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Mum of OCD daughter (I'm so distressed)


Guest Vanessa77

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Guest Vanessa77

Please someone tell me this awful condition can be conquered. I was crying my heart out a few minutes before typing this and went into a blind panic to get registered on here so as I could pour out my feelings.

I suppose in one way I'm lucky that I've been able to get my daughter to the doctors she is 19 and we are waiting 2 months for a referral to an OCD clinic for cognitive behavioural therapy. Her OCD seems to take a form of obsessive health thoughts and about not getting fat, even though she is a lot underweight which is what caused us to visit the doctor in the first place, she over exercises in my opinion, 'she' says she has an eating disorder, she sounds happy to put a name to these thoughts, though the doctor says it is more like OCD as she isn't displaying the classic symptoms of delusional body image, it's as if she has a fear of 'getting' fat, she 'seems' to eat enough and I don't think that she is making herself sick as she has gained a 'small' amount of weight, but she is very purist in what she eats, piles of veg. nothing processed, no sauces, salt sugar, wheat, dairy, meat or fish, She eats eggs now and I thank God for getting her to see she needed more than what she was eating, she was cutting carbs too much and treating all carbs as bad which they are most definitely not, good carbs are an absolute necessity. She feels guilt if she goes over her prescribed calories for gaining weight, which she needs to do, she needs another stone on at least. It seems these OCD thoughts are controlling her and doing battle in her head. It's as if she knows the answers then the OCD quashes the positive idea, she is self berating and self critical and puts herself down.

People have been advising her and though she has dug her heels in, she has eventually eaten better, but she is 'very controlling' over the quantities and has been driving herself mad with calculating calories, though she seems happier when she carries out this ritual. I told her to listen to her body and not to these thoughts to gauge what her body requires, but she seems intent on doing all these calculations, it holds us up from going out or keeping to time. Although I have to say she is aware of all this and has made a great effort to cut short her exercising and to go out and socialise more so as she breaks these strange routines, for which I am very proud of her. I suppose she is stronger than she realises, but the worrying thing is that she keeps getting down and crying, losing her temper and referring to 'death' or 'dying' when she is having a really bad day, I am so frightened that I keep having serious anxiety attacks, I wake up in the morning with my heart pounding because all I care about are my children. I have tried to explain things to my husband but he has limited patience at times and is not very sympathetic for long, he has no concept of other people's suffering at times, which really doesn't help.

If I think back to when I was younger I used to have these strange thoughts, so I understand what OCD is, I had a serious nervous breakdown 15 years ago and it took a long while to claw my way back to health, but I did and did it mostly on my own steam....strangely since that breakdown my odd thoughts went and I am mentally stronger than I've ever been, but I remember suffering when I was younger with anxiety, I'm in my 50's and no one understood these things then.

I no longer worry about day to day things, but I DO worry about my children's happiness and I feel helpless....the appointment is 2 months away, so I bought a good book on CBT to try some self help, I'm exhausted, she's exhausted, what can I do? I'm scared to go to work, I'm constantly texting, one day may seem ok then the day after everything falls apart, is that the nature of this condition? I feel constantly on edge waiting to jump into action because I feel it's unpredictable, I know I'm strong enough to deal with it, I have to be, but I just need reassurance right now, I feel so alone, please help x

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Guest Sisyphus

Hello V,

I read through this and the fact is I don't fully understand all the issues you're talking about there with the eating disorder, and how maybe OCD comes into that. So I'd be fumbling in the dark trying to advise you on that.

But I didn't want to leave the post unanswered either because that totally sucks. Not many people seem to check this particular forum(which also sucks) so sometimes posts get missed.

So I just wanted to say hi and I'm sorry about your daughter's problem with dieting/OCD and it really sounds to me like you've done 150% to help so you shouldn't be beating yourself up about it so, though I guess that's what mothers do.

The thing you said about one day everything seeming OK and the next it falls apart can definitely be true of OCD in my experience. Events that maybe seem incidental to other people can really rock your world and set off a new cycle of obsession/compulsion.

Forgive me if I'm spekaing out of turn, but there is another thing that occurred to me that you might want to check out called OCPD. This could be mistaken for OCD except an OCD person finds their obsessions abhorrent and resents that they have to carry out the compulsions whereas an OCPD person doesn't find the obsessions abhorrent, but rather they are a way of life and they have no problem carrying out the compulsions and can be very aggressive in defence of said compulsions. I know this cos my old man's got it. Probably doesn't apply to your daughter at all but just mentioning it in case.

Sorry I don't know more.

I wish you both the very best of luck,

David.

Edited by Sisyphus
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  • 2 weeks later...
Guest Vanessa77

Thank you for taking your time to reply David, I'm sorry it has taken me so long to reply back. We have had a very trying week, for some reason my daughter has felt worse this week on and off. Thank you for mentioning the OCPD because, come to think of it she does have rituals which she digs her heels in about and defends and accuses me of upsetting her even though I'm only acting in concern for her.

If I point something out it's as if I'm trying to control or stop her from doing something. She admits she does things, such as touching things a certain number of times, which she hates and does find abhorrent and she does want to knock it on the head, though she can't seem to do it. Though she has a certain ritual with exercise which she doesn't seem to be able to break (maybe it's because exercise makes her feel good). I feel she is doing TOO much, because she is very thin and baulks against taking extra calories. It's as if she has both OCD and OCPD.

I've just come to realise that I need to calm down because my worry over my daughter's OCD is making me come out with things that she takes the wrong way (though I don't 'say' them the wrong way), this then triggers her anxiety off more and then she starts the OCD again. It's so exhausting and worrying to watch her beat herself up so much, it breaks my heart. I have to break the cycle of worry.

I bought some Hypericum tincture (St. John's Wort) which is practitioner strength to try to lift her serotonin levels and cope with the anxiety which hopefully will help her to lessen these rituals.

I must admit I may have a slight OCD tendencies, because I remember being neurotic for checking taps and switches when I was younger, I still do it but not in an obsessive way. I found that by 'mindfully' checking them ONCE (in other words, concentrating and registering actually checking them) I go around the kitchen starting furthest from the door and then out the door and not coming back to check again because I've actually registered it, in 'convincing' myself they are off and safe then I don't give them a second thought.

I've always been highly strung and I think this kicked in more in adolescence (hormones etc).....my 'eldest' daughter (not the one I'm discussing) can be a little obsessive about worrying over things at times and berates herself too much, my Mother admits she used to be the same, she used to say her own Mother was controlling and over anxious about her whereabouts when she went out and I'm wondering if there's a family trait, though I don't agree that because one family member goes down a particular route that you have to follow. Even my husband (who is obviously not blood related to me), seems to have obsessions, especially over money, I'm even wondering if his behaviour affects my daughter as it has certainly affected me in the past. The way I tackle him is not to go along with it because it's not a realistic way of dealing with things on a daily basis, he doesn't like me to spend money and has a tight rein on it, so I go ahead and do it because it's been necessary at times. I don't know if my daughter's problems are her own or reflected problems from someone else, like learnt habitual behaviour....it's just how to tackle it, it breaks my heart to see her so down. Oh by the way I've found that eating sweet potato is a good serotonin booster, I think that this is what it's all about, raising the chemicals in your brain.

Thank you for your reply and I will continue to look for self help solutions.

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Guest Sisyphus

These are such sutble phenomena to discuss in words. I am worried I could have misled you with OCPD. It's possible for an OCD sufferer to defend their compulsions and get angry when osmoen tries to prevent them doing them, or interrupts. I can say this from first hand experience. Yet I still hate my obsessions and compulsions and wish I did not have them. Whereas the OCPD person will get angry if someone tires to stop them/interrupts, but doesn't hate the obessions/compulsions - it's a lifestyle choice. So I hope I haven't led you up the garden path on that one. It was just something you said in the other message reminded me of it so I thought it worth mentioning.

Thanks for the suggestion for raising seretonin levels. I must admit I've not done anything along those lines as I didn't realise it was a factor. I hope it helps with your daughter. I've noticed everyone has a different undersstanding of this thing and comes at it a different way. Oh and by the way, they didn't per chance say anything about beer, red wine, chocolate or cigarettes raising serotonin levels did they? (just say yes to all of them)

You know what - I suspect a heck of a lot of people have certain obsessive traits. While yours definitely sounds like a candidate for OCD, your husband obsessing about money *could* just be a rational response to having no money once upon a time, or a learned behaviour. I'm totally guessing obviously - you know better than anyone. Brain Lock discusses how OCD/Tourette's can be inherited between parents/children. Pretty confident my old man has OCPD, my brother has OCD, and my sister Tourette's and possibly OCD as well. And we wonder about our long gone grandad too as he exhibited some strange behaviour that they put down to shell shock but could easily be OCD. Longshot obviously. It's easy to start attaching it to everyone and everything.

Anyway I can only speak for myself here, but I think therapy is likely the only answer for this thing - in the meantime if anyone tries to get between me and my compulsions, well good luck to them cos I'm not going to have much of a sense of humour about it I'm afraid! I mean, there's no negotiation, when I need to do these things, I'm doing them one way or another. Even if I thought someone was concerned and trying to help. I wouldpolitely ask them to get lost and leave me alone until I'd dealt with my stuff. So I don't know if that sheds any light on it. I hope that therapy will one day get me to a point where I no longer need to react that way, obviously. It doesn't win you any friends in life that's for sure.

Oh yeah and there was another very interesting part in Brain Lock which details how sufferer and family alike can use OCD as a weapon. So the sufferer can start using it as an excuse to get out of anything they don't want to do - e.g. "I can't face studying for the exam - it'll make my OCD spike". Of course the trouble with this one is, unless you're the sufferer, you'll never really know so maybe best not to try and second guess. And family can use it as a catchall bucket for any behvaiour the sufferer exhibits that they don't personally like and want to change, regardless of whether that behaviour is anything to do with OCD, e.g. "No you can't play that computer game because I think it's making your OCD worse". But I don't think this is peculiar to OCD, I think it's a thing people can do with any illness/mental problem.

Not sure what to say about the exercise. It's tough to discourage someone from exercising, cos it can go the other way. But if she's too thin and not getting the necessary nourishment, then perhaps you're right. But then of course she wouldn't get the endorphin hit from the exercise so swings and roundabouts.

It's hard to know what to say about some of these things. Everything feels potentially offensive or something but hopefully the more information from different people about ti the better insight you will have into it, and the better equipped you will be to deal with it. It's an unenviable task. Some parents would just deny it's a problem so you're one of the good guys.

David.

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