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Hi everyone Im in bits over Alfie Evans


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25 minutes ago, Isthisreality said:

Drop the therapist then

Why would i drop the therapist? She didn't say i dont have ocd, she said my thinking about alfie evans in her opinion isn't ocd. 

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6 minutes ago, Saz said:

Why would i drop the therapist? She didn't say i dont have ocd, she said my thinking about alfie evans in her opinion isn't ocd. 

Becuse i am pretty certain it is OCD. Now, i don't know how much you told her about you obsessing about this, to what extent you are "thinking about this". But if that is what she said i think she missed something. I really do 

I am sorry but i don't see any reason a therapist would say it is normal for you to sit and analyze photos, text and other things about this event, when she knows you have OCD. Just brush it off with saying that it is you being empathic. But i don't know how much you told her.

Edited by Isthisreality
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Every little thing can’t just be boxed off neatly as ‘OCD’ or ‘not OCD’. That’s far too simplistic. We are people, who have thoughts and emotions about all manner of things. I don’t see a reason that you need to decide whether feeling sad about the death of a child ‘is’ OCD. If you feel that you are thinking about it too much then you could try to implement some of the tools useful to help you to stop overthinking, and this will probably ease your mood. Any attempt to try to connect this to your false memory fear is unproductive in my opinion. Of course you will have thoughts and feelings that are ‘not OCD’ (to be crude) - it has no bearing whatsoever on whether or not your memory is true or false.

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The thing is that she is reading about it and looking at photos - compulsions.

This is how i see it, i could be wrong. And i don't know how much Saz have told her therapist. So i shouldn't have said drop her, what i meant was that if Saz is telling her everything about how much she actually is thinking about this and looking it up - and then for her to say that you are just empathic. It really sounds strange to me. It really do.

Edited by Isthisreality
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I think it's OCD. If we obsess for very long periods about something, have powerful urges to carry out compulsions as a result of that obsessional thinking, and suffer disorder as a result, how is that not OCD? 

It's perfectly common for people with OCD to have various themes of it. Saz knows she has had other ones, even if they aren't bothering her at the moment. 

 

 

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Just a point on this- Saz is a very empathetic person and cares so much about her own children, so it is no surprise that the Alfie Evans thing is hitting. I can say that I have been in floods of tears over animal cruelty related cases and I've never met the animals, so I can only imagine how Saz would be feeling about a human child- plus after months and months of OCD taking its toll, it's no wonder Saz is fragile and more sensitised to this stuff.

 

please take care of yourself Sarah and know none of this is your fault. Grieve if you need to. You're not weird! You're human, and a nice one at that :) 

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I agree life is messy and you can't just say "this person has OCD, therefore everything he/she experiences is OCD" - people still experience real emotions, care, sadness, empathy and so on - and Saz I know you have these in bucket-loads.

That said, I think as OCD-sufferers we often bring these patterns of thinking to other things in life.  So although sadness and empathy are very real and normal emotions, perhaps you are also applying OCD-type thinking patterns as well?  As Franklin says, not everything can be put in a box.

I agree that grieving and sadness are totally normal human emotions.  I have often got upset about stories I've read about even if I've never met them.  as PB says, you can't choose what touches your heart x

Edited by gingerbreadgirl
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This case bothered me too. It seems that ventilators are often shut off within 2 or 3 days now (in Canada anyway) without giving the person a chance to heal. I'm not very religious but I don't agree with this as many people have gotten better even though they were in a coma and a few that were declared brain dead have woken up.

I think that if they were allowed to publish his latest brain scan it might have helped people see how degenerative it was. I thought he had only a bit of brain damage. Very sad.

Sometimes something like this might be from something else that is bothering us. Years ago a friend's dog died after being hit by a car. I cried for four days. I was sad about the dog but I was also upset that the friend who I was sort of dating, sort of not wasn't treating me well. Maybe it's OCD, maybe it's something else you are sad about that is triggered by something like this case. 

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On 01/05/2018 at 15:35, Isthisreality said:

Becuse i am pretty certain it is OCD. Now, i don't know how much you told her about you obsessing about this, to what extent you are "thinking about this". But if that is what she said i think she missed something. I really do 

I am sorry but i don't see any reason a therapist would say it is normal for you to sit and analyze photos, text and other things about this event, when she knows you have OCD. Just brush it off with saying that it is you being empathic. But i don't know how much you told her.

Sorry for the late reply everyone. 

I don't think everything can be put down to ocd. I was looking at the photos and posts that were being made but thats mainly because the admin for Alfies Facebook page kept putting new posts up and naturally I would read - as would thousands of others people accross the world it would seem. I could see from my Facebook that a few of the same friends had liked and commented on lots of things from the page, they seemed really affected by it all, and im sure they dont all have ocd. Also there were tons of articles about it last week in the media so it was hard to avoid it.

I have always described myself like a sponge, I seem to soak up lots of emotion and feelings of others but I genuinely get affected by people and their stories or situations, its not ocd always, its down to my nature. The part that is probably ocd is the part were i have made an unnecessary connection with what my therapist said about it not being ocd and me then linking that to my false memory, believing that too must also NOT be ocd. 

I mentioned everything to my therapist, how much it bothered and upset me and all the reading and thinking I was doing about it.  She knows how big this story was, still is, and so can understand how a lot of people ocd or not have been really upset by it, myself included. She just said to keep an eye on myself regarding it,  just to make sure it doesn't become an obsession.  I trust my therapist, she makes a lot of sense to me up to now. I have actually calmed down a lot over it, its still really sad an no doubt if more is published again I will feel the same once more. X

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On 01/05/2018 at 18:31, orange said:

This case bothered me too. It seems that ventilators are often shut off within 2 or 3 days now (in Canada anyway) without giving the person a chance to heal. I'm not very religious but I don't agree with this as many people have gotten better even though they were in a coma and a few that were declared brain dead have woken up.

I think that if they were allowed to publish his latest brain scan it might have helped people see how degenerative it was. I thought he had only a bit of brain damage. Very sad.

Sometimes something like this might be from something else that is bothering us. Years ago a friend's dog died after being hit by a car. I cried for four days. I was sad about the dog but I was also upset that the friend who I was sort of dating, sort of not wasn't treating me well. Maybe it's OCD, maybe it's something else you are sad about that is triggered by something like this case. 

Yes a lot information was very conflicting wasnt it. According to the hospital he was completely brain dead but then wasn't allowed to fly because he would feel pain... Then I read he was only in a semi vegative state, so no wonder the parents were fighting for a diagnosis and looking at anything that could potentially help their boy... Sad, sad situation. X

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4 minutes ago, Saz said:

Sorry for the late reply everyone. 

I don't think everything can be put down to ocd. I was looking at the photos and posts that were being made but thats mainly because the admin for Alfies Facebook page kept putting new posts up and naturally I would read - as would thousands of others people accross the world it would seem. I could see from my Facebook that a few of the same friends had liked and commented on lots of things from the page, they seemed really affected by it all, and im sure they dont all have ocd. Also there were tons of articles about it last week in the media so it was hard to avoid it.

I have always described myself like a sponge, I seem to soak up lots of emotion and feelings of others but I genuinely get affected by people and their stories or situations, its not ocd always, its down to my nature. The part that is probably ocd is the part were i have made an unnecessary connection with what my therapist said about it not being ocd and me then linking that to my false memory, believing that too must also NOT be ocd. 

I mentioned everything to my therapist, how much it bothered and upset me and all the reading and thinking I was doing about it.  She knows how big this story was, still is, and so can understand how a lot of people ocd or not have been really upset by it, myself included. She just said to keep an eye on myself regarding it,  just to make sure it doesn't become an obsession.  I trust my therapist, she makes a lot of sense to me up to now. I have actually calmed down a lot over it, its still really sad an no doubt if more is published again I will feel the same once more. X

I agree with all this - I think being upset over a news story, and even becoming very affected by it and even slightly "obsessive" over it, is quite a normal human reaction.  I think we have to be careful about aways pathologising things and people just because this is an OCD forum - if you have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail, and all that.

I think you have properly identified the part of this which is OCD, though x

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On 01/05/2018 at 18:23, gingerbreadgirl said:

I agree life is messy and you can't just say "this person has OCD, therefore everything he/she experiences is OCD" - people still experience real emotions, care, sadness, empathy and so on - and Saz I know you have these in bucket-loads.

That said, I think as OCD-sufferers we often bring these patterns of thinking to other things in life.  So although sadness and empathy are very real and normal emotions, perhaps you are also applying OCD-type thinking patterns as well?  As Franklin says, not everything can be put in a box.

I agree that grieving and sadness are totally normal human emotions.  I have often got upset about stories I've read about even if I've never met them.  as PB says, you can't choose what touches your heart x

This is actually a good way to describe me and it makes sense to me. I was initially questioning if this was ocd or normal but I think now a few days have passed and I have not felt as bothered then its clear it was probably just my normal human emotions and response to a sad situation x

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On 01/05/2018 at 16:48, Orwell1984 said:

Just a point on this- Saz is a very empathetic person and cares so much about her own children, so it is no surprise that the Alfie Evans thing is hitting. I can say that I have been in floods of tears over animal cruelty related cases and I've never met the animals, so I can only imagine how Saz would be feeling about a human child- plus after months and months of OCD taking its toll, it's no wonder Saz is fragile and more sensitised to this stuff.

 

please take care of yourself Sarah and know none of this is your fault. Grieve if you need to. You're not weird! You're human, and a nice one at that :) 

Thanks orwell, thats really kind :)

You know me well and think you have a really good point that months and months of ocd has taken its toll on me, maybe I am more fragile than I realise x

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On 01/05/2018 at 16:32, taurean said:

I think it's OCD. If we obsess for very long periods about something, have powerful urges to carry out compulsions as a result of that obsessional thinking, and suffer disorder as a result, how is that not OCD? 

It's perfectly common for people with OCD to have various themes of it. Saz knows she has had other ones, even if they aren't bothering her at the moment. 

 

 

Im not feeling too bad about it at the moment Roy, I think last week it was all just so intense, everywhere i looked it was about poor Alfie. If I sat just now and really thought about it again or went onto the Facebook page I would probably feel sad again - but that's because it is a sad story x

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You putting it into perspective with your own memories is a compulsion. This story have no bearings at all when it comes to your own memories.

I would not read any news about such events while i i was recovering, if it wasn't some kind of exposure. It is fine to be empathic and caring, but OCD is so tricky. I would also look at what it is inside that needs to justify that people without OCD also have emotions. 

I would also like to point out that i am consuming sad stories like crazy when i am depressed - only makes me more sad. And the circle is going. 

Edited by Isthisreality
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On 01/05/2018 at 16:02, Isthisreality said:

The thing is that she is reading about it and looking at photos - compulsions.

This is how i see it, i could be wrong. And i don't know how much Saz have told her therapist. So i shouldn't have said drop her, what i meant was that if Saz is telling her everything about how much she actually is thinking about this and looking it up - and then for her to say that you are just empathic. It really sounds strange to me. It really do.

I think i am an emphatic person who is an anxious mess with ocd thrown into the mix lol. X

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I think you do have strong empathy with other people's struggles. 

It's a sort of emotional bond with them, and it's a key part of your psyche. 

I a glad you are feeling more calm now though :)

 

Edited by taurean
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2 minutes ago, Saz said:

I think i am an emphatic person who is an anxious mess with ocd thrown into the mix lol. X

Do you analyze if you are an emphatic person? I think you know if you are or not. And you will find out when you are recovered. 

 

It is very good that you are telling your therapist everything, it can be hard, so good job.

Edited by Isthisreality
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On 01/05/2018 at 15:59, Franklin12 said:

Every little thing can’t just be boxed off neatly as ‘OCD’ or ‘not OCD’. That’s far too simplistic. We are people, who have thoughts and emotions about all manner of things. I don’t see a reason that you need to decide whether feeling sad about the death of a child ‘is’ OCD. If you feel that you are thinking about it too much then you could try to implement some of the tools useful to help you to stop overthinking, and this will probably ease your mood. Any attempt to try to connect this to your false memory fear is unproductive in my opinion. Of course you will have thoughts and feelings that are ‘not OCD’ (to be crude) - it has no bearing whatsoever on whether or not your memory is true or false.

I totally understand what yoir saying here and agree with you too! Just got spiked by your last sentence though.. Typical of me x

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Just now, Isthisreality said:

Do you analyze if you are an emphatic person? I think you know if you are or not. And you will find out when you are recovered. 

 

It is very good that you are telling your therapist everything, it can be really hard, so good job.

Thank you x

No i don't analyse it, I have always been this way, always felt sorry for people all my life. For example in school I couldn't bare to see a child sat on there own at dinner time, it would break my heart, so I would go and sit with them, I would feel bad on a teacher if people in the class were playing up for them or being mean...I don't know, there are loads of examples, i could tell you lots amd lots, but more than anything its a feeling i get about situations if that makes sense x

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4 minutes ago, Saz said:

Thank you x

No i don't analyse it, I have always been this way, always felt sorry for people all my life. For example in school I couldn't bare to see a child sat on there own at dinner time, it would break my heart, so I would go and sit with them, I would feel bad on a teacher if people in the class were playing up for them or being mean...I don't know, there are loads of examples, i could tell you lots amd lots, but more than anything its a feeling i get about situations if that makes sense x

Yes that seems common when it comes to people with OCD. 

But this story or any other sad story you read in the news have no importance when it comes to your own past. Do not compare them or analyze if this or that is so what does that mean for me? If he did that could i be that way then? and so on and so on.

Edited by Isthisreality
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1 hour ago, Isthisreality said:

I would also look at what it is inside that needs to justify that people without OCD also have emotions. 

I don't understand this bit sorry x

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10 hours ago, Caramoole said:

Don't dig Saz.  Let the comment go without the need for clarification, you don't need to be panicking wondering what he means.  Let to wave come in, let it roll out again :)

Thanks caramoole I know what you mean but I've taken the comment to mean that I am having to let everyone know that i am a caring person. To be fair to Isthisreality I did think myself that by telling you that I am emphatic etc that I probably sound like little miss perfect or something. I hope nobody thinks that because I'm far from it and have made plenty of mistakes in my time x

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