New and need some help

[Squirtsdad]

I am new to the forum as I have only just had it suggested that my deep depression and anxiety are tied in with my OCD tendencies. I am now on a waiting list for some CBT therapy. Can I just put this short piece I wrote this afternoon to get on paper what I am going through? I do not know if it definitely is OCD and what I can do about it. I would love any comments, advice or just to hear that other people understand this and I am not quite as crazy as I am beginning to think I am. Sorry, it is quite long.

A busy day, but not a good one

I wake up, lay there for a moment and decide it is time to get out of bed. Quick, need to move before my wife makes a sound. From the moment I throw my legs out the bed I have to be off the bed and touch the curtains two times before she talks, or the day will go wrong. Right. Managed that, quick touch all four wardrobe doors: don’t get the order wrong. I am half way across the room now, need to touch the second draw down, and then the back of the door. I manage this and now jump out of our bedroom as I need to get off the carpet and into the hall. Right, next step, check on my son. 

From the moment I walk into his room I have to touch three different bits of furniture and him before he wakes and says good morning. He has a knack of waking up and waiting for me to come in so this panics me that he may speak. I quickly touch the door, chest and bed before stroking his shoulder. Yes, I have made it before he says “hello”. I tell him to snooze and I will go down to make breakfast. I now really do not want anybody to talk before I have touched the tray at the top of the stairs and got down to the landing. I make this and carry on down the stairs, making sure I touch the curtain, window ledge, cupboard and railing in order, now I have to get off the last three steps of the stairs and over to the alarm without seeing myself in the mirror. 

I turn off the alarm and open the door through to the kitchen making sure I tap the door three times first and don’t walk on the carpet strip. When walking into the kitchen I have to put down my glass at an exact spot and touch the microwave three times before looking up at the clock. I don’t know what will happen if I don’t: it does not bear thinking about!

Switch the kettle on and get milk out the fridge. I have to have the top of the milk bottle off before the fridge door shuts. Pour the milk and put in the microwave for two minutes. Time is tight now as I have those two minutes to unlock the door to the outer kitchen, plug in the grill, make sure the back door is locked for the first time today and then hop back over the kitchen step to the cutlery drawer, to get out a spoon, before the microwave gets to zero and beeps. It just can’t beep. I have to be there to stop it exactly on one second or the day will go downhill rapidly.

The above scenario takes about ten minutes and is the same every day. It has been like this for over twenty years, and this is just the start. My brain is worn out and it is not even seven in the morning!

Everything I do throughout the day is governed by how quickly I can do things, in what order, before someone talks, or something happens. From walking the dogs, driving the car, sitting at the computer working. Just writing this piece, my fingers have had to be clicked the right amount of times, no word can be on its own on a line, tapping the side of the computer, lifting my feet off the ground, not breathing until a certain amount of words are typed, blinking three times and not one – it goes on and on with no rest until I go to bed. 

Not that then there is a break. I have to click each of my fingers, touch the wardrobe doors in reverse order, make sure I don’t touch the bed until I have touched the curtains, the list goes on. The last part of the day goes the same every night. From the moment I hear my wife flush the toilet until she turns out the hall light, I have to flick the nails on each hand three times. Then, once she is in bed, I have to have just my left eye open, then my right eye open, both eyes closed, and then both open before she says “night, I love you”. Jeez, I was I could love me as well, but I hate myself and my weird ways so much it hurts. I tell her I love her, and I do love her so much. Who else would put up with someone like me? I turn over, click my feet six times, and try to go to sleep hoping that tomorrow morning, I will wake up, and feel better.

[taurean]

Hi there. 

You seem to be suffering from rigid OCD restrictions to everyday life following "magical thinking"

If I don't carry out this ritual something bad will happen is classic OCD. 

Unfortunately this restriction seems to be applying in many manifestations during the day so I am not at all surprised that you are suffering from anxiety and depression. 

By whatever means you have stumbled on a place where we understand these issues and can provide some support. 

[PolarBear]

Hi dad and welcome to the forum. We cant officually diagnose you but , yeah, thats OCD.

It would be easy to understand someone with so many rules becoming anxious and depressed. I suggest it's very possible that all your problems are tied to your OCD.

You need help. You need an OCD therapist to teach you CBT and come up with a plan to deconstruct your compulsions, which you have an incredible number of.

[Squirtsdad]

Thank you, both. Sorry, I thought I had ticked notifications so did not realise anybody had commented.

I have bee put on a waiting list for CBT and will hopefully have an appointment in 10-12 weeks. I just feel so alone with this at times and sometimes it pushes me very close to deciding that life is not worth living anymore if I have to deal with this every day.

[taurean]

It's a shame that it has built up into such a number of rituals. 

But magical thinking OCD is, as with all OCD, built up around falsehoods. We don't have magical powers to make things happen or not happen through some performed ritual. But OCD says we do. 

The therapy will teach you how to gradually apply this and wean yourself off all those time-consuming, but in fact pointless, rituals. You won't be able to believe that right now, the force of the OCD will be too powerful and strong, but it will come in CBT. 

For my sister, another magical thinking OCD sufferer, the number 11 is a bad number. She says there is no fear consequence around encountering it. 

For me, the 11 represents the number of one of my favourite bus routes through central London

An important thing to learn in human psychology is that life itself is neutral. It's our thoughts that colour it negatively or happily. 

So my friend, support is here and therapy can really turn things around for you. Whether we have one, several or lots of compulsions, the thinking and behavioural responses we learn to make will remain the same. 

[Squirtsdad]

Number 1 is my big fear. 3 is good. 4 not so good and so on.

Thanks for the help and support. I hope my CBT comes soon

[taurean]

I hope so too. But meantime remember numbers are, like life itself, neutral. But if we give a meaning to them it can be good or bad, positive and negative.

Well before I knew I had OCD,and in my teenage years, there were some issues I had which I now see were OCD. 

I developed a counting ritual - essentially I felt the need to mentally count to a million but would do so in a simple quick mathematical way. 

There was no feared consequence if I didn't, I simply had a compulsion to do so. 

I felt a powerful compulsion to avoid stepping on the cracks in paving stones -again with no fear consequence. 

So magical thinking OCD can have good or bad connotations, and with or without a fear consequence. 

What happened with my rituals?  I myself realised they had no value, resisted the compulsion and phased them out. 

[Squirtsdad]

Counting regularly but only up to 100s.

Funnily, it is the cracks etc. that I have started with. I am trying to not take notice of these and just walk to where I am going. I then realise that nothing bad is happening when I walk on cracks or on the edges of manholes etc. Another one is having to count to 6 on each new type of paving slab.Get to six before someone hoots, or someone talks. I have been trying to stop this too.

Thanks for your help. I don't understand OCD yet but at least can see that there may be some relief in the future.

[taurean]

All the counting worrying about paving numbers etc are examples of the genre. 

But you can tackle this and reclaim the time you are losing,with the CBT. 

 

Edited July 24, 2017 by taurean