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Hi, i am caring for my daughter with OCD, she has just turned 29 yesterday and was diagnosed at age of 11, we have had some really terrible times, she suffers from the fear of vomiting and illness so shuts herself away, she has had ect which did bring her out of a very bad stage, she has been into a therapy unit in london but that didn't go well as we are in midlands and that was in london so too far from home and she was terribly home sick and came home after a month....where we are now and my question....she was in an assisted living flat which was great but she still wouldn't interact with other residents only the staff and although half an hour away she wanted to be closer and was very lonely, she has moved into a house in the village she grew up in but again is very lonely, she is on medication, she is in CBT, at the minute with help of a social worker we are trying to get her into an art group to get her socializing, as soon as i get home from work she is round ours and when it is time for her to go home she gets very upset saying she hates living alone and wants to come home, we are resisting saying she needs to be independent..........am i thinking too much/wrongly that living alone is being independent when i should be thinking about the social side of things like the art group, they have cut her housing benefit so i am now paying half of her rent to keep her there which is  causing me financial problems.....please give me advice on what to do for the best for her.

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Hi lorna,

Welcome to the forum:)

I can understand how difficult this decision is to make, there are pros and cons with both options you're thinking about. If your daughter were still in assisted living i think I would have suggested maybe holding-off inviting her back home...with a bit more time it's possible she may have felt more able to gradually mix with the other residents. 

My main worry with inviting her home again would be the risk your daughter could feel less alone, but still as isolated if she were to refuse or had no reason to leave the house. You could find yourself taking on more of the everyday chores she has to do for herself like shopping, cooking, washing etc. If you did go for that option I"d be tempted to try to make a deal between you where she continues organising her own life, with maybe a part of that entailing joining the art group.

The risk there would be she isn't able to stick to her side of the agreement leaving you with no room for manoeuvre, other than asking her to leave, and being back to square one with some possible resentment.

The other possibility would be to ask her to persevere with her current living arrangements a bit longer, and hope the isolation might just be enough to spur her on to socialise more. I guess it would be the cruel to be kind option, but this again could also come with the potential downside your daughter might still refuse to mix more and remain isolated.

Something else that did occur to me (I could be way off) was whether perhaps although she does genuinely feel alone and homesick, could your daughter unconsciously possibly be using it too quickly as a reason to leave situations when they become too difficult for her in terms of her treatment...but ultimately like the London unit it could have helped her more if she'd worked through the homesickness.

I have a feeling I might have muddied the waters more for you...do you have any contact at all with her social worker or pyschologist/therapist, and their feelings on what would be best? 

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On 04/01/2019 at 09:17, lorna said:

Hi, i am caring for my daughter with OCD, she has just turned 29 yesterday and was diagnosed at age of 11, we have had some really terrible times, she suffers from the fear of vomiting and illness so shuts herself away, she has had ect which did bring her out of a very bad stage, she has been into a therapy unit in london but that didn't go well as we are in midlands and that was in london so too far from home and she was terribly home sick and came home after a month....where we are now and my question....she was in an assisted living flat which was great but she still wouldn't interact with other residents only the staff and although half an hour away she wanted to be closer and was very lonely, she has moved into a house in the village she grew up in but again is very lonely, she is on medication, she is in CBT, at the minute with help of a social worker we are trying to get her into an art group to get her socializing, as soon as i get home from work she is round ours and when it is time for her to go home she gets very upset saying she hates living alone and wants to come home, we are resisting saying she needs to be independent..........am i thinking too much/wrongly that living alone is being independent when i should be thinking about the social side of things like the art group, they have cut her housing benefit so i am now paying half of her rent to keep her there which is  causing me financial problems.....please give me advice on what to do for the best for her.

Having been in this situation myself, I would definitely say bring her home. The socialising attempts are the way forward and are a good base to build upon.

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