This obsession has sort of defined my life for the past decade...

[Ryukil]

Hi all. I have OCD, and generalized anxiety disorder. The generalized anxiety disorder sucks. Constant feelings of unreality, nervousness, social anxiety, just feeling on edge all of the time. The generalized anxiety has affected my larger life (perhaps only because I let it, but it really was a tough thing to deal with)...I left high school to be home schooled, and still have not finished university as I'm nearing the age of 24. I don't have a driver's license, have never had a job, etc.

So naturally, since the anxiety felt terrible, and seeing that it affected my life in such an adverse way, I became obsessed with "solving it". You know how doctors are with this, they tell you that you will just have to "manage" it and "cope" with it. Some of you may believe that, but I refused to believe that. I believed every problem was solvable. However, in retrospect, I feel that my obsession with solving it, my constant fighting, was actually a large part of what it kept me so anxious! But that's for another post.

The obsession I want to talk about here is my putting everything on hold until my anxiety has been "solved". For instance, I love learning languages. So, say I want to start studying Italian. I'll start reading it, but then the obsession comes up. The obsession is, "Dude, what are you doing? Learning Italian is a waste of time. You need to fix your anxiety ASAP because your life is just passing you by!" So then I'll drop the Italian book and start going on websites trying to find "the solution" to my anxiety. Say my family wants me to watch a movie with them. I will, but I still feel like it's a waste of time because the anxiety problem is still unsolved. "I need to get rid of it! If I do nothing about it it will just stay there forever and my life will be ruined!"

So, because of this obsession with solving my anxiety and the idea that everything else is a waste of time, I've put quite a lot on hold in my life. The thought was, basically, nothing else is important until I've fixed this issue. I now believe I've found the solution to my GAD problem, which is acceptance (like I said, no wonder I stayed anxious when I was so obsessed with trying to solve it!). I've found a couple books (by authors Paul David and Dr. Claire Weekes) which describe what I started to suspect, that the way out is to actually stop fighting it and just live your life alongside the symptoms, not worrying about them being there. But as you all know OCD is crafty, and I noticed different people recovered from their symptoms in different ways. All acceptance, but for instance some dropped the subject of anxiety completely, some continued to visit forums from time to time, etc. Because it will take at least a few months to recover (according to the testimonies I've read), I've become obsessed with doing it "the right way" so that I don't "waste time". Of course, I've been obsessing about this for nearly TWO YEARS now, so wasting time should be the least of my concerns.

Anyway, the same thing is happening with this obsession...until I've decided which approach to take, the anxiety problem is not being solved and so studying Italian, trying to make some money online, is all a waste of time. I suppose the way to move past this is to do things in spite of the feeling that they're a waste of time? That would be exposure? 

Thanks for your help.

[PolarBear]

Unfortunately you're listening to the thoughts. You're getting intrusive thoughts that things are a waste of time until you've solved your anxiety and you go along with that. That's the wrong thing to do. You need to ignore those thoughts and press on with what you want to do. Sure you'll feel uncomfortable for a while but anxiety won't hurt you. You can Forge on ahead.

[Ryukil]

Alright, yeah. Just keep doing things in spite of that obsession.

[snowbear]

Ryukil, there's a book you may find helpful.

It's called 'Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway' by Susan Jeffers. 

I highly recommend it. It's over fifteen years since I read it and I still remember huge chunks of it verbatim - it was that good.  

The takeaway message of the book is 'keep doing things in spite of your obsessions/fears'  and you've already grasped that, but there are some useful exercises in it that show you alternative ways of thinking about things. They can help if you're still struggling in spite of knowing what you should be doing. 

 

[Ryukil]

Sorry, I've been off the site for a bit. So...I guess it really is as simple as do stuff in spite of how I feel. 

I was considering going to some kind of residential OCD clinic, but I'm not sure I want to do that....I mean might as well just work with a therapist. But I think I have a pretty good grasp of what my issues are.

[Magicat]

Sometimes you need to get out of anxiety mode for a bit and distraction by learning languages or anything like that is an excellent way to do it. Having OCD and anxiety is exhausting and sometimes your focus needs to be on something else, otherwise it would be all stress all the time. Don't beat yourself up! If there are small parts of your life you can gain enjoyment from grasp it with both hands! It's what can keep you going at your lowest ebb.