that bothers me now instead of keeping it bottled up or just writing about it, and talking about it always helps me, even when the other person doesn't offer any advice. It helps just because verbalizing my thoughts gets me out of my head. (I don't typically need advice or reassurance. I just need to say things and then logically dial it back down.)
     I also realized that talking to someone about something doesn't mean I'm weak or that I'm being an attention-seeking person. It just means that I've realized I don't have to deal with everything alone. I also realized that talking to someone about my OCD or anything else isn't some OCD compulsion for confession or reassurance seeking (because not everything is I do pathological). It just means that I'm human and humans need other humans.
     I'll end with this: You don't have to go through everything alone to be tough or strong. Talking about a mental health condition or your jumbled up feelings or something as simple as your everyday happy moments or concerns with someone is a good thing. It doesn't mean you're an attention-seeking person. It just means that you are human, and sometimes things (even happy things) can be too much for one person to deal with on their own. You don't have to go through everything alone, pretending everything is fine.

One Year Later

     This week is the anniversary of the huge meltdown that pushed me into therapy. I thought I'd finally had some kind of psychotic break, and that I was going to be placed in some kind of psychiatric facility. A year ago this week, I was hysterical. I was terrified that if anyone knew what was running through my mind, they would think I was evil. I thought I was evil, unworthy of God's love, even. I was so sure I would feel that way forever, that no one could help me. I can remember all those feelings just like it happened yesterday.
     A year later, and I'm still struggling. For the past few weeks, I have only been moderately hysterical, medicated, or asleep, with a few days of high functioning sprinkled in. (Hey, those few good days are better than nothing.) The fear that I'm not a good person (my biggest OCD issue) tries to creep back into my mind on a daily basis right now, and sometimes the OCD feels like it still wins. My situation right now seems similar to the place I was in at this time last year.
     Even though my current situation seems similar to the place I was in last year, there is one difference, and it's a very important difference. I understand now. I understand that these thoughts and this seemingly never-ending worry that I'm still not a good person are just the OCD. I understand that thoughts don't matter. I understand what is happening in my mind, and I know how to manage it (even if I'm struggling to manage it all right now). I also understand that these unpleasant feelings won't last forever. I know I can eventually get back to the place where my OCD isn't the loudest thing in my mind. I was just in that place about a month ago, and I was in that place for around 8 months. I was okay for 8 months, and I will be okay again. I understand that mental illness waxes and wanes over time, and that even when it gets worse, it isn't my fault. I understand that my anxiety and guilt aren't some sort of divine punishment.
     I will admit that I'm not in the place I thought I would be or in the place I wanted to be a year after what I was sure was a psychotic break. I expected to move through therapy in leaps and bounds instead of toddling along in baby steps with the occasional moments when I lose my balance and fall down. I will also admit that my super high expectations of therapy and of myself are part of my problem. My high expectations of myself even play a part in my obsession about whether or not I am truly a good person. (One year later, and I still need to work on not being too hard on myself.)
     One year later, and the point is that I survived. One year later, and I've fought my way into the place where I am right now. One year later, and I'm still a work in progress, and that's okay. The point is that I'm still trying everyday, and I know I have a long journey (still) of more treatment and recovery ahead.
     I'll end with this: It's nice to stop sometimes and just look at the progress you've made, even if you feel like you haven't made much progress at all. You're trying, so give yourself a break. If you're in a bad place right now, please don't lose hope. It can get better, and it will get better eventually. Our minds can be bullies so don't believe everything you think (something I'm still working on myself.)

Memory Lane

     Since I've been attending therapy sessions once a week, I've had some times when the volume has been turned way down on my intrusive thoughts. The quiet in my mind and the lack of anxiety caused by my intrusive thoughts is a relief...until I check in with myself and realize that I don't feel anxious. Then the free floating anxiety sets in.
     The free floating anxiety is actually more bothersome at this point than the anxiety caused by my intrusive thoughts. I know what to do to help manage my anxiety specific to my intrusive thoughts, but I have no idea how to manage anxiety that just hangs out in my mind that isn't attached to any specific thought. So, I just have to sit with that anxiety, which is something that I'm not exactly good at. At the first sign of free floating anxiety, my mind starts trying to solve the puzzle. The thoughts starting spinning around like a dog chasing its tail. Why do I feel anxious? What's going on? Why is this feeling still there? Why? Why? WHY?
     All the introspective questions and the digging just cause another problem. When I can't find an external trigger for my anxiety, my brain looks for an internal trigger. When it doesn't find any thoughts to deal with, it decides to take a trip down memory lane. On the trip down memory lane, all sorts of memories get brought to the surface of my mind, and none of them are pleasant. All of the memories are usually things that I would much rather forget, like some mistake I made sixteen years ago or some other guilt-inducing thing that I forget that I even did or said. These unpleasant trips down memory lane have been a nonstop cycle for the past few weeks now. Anything that can make me feel like a bad person gets dug up and shoved right to the front of my mind. Then I cry about it.
     I've read some other blogs and things like that, and apparently unpleasant trips down memory lane are a pretty common thing when you live with an anxiety disorder. The information I found said that the memories get brought up because our brains were used to such high levels of anxiety that it would do whatever to keep up the usual levels of anxiety (basically replacement anxiety all over again.) Will I never escape replacement anxiety?!
     The key to supposedly being able to let this go: acceptance and forgiveness. Accept that you made a mistake in the past because you're human, and you can't go back and change the past. Then, forgive yourself just like you'd forgive someone else if they made the same mistake. We're all human, and we all make mistakes. (My therapist likes to point this out to me regularly.) When a memory pops up and increases my anxiety, I try to just say, "Yeah, but I'm a different person now. I can try to not make that mistake again."
     I'll end with this: Memory lane isn't really the place any of us want to be when we're dealing with an anxiety disorder and replacement anxiety because our brains will latch on to anything to keep up the usual levels of anxiety. Remember, these sudden trips down memory lane that cause you anxiety aren't your fault, and the anxiety doesn't mean you're a bad person. We all should go a little easier on ourselves and realize that we're human. We just have to accept that we made a mistake (like every human makes mistakes), and then we have to try to forgive ourselves.

Threat Assessments from an Anxious Brain

     July is finally here, and I'm usually so excited about my birthday. Well, I'm not super excited this year. I'm more worried about having my anxiety ruin my birthday because, I know I've mentioned before, that in July, shortly before my birthday, was the time when I had my meltdown that landed me in therapy. Last year was a birthday that I do not look back on with happiness.

     My therapist asked me last week what I thought might be causing the heightened anxiety that I've been dealing with since around mid-June. I shrugged because I was sure it was PMS-related and that it would go away. Then a few days later, I caught myself thinking, "Man, I hope my anxiety doesn't ruin my birthday this year." I even caught myself praying more and more often that my anxiety wouldn't ruin my birthday. So...that was the root of my anxiety. I remembered the place I had been in last year at the time of my birthday, and I was terrified of being in that place again.

     I even caught myself guarding against my own mind, trying to protect myself from anything that made me anxious. I was so afraid of the way I felt last year at this time that I desperately wanted to avoid anything, any place, any thought that could send my anxious brain into overdrive lest I experience a major setback and have more panic attacks again. It’s like my anxious brain was constantly running a threat assessment and then deciding that everything my mind thought was a threat. It had been 8 months since my last panic attack, until Monday when my anxiety reared up and consumed me in a crowded park where I had hoped to watch some fireworks.
   Ever since that super high, panicked level of anxiety broke through the walls I thought I had built up, more anxiety has come. I wouldn’t say that I am back in that frightening place of last July, but I have definitely had a setback, all because I was so worried about how my anxiety was going to affect my birthday. The difference this time is that I know it can get better. I know I can climb out of this black hole of anxiety and feel okay again.
     Almost as often as I was worrying about my anxiety and praying that it wouldn’t ruin my birthday, I found myself saying things like, “Alright, Megan. You know how to handle this. You can get through this like you did before. It’ll just take time.” Sure, the OCD creeps in and makes me worry that I’ll be like this forever, in this heightened, anxious state, terrified of what dreadful thing my mind might throw at me next, but I know that is just the OCD this time around. It isn't a reflection of how good or bad a person I am. It isn't some punishment because I am a bad person. It's just chemicals off balance in my brain that gave me an anxious brain.
     I’m dealing with the same strange things as always, but at the moment, my response to anything related to my mental health is heightened because I have been so worried about my mental health lately. Mental health conditions do wax and wane over time. I also know that new obsessions can form with OCD, and that old obsessions can change. I had been guarding against developing new obsessions for months now (which also means that my anxious brain was running threat assessments in the background of my mind this whole time.) So, the background business just pushed through to the front and gave me even more things to be anxious about.
     I feel like a crazy person, and this time I bought my ticket to crazy town. Maybe if I wouldn’t have been so worried about my upcoming birthday, I wouldn’t be struggling with a setback at this very moment. Maybe I self-sabotaged this entire month instead of thinking that, after 3 years of bad birthday experiences, I deserved a great birthday. Or, maybe in my cycle of dealing with panic attacks and OCD, it was just the time my symptoms flared up, which, accidently, also happened to be around the same time as the meltdown last year.
     I'll end with this: An anxious brain can see a threat in the smallest thing, and it can form associations with some time, event, place, or even person that we might not be consciously aware of. Living with an anxious brain doesn’t mean that I am a crazy person; it means that I am human. Setbacks are a normal part of recovery, but we can’t let ourselves get stuck in them. Also, please know, that it won’t be like this forever, no matter what your anxiety, OCD, or depression is making you think during your setback. Just take it one day, or even one hour, at a time.

How Can I Help?

     I've discovered something recently. I've discovered that most people (myself included sometimes) don't really know how to deal with someone with an anxiety disorder (or any mental health condition)when that condition seems to be getting the best of us for a moment, or in my case when I experience a significant amount of anxiety or when I have a panic attack. It seems to be humanity's default setting to go into helper-teacher-cheerleader mode (myself included) when we see someone we care about struggling with the symptoms of a mental health condition, which means we try to fix the problem, solve the puzzle, and pep talk people into feeling better. It's a nice gesture, and we're all so glad that someone cares enough to want to help, really.
     The problem is that in the middle of a bout of really high anxiety or a panic attack, or a particularly rough day with depression, this helper-teacher-cheerleader mode might not actually help. I know when I'm trying not to panic because of my anxiety, a pep talk filled with reassurance and suggestions about what I should be doing to fix it don't exactly help because I'm so stuck in the unpleasant way that I'm feeling. It actually just makes me feel more frazzled, and when I'm frazzled I tend to get irritable. (I'm really sorry about being irritable, too.) Then, I just feel guilty for being irritable when someone I care about was just trying to help.
     A better way to handle these rough moments is to ask one simple question. Ask me, "How can I help?" Odds are, that if you're close enough to me to actually be present when I'm having a rough day because of my anxiety or panic attacks, I'll tell you what I need. It might be something simple like letting me crank up Bob Marley's "Three Little Birds", watching one of my favorite funny movies with me, or just letting me cry for a little bit while you just sit there. Or, it could be more complicated like going for a walk or taking a drive. Or, I might not need anything. It depends on just how bad the day has been.
     How can I help? I might not know how to answer this question at first, especially if I'm in the middle of a meltdown, but I'll think about it. I'd also be glad that someone cared enough to ask because that means that whoever asked doesn't want me to struggle, or at least the asker might not want me to struggle alone. Kindness goes a long way, especially if I already feel like an irrational, out of control, crazy person.
     Asking someone how you can help someone you care about is also a good idea because that means you care about that THEY (the struggling person) needs most. This question also means that you aren't assuming that you (the asker) understand whatever is going on because, if we (the strugglers) are being completely honest, we may not completely understand what is going on in our mind either at that moment. Even when you ask, though, keep in mind that sometimes, the best thing you can do is just sit with us because we have no idea what you could do to help, but just being there is often helpful.
     I'll end with this: It's really hard to see someone you care about struggling, and it's so great that you want to help. I know I'm always simply grateful when someone sticks around to help, even after my anxious brain has gotten the best of me for a few moments. Just keep in mind that giving suggestions, or a pep talk, or treating us like a problem you can fix isn't the most helpful thing to do. The most helpful thing is to ask how you can help, or ask what we need from you, and then just be there.

Thinking in Extremes

     My therapist brought something to my attention this week in our session, and I'm still struggling with it. It's called thinking in extremes, and it's the reason that my anxiety gets the best of me. Apparently it's a pretty common thing when you live with OCD (or other anxiety disorders) along with the doubt and the need for certainty, but according to my therapist, it's a thing that can happen whether or not a person has a diagnosable mental health condition.
     What I mean when I say thinking in extremes is seeing the world (or whatever issue you're dealing with at the moment) in only black and white with no gray area. In my case it's seeing something only as good or bad, and by something I mean myself. I would label certain thoughts I would have as bad, and since I had those thoughts, I was also bad. I also classified emotion in this way. Anger and sadness were bad, so I must never feel those. In regard to my OCD thoughts and my anxiety I would often go to the extreme in thinking that I was never going to get well again, and that I was always going to feel as awful as I felt in that moment. (I still struggle with the last example in particular.) Basically, thinking in extremes is an unhealthy thinking pattern.
     Most of the time, I only tend to go into thinking in extremes when I'm already experiencing an elevated level of anxiety, and when I go into the extreme thinking pattern, my extreme thoughts always revolve around the OCD worry that I have that I'm really a terrible, possibly intrinsically evil person. Do you know what happens when I think in extremes? I get even more anxious, and then I cry...a lot. This happened yesterday. I had a thought (a completely normal thought that I've had before), and I wasn't proud of the thought, even though it was a completely human thought. I went to the extreme, and I felt like I was a terrible person.
     My therapist and I are working on separating my thoughts so that I can develop healthier thinking styles. At the moment, I just have to label my thoughts as extreme and/or OCD thoughts. My therapist is also working with me so that I can be okay with a gray area instead of insisting on certainty or thinking that to be good I can only live life strictly in the "white" area of things. I shouldn't feel guilty if I can't be all good, 100% of the time. It's impossible to live that way. We all have a shadow self. Life is full of uncertainty and the "gray area". Nothing is ever just black and white, and no person is only good or only bad, like my OCD and extreme thinking patterns would have me believe when my anxious brain chimes in.
     I'll end with this: Thinking in extremes is a harmful thinking pattern that has definitely added to my anxiety, and changing that thought pattern takes more time and effort than I thought it would. A gray area of uncertainty does exist in life, and it's impossible to live an all black or an all white life in a world full of all kinds of different shades of gray. Life is on a spectrum of good or bad, and it's okay to slip into the middle sometimes because we are human, and we don't all always make the best choices. They gray area isn't the end of the world, or at least I don't think it would be if I could find a gray area to categorize my thoughts into. (I'm working on that...")