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Boyfriend has OCD, am in despair and don't know what to do


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Hello, I'm new to the site. I joined because it's 1:30am and I'm sleeping on the sofa because my boyfriend and I have had a row over his OCD behaviours. He's currently having CBT but I feel like his obsessions have become more random lately; the slightest thing I do seems to set them off. I've tried letting him follow his compulsions and tried telling him to stop, but when I do the latter, he gets angry and quite nasty with me - "don't tell me what to do", that sort of thing. He told me at the start of his therapy that he wasn't prepared to discuss his CBT with me, and that he didn't want me to ask about it. However, on a few occasions, he has told me what his treatment entails and what exercises he needs to do. I feel like he's being very manipulative with me in withholding information when he feels like it, and I honestly don't know if this is part of his OCD or another aspect of his personality. I'm due to start stage 3 CBT myself soon to treat ongoing anxiety and he is sometimes less than sympathetic. I find myself in tears a lot of the time because I don't know how to support him and he won't talk to me about it. Does anyone have any advice? I really do feel very desperate and alone right now.

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Hi and welcome to the forum.

I thought it might help if I moved your post to family and friends, as so many of us know how you are feeling.

CBT is really really challenging. Your boyfriend is having to challenge everything which makes him feel comfortable. At least lets hope that is what he is doing!

When my son had CBT I tried very hard not to ask what he had discussed with the therapist, sometimes he opened up, sometimes he didn't. I think the problem particularly with adults is that they need to want to get better and you dont actually know if he is telling the therapist he is doing the exercises and then coming home and carrying on as normal. When he told you about the exercises, did he appear to be trying them out?

You must look after yourself, especially as you are already suffering from anxiety and your boyfriend has to understand that. During a calm time I would tell him, you will support him, but he must support you too. OCD is a condition, its not his fault, but it also not your fault and he shouldn't be taking it out on you.

You could do an exchange, for not asking him lots of questions, he could ask the therapist if you could go along to a session and just spend a few minutes talking through your part in his recovery.

Thinking of you both at such a difficult time.

Carol

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Thanks Carol, that's a brilliant idea. I'll ask him today if it would be possible to go along to a session.

As for the exercises, I don't know if he's doing them - he won't tell me what they are and he doesn't want me to ask. He's still doing his coping mechanisms as far as I can see, though - things like putting his foot in and out of a door frame. If he does it when we're at his parents', his dad tells him to stop it and he's said that helps 'snap him out of it', but if I try that, he yells at me!

Thanks again for replying and for your advice. It's much appreciated.

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I think the important thing when you go along is that the therapist can tell you both what you should (or more importantly shouldn't!) be doing to help. That way your boyfriend knows its not just you being difficult, but its what the expert has told you to do.

To be honest I think he is making excuses for his Dad, because I dont believe for a second telling him to stop it helps him 'snap out of it'. What it would probably do is cause him to start all over again!

Fingers crossed he sees the benefits in you being involved.

Carol

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Guest Georgilou

I can relate totally to this.... my partner and i have known each other for 5years and been a couple for 2 and a half and lived together now for 8 months. Since living together his OCD has become unbearable and over the Christmas period it has brought us to breaking point. He constantly questions everything i do, i feel on edge all the time that if i move something even slightly it will turn into a row. I try to empathise and apologise when i do something that upsets him (i struggle with this though as i dont feel i have done anything wrong e.g. closing the shower door hes left open) but sometimes that just makes him angrier, he then believes i am patronising him. He doesnt understand the changes i have had to make to the way i live my life to be acceptable to him. I have so many tiny little things to remember each hour of each day sometimes i forget something and he goes mad at me and i receive hours of lecturing about how i am useless and i dont listen and i contantly frustrate him. Ive eneded up being on edge all the time myself worried about going home incase hes come home and i have left something 'just so'. I try to think of ways i can improve myself to make it easier for him but i currently already look at my friends relationships and see that i already wait on him hand and foot, do exactly as im told etc. People think im crazy and should stand up to him but when i do that he gathers my stuff and kicks me out. I know he loves me dearly and i do him but i am struggling so much to handle all this as it is making me depressed thinking i am inadequte all the time.

He went to the doctors a couple of weeks ago for the first time and admitted the had a problem. We had a great conversation when he returned and he opened up about the whole thing and that he was so concerned about how much of a strain it was putting on us. I saw a glimmer of light. The Dr has referred him for some councilling and we are waiting to hear but now he has changed again and is saying he doesnt need help and its me thats making him the way he is .... 'i was fine before we lived together' etc.

Any support or advice would be greatly appreciated, i am running out of time and strength. im exhausted trying to be 'perfect' for him all the time. I try to speak to my friends but they just think he is controlling and tell me to leave him. I know is not really him but i dont know how to make him better. He wnts us to have a couple of weeks apart but i cant do this as i am so scared he will think its an easier life for him without me and he will end the relationship. I dont think he really wants to leave me but hes making himself ill with the constant anxiety and assumes im the root cause and easy fix to the problem.

Please help.

Thank you

G

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Guest ironduke

G,

as a sufferer I have total sympathy for you. I too have made a partners life hell with my illness.

Others on here will help you better with how to deal with the situation but please believe it is the illness that drives him to be unkind not you.

Good luck.

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Georgilou,

If he's kicking you out whenever you stand up to him, you need to question whether this is a relationship you want to be in. Do you have somewhere you could go and stay for a few weeks to give yourself some respite? He shouldn't be doing things like that to you.

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I agree with Snowflake, you need time to consider where this is going. As much as your boyfriend's OCD is the cause of the problems, he shouldn't be treating you in this way and whilst you accept that, he may well not get treatment because everything is as his OCD tells him he wants it.

Complying with the demands of his OCD just makes it worse, it always wants more and more. Why should you be living your life being shouted at and thrown out? Whether he means it or not, your boyfriend has asked for a couple of weeks apart and that is what I would do in your shoes and I myself wouldn't go back until he agrees to go ahead with treatment. It might be during that time he would find it easier not to live together, but honestly would that be as bad as living as you are now?

Im sure he loves you and you will be his reason to get his OCD under control, but he needs to help himself too, you can't do it all for him.

In the meantime look after yourself, your health is important too.

Carol

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I asked him if I could come to a session with him like you suggested - he wasn't keen initially, but has agreed. He's seeing the therapist next week and is going to ask if I can come along and find out more about it.

I concur with your advice to Georgilou, too. X

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Guest bluelion

Hi Snowflake.

As the partner of an OCD sufferer, the best piece of advice I can offer you is please look after yourself, and seek help. Living and caring for someone with OCD is physically and emotionally exhausting. Don't take everything on yourself. And remember, none of his behaviour is your fault. Good luck, and stay strong x

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks Bluelion. Having a horrible weekend. He's insisting on making the bed the way HE likes it because I don't do it properly. He's stomping around in a huff and I'm downstairs on my own; he went out to his parents' earlier and when he came back, went upstairs to do his OCD exercises. Know I shouldn't be complaining but I feel like I've been on my own all night. I'm absolutely exhausted right now. He keeps telling me what to do and I've had to ask him pretty much every day this week not to be so nasty when he speaks to me. He did it in front of my parents earlier this week and I was so embarrassed. Wish I could just disappear somewhere quiet on my own for a few weeks.

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Quite scared and frightened tonight. We had a row about stupid stuff and I mentioned some things he's said to me in the past - he flat-out denied ever saying them. He does this a lot. He denies saying/doing things he HAS done, even when other people remember them. I worry that he's trying to make me feel paranoid or crazy. Don't know how much more of this I can take before I really do go crazy!

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Guest eden1616

Quite scared and frightened tonight. We had a row about stupid stuff and I mentioned some things he's said to me in the past - he flat-out denied ever saying them. He does this a lot. He denies saying/doing things he HAS done, even when other people remember them. I worry that he's trying to make me feel paranoid or crazy. Don't know how much more of this I can take before I really do go crazy!

Ok he might actually not remember at all that he said those things. I know there have been hundreds of times when my mother has said that I said something and I could not remember having said that for anything and we argued about it we still do I find it hard because my mum has memory problems so between the two of us it is hard to know who remembers correctly. But my point is I don't think he is trying to make you feel paranoid at all I think he just does not remember saying what he said. If this is the case fighting over it will only worry him more and I find for me it has even made me quite angry because I feel like people are calling me crazy and I am sure this is how he must be feeling so maybe in future if this happens again just agree to disagree or just say I remember things differently until he is calm and you can talk about it.

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