Tez

Hello down in warm Cornwall! Yes, I find that the Guardian and Independent, of the mainstream press, are pretty good when it comes to covering mental health issues. Some of the tabloid ones have a less illustrious reputation! Tez :original:

Hello All and New Year Greetings! If you are in urban Bristol, then you might like to know that service users from the Second Step Mental Health charity in the city are producing a special presentation on Wednesday 7th January for community radio. People living with a range of mental health support needs will be taking part in a panel discussion on New Year's Resolutions and making a fresh start in January, as part of a general programme at 12noon; and then between 1 and 2pm, they are making their own presentation on volunteering in the mental health field, and how people with lived experience of issues (including OCD) can help other people on their paths to recovery. Expect some interviews, discussion and some music over the hour, all with a positive message on how volunteering has helped people get more from life. The programme goes out on St Paul's based community radio service Ujima Radio, which broadcasts to urban Bristol on 98.0 MHz FM, and streams over the internet to the world. With very best wishes Tez :original:

Just an update note to say that the interview went really well on B.B.C. Radio Bristol. Barry spoke very well to presenter John Darvall about his experiences living with PTSD and surviving homelessness, and talked of the work of local mental health charities in helping him and others like him to recovery. Then, after a musical break, we had another chat about Christmas, the New Year and how Christmas can be a difficult time of year for people who are living with mental ill-health. We left things on a positive note, giving out details of local charities and encouraging people to seek support and assistance if the next few days are going to be a struggle. The interview will be available to listen to until mid-January 2015 on the website of BBC Radio Bristol: it can be Googled for your reference. With kind regards Tez

Well, here we are at the Winter Solstice. The days are short and the nights long. Only a few days before the holiday season. On Monday, the regional radio station for the West Country, B.B.C. Radio Bristol, will broadcast a feature on mental health and coping at Christmas. I will be in the studio with presenter John Darvall and a survivor of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Homelessness, called Barry. The interview will be going out at 11.05am to 11.25am and will touch upon the particular stresses and strains at this time of year, and what services will be available for people finding that they need an extra hand during the holiday period. Radio Bristol is on 94.9 MHz FM in Bristol and on 104.6 MHz FM in Bath; it is on DAB radio and Freeview Channel 719, and also serves the whole West Country on 1548 kHz / 194metres mediumwave. Best wishes Tez

Ashley is one of the unsung heroes of the mental health movement. OCD UK has been immensely beneficial to my own mental health and I rely on its Forums for support and guidance on a daily basis more or less. Even when I am well, I look in. When I am ill, it provides solace and comfort. One of my former colleagues, a Somali gentleman, once said to me "You British, you do not realise how important you are - you all do charity. Little old ladies knit teddies for the shop, or you give time to helplines. Everybody is involved". I thought that was an interesting insight. The moderators and staff of OCD-UK will be a lifeline over the holidays for anyone, myself included, who can sometimes find this time of year difficult. Tez

Thanks Ashley and have a Merry Christmas. Tez

Hi Folks I am putting together some resources for the organisation for which I work for our service users at Christmas. These will be made available on our website, and on a special presentation for local community radio here in Bristol on Wednesday. We just want to establish which organisations and services are open and which are closed over the Christmas and New Year holidays. I am taking it that the OCD Information Line on 0845 120 3778 will be closing on the Bank Holiday days (Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day) but open otherwise. Of course, I know the forums are always open and fully moderated so I can point people in that direction too. If you are interested, the programme, made by the service users of the Second Step Radio Group, is called "Coping at Christmas" and goes out on community radio service Ujima FM (98.0 FM in Bristol - between Kiss-FM and BBC Radio 1 on your VHF/FM dial) on Wednesday 17th December between 12noon and 2pm. Many thanks! Tez

I have quite severe OCD and medications have been a life line to me. I have thought about coming off them, but usually experience a major relapse which I need meds to get over. I am reasonably happy with this situation. However, I come from a family which struggles with weight at the best of times and therefore, with anti-depressants and anti-psychotic elements in my treatment regimen, there is a tendency for me to balloon. I have therefore taken to a high protein diet, like a paleo diet but not quite as strict. I also do a very good fitness class on Monday evenings at a local community centre. I have a fantastic instructor who is very kind with people who are not good at exercise. It's great, but I have to say that whilst I feel better for it, I do not think I could cope with just exercise and diet as a means to control my mental health issues. best wishes Tez

I take meds for my OCD. An anti-depressant, and and anti-psychotic. They have been extremely good for me. I also have benefitted from two periods of CBT after times when I became unwell: these were in 2000 and 2009. Tez :original:

Ha ha! Yes, I do get some sleepless nights, but often, I am in bed early, and then I have a spot in the dead of night when I get up and have a coffee and whilst the house is quiet do some work on the computer. Then I slip back off to bed and slumber for a few more hours! When I was ill in the Winter of 2009, I did become nocturnal for a while. I found solace in the peace of the night when everyone else was fast asleep. I think that we are lucky that we have night time radio and television these days as it kept me going! Tez

That sounds really positive. The Guardian / Observer have been very supportive of mental health issues and have given supportive coverage of the work of charities like OCD-UK for some years. Tez

My mum's depression was affected negatively by the menopause, but as things settled down afterwards, she enjoyed much more stable modds and we got her some help. Today, she takes a small dose of amitrypteline daily and she snjoys very good mental health. Tez :original:

Thanks for your replies folks. I do not think I am terribly depressed. Just a bit "raw" this weekend. I haven't eaten terribly well for a few days, so perhaps that is part of the problem!! Sometimes, I do believe that it is good for you to have a good cry. It certainly lets out a few emotions, whether the tears are of sadness, joy or a bit of both! I usually then have a good bath and a deep sleep and I feel a lot better afterwards. Tez

I think you did the correct thing, Whitebeam. You did not have a rant, but did gently raise the issue of how people use the term OCD. I think that's fair enough. It's an uphill struggle, but you can make a difference to one person's perception of the illness. We live in a strange society at times. People have all sorts of strange attitudes towards illnesses. In ancient times, they had a lot of taboos about leprosy. My granmother's generation would never speak about cancer by name, as if to speak about it would incur its wrath. And mental illness still suffers from constant misuse in popular culture. "Psycho", "Schizo", and so on are misused daily, and a lot of popular use totally misuses terms like depression and obsessive. It is, to coin a term, quite "mad"! Cannot get over how good, responsive and sensible UKTV has been tough - clearly a beacon for other broadcasters! Tez :original:

Hi Everyone I freely admit to being highly strung. I wondered whether any one had problems with what I call "emotional regulation". At times, particularly during these wintry evenings, I can get rather melancholic. Little things can set me off crying, such as a sad song on the radio, or the memory of a good time in the past, a poem or even if someone has just posted something cute to You Tube or to Facebook. (Never have so many tears been shed over a panda!). I am on mood stabilizers (olanzapine), which usually moderate my mood, but at times, I am very lachrymose. These times often co-oincide with periods of poor health as far as OCD is concerned, but not always. Sometimes, they can be triggered by not eating, sleeping badly, or just an argument with a member of the family. Anyone else suffer from raw emotions at times? Best wishes Tez

Hello Matthew. I am very sorry that you have been experiencing problems with your employer though your experience with OCD. It is a cruel and debilitating condition at times, and we do not need the additional hassle of unsympathetic treatment that you describe. I have been very fortunate during my working career. In 2000 I experienced a major breakdown of depression and OCD and was admitted to the Priory Hospital here in Bristol. At the time, I was employed by an insurance company, one of the last of the nineteenth century ones that genuinely looked after their staff. (It was later taken over and asset stripped, but that as they say, is another story). They were SO nice to me. I had three weeks off, and afterwards when undergoing extended OCD was able to take early afternoons once a fortnight. My managers were kind and the lady in HR actually revealed to me that her brother had experienced psychological illhealth. I worked for that company until 2005. Since then, I have worked in a charity that houses people with mental health support needs. I use my own experience to assist people and advise on OCD to my colleagues. I also research issues such as equal opportunities and financial support. I am very fortunate and I love my job. I have been in the local paper and on the local radio services several times to talk about my experience. In 2009 I became ill again for a prolonged period, and was off work between January and May and again between August and November. However, I felt supported and loved by my colleagues and it made a great deal of difference. I understand that I am very fortunate in my experiences, and I would encourage you to seek the advice and support of OCD-UK in dealing with work, and if you are in a trade union, then they can be very, very helpful. In fact, for all their warts at times, I would always encourage people to be a member of a trade union because it will stand you in good stead for a rainy day. I hope that helps and I am rooting for you to get all the help and support that you need. A day off once every few weeks does not sound very bad in my book at all! Best wishes Tez :original:

Very positive, thanks Ashley for chasing this up, and for everyone in OCD-UK for opinions and ideas. As I previously said, it did not personally affect me too much, but I take the point that the use of "OCD" as a throwaway line in this way, referring to overtidiness or neatness, does not do justice to the extreme suffering that so many of us have gone through at times during our lives. Let's keep up the media watching, and perhaps a message needs to go to UKTV Group (who own the station Dave, along with Drama, Really and Watch among others) to convey appreciations of the OCD community for their sensitivity. Tez :original:

Thanks Ashley. Keeping tabs on the "misuse" of the terms obsess-compulsive disorder is not always easy as there are now so many instances in the popular culture of where it is misapplied. Other mental health phrases are used as well in a non-scientific way. A lot of people say "I am depressed today" when what they really mean is they are "fed up". Clinical depression is much more than just that feeling! Best wishes Tez :original:

Hello All I did know what else to label this post - media enthusiasts will know that a 'channel ident' refers to those station identifications that television broadcasters use between programmes and commercial breaks to establish with the viewer what station they are watching. Over the last couple of days, the UK based station "Dave", which is on Freeview, Virgin, Sky and other platforms, has had an ident that reads "OCD Badgers - Do Not Adjust Your Sett". I did not find it offensive, just a bit strange really. "Dave" television bills itself as "the home of witty banter" and this identification is obviously supposed to be a knowingly clever play on words. As I said, I am not personally offended by it, but I do find it worth noting that "the public" think that OCD is a source for their puns and jokes along with other mental illnesses. In polite company, however, it is generally not permitted to crack jokes about - say, cancer, heart disease or stroke.... unless you are listening to a particularly "edgy" comic that is. C'est la vie, I guess....... Tez :original:

Hello All I first went to see my GP in 2000 - a long time in health care, and under a different NHS, with a different government and different policies. And of course, treatments were that much less established then. I had already worked out from the website of the charity then called Obsessive Action that I was an OCD sufferer. My GP is a kind man and I am glad to still be with him today. He referred me to a psychiatrist, but it was in a private capacity. This took me on the road to staying in the Priory for a while, and receiving adequate but not spectacular CBT. In 2009, with my most recent breakdown, I was able to see my GP and he this time referred me directly to NHS mental health services. I had to wait about six weeks to see a psychiatrist, but it was definitely worth it. I have not looked back! Tez :original:

Hi Media Watchers For the moderators and OCD-UK admin team: the November issue of the long standing gay magazine Gay Times (or GT as it calls itself after rebranding) [issue 439, November 2014 issue] has a two page article in the health and wellbeing pages on one man's experience of living with someone suffering from obsessive exercising and problems with fixations on eating. The terms OCD or BDD themselves are not used, but it nonetheless makes for interesting reading. I do not think the piece is available online, just in the print edition, but I can see if I can get it scanned and emailed in if the team want it for archive. Best Tez :original:

Yes, as I understand it from reading several books and articles, before CBT was developed in the 70s and 80's, people living with OCD were often "written off" by mental health professionals as a "lost cause" and the condition was considered pretty untreatable. Then all that changed with CBT. Of course, as some people have noted, CBT does have a failure rate for some people with our condition. This does not negate the usefulness of CBT, but it should perhaps mean that in the future, there will be more and varied treatments developed. Personally, I struggled to apply CBT in the first decade of my treatment, and was then put on stronger anti-psychotic medication, which has really improved my thinking and facilitated a much better period. Let's hope that what comes from this debate is a balanced appreciation of what we know about OCD and renewed commitment by services to improve treatments even more! Tez :original:

Whilst of course, everyone has the right to express their opinion - even those with whom we disagree at times, I do like Katie's tweet (quoted by Caramoole, above) asking "Who is Oliver James?". I'd never heard of him either! Gingerbread Girl is kind of right too in my book - the Mail overall is a pretty loathsome paper, but that, as they say, is another story..... . Kind regards Tez

Hello All My boss has just advised me that an article appeared to day in the Daily Mail newspaper in which Dr Oliver James, who is quite well respected in some circles, has launched a blistering attack on Cognitive-Behavioural Therapies and branded it as fakery and a waste of NHS money. I have not read the article in detail (yet), as the Daily Mail is not one of the papers I usually take. Indeed, we should note that it is not always sympathetic to people with mental health issues and some people may detect an attempt to undermine the NHS by the paper - whose political leanings are usually to the right of the political spectrum. The article is available on the Mail's website. It would be interesting to hear how people feel about this, particularly as CBT has been the therapy of choice for OCD and BDD for at least thirty years now. Personally, I kind of rely on meds more than successful CBT, but I do use cognitive techniques on myself such as Socratic questioning and mindfulness when I am experiencing an "episode". In the meantime, kindest wishes from Tez :original:

A bit of political campaigning might be the way to go for a lot of mental health charities. There has been some positive coverage in the 'progressive' leaning papers recently: the Guardian has published many column inches recently arguing for mental health to be treated as seriously as physical health by the NHS management level. Tez :original: