Living with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

when you share with someone that you're diagnosed with ocd how do you hope they respond i mean i hope they respond with with compassion and empathy and i hope they don't respond with you know with the generalizations of oh i didn't i i don't see you wash your hands all the time or oh like i was at your house the other day and your desk was pretty messy like you know there's no way you're that ocd um because like those those comments definitely hurt it just it feels such like a generalization to like assume that everybody with ocd is super organized that everybody with ocd is always washing their hands that they're always doing something like that and again with some people that is the case but it's not with everybody why is it so passable for somebody to say like i have a little ocd and most people will like laugh and be like oh haha um and so that like that really bothers me that like we're not it feels like we're not respected as a group that like our feelings and our the the problems that we go through aren't respected by the general public like some mental illnesses are um so when you hear a comment like that when somebody who's not clinically diagnosed is just saying that as a personality trait oh my pencils always have to be this way i'm a little ocd does that sting that hurts yeah absolutely and you know depending on you know the person in my relationship to that person like you know if if i know them well like i'll be like hey like that's i understand like you might want to keep things a little bit more tidy like most people like to keep things generally clean but like it unless you like really suffer from it like it's not like an okay thing to kind of like joke about what would you say is the best way to describe it to somebody who's never heard of ocd so if you're looking at like just general ocd like as like an umbrella term um it stands for obsessive-compulsive disorder um and the obsessions being for example when i was younger i one of my first things was like if i bumped into something i would have to bump into it again to kind of even it out um so the obsession would be like if i bumped into it once the obsession being like i have to bump it again i have to bump it again like or you know something bad will happen to my family or this feeling won't go away or something like that and then the compulsion is me doing that action uh to bump it again to um get rid of whatever feeling i'm feeling the whatever need i'm feeling to to get rid of that when it first started happening to me like i had no clue what what the feelings i was feeling were why i was having these intrusive thoughts why i was having you know feelings of like if i don't do this you know my parents are gonna die like you know i i don't i had no clue what even ocd was at that point and it's something that seems easy to control it seems like for if you don't know anything about it it's like well then just don't do it you know like you know and there's a lot of battles with irrational thinking with people with ocd it even got to a point where like it almost moved its way on to my girlfriend where um i would like ask her to do certain things to like satisfy that feeling within me like i would have her you know like grab a bottle a certain way or turn around in a certain way to like go somewhere and like luckily she is like you know she's the best girlfriend in the world that like she is never had a problem with it like when i first told her about it when we first started dating she didn't have a problem so does she grab the bottle the way you ask yeah is that a good thing absolutely it's weird because it feels like it's feeding into like the negative side of that like and i always feel awful about like having to put that on her but she she always has a smile on her face whenever she does it i love the smile you get when you talk about her yeah that like she is so willing to like she's so willing to do that stuff for me um that she'll stop whatever she's doing and just be like just tell me what you need me to do like you know um and you know she'll do that and she'll be she'll look at me and be like are you are we are you okay and i'll be like yeah no we're fine and then we'll just kind of keep going and kind of not mention it and just kind of like keep going throughout our day when the first thought through your head is like if i don't bump into this table again then you know my dad's gonna get into a car crash later and you know something horrible is gonna happen and all of this stuff and it's it's so obviously irrational and when i was going through that that phase i knew it was irrational in myself i i knew it was crazy i knew that there was probably nothing that was gonna happen in my family but at the same time i didn't want to take that chance you know but like god forbid that you know i i don't bump into that table again and then something does happen my first thought's gonna go back to that like what if that that whole what-if game of like if i had just done it you know and if anything like that was to happen it would probably just be a horrible coincidence but there's still that like what if what if and that's like the biggest thing with people with ocd and you know again i'm generalizing but that like if we don't do these things then like there is that irrational fear feeling there is that sensation feeling um that like you just can't get rid of it i hate feeling those feelings when i have a um when i have an urge to do a tick when i have a you know obsession um but at the same time there's such like a satisfying release like whenever you do do that that it feels like it's like one of the few like controls that you kind of have it's almost like you have the power to control your body like that in like a in like a backwards way um they're like when you when you relieve that tension it's that like oh like i had control to like change something about my self and my body like in that moment to to fix it but it's like it feels like a small microcosm of like well if i can do that like i can if i can control my ocd then i can take anything on you know throughout the day it feels weird it feels weird to to have to do certain things um like i have a i have a tick that i do kind of in the air that i mean it's it's similar to what i'm kind of doing my hand and it's i hate having to do it because it feels so like obvious to people that like i don't want to sit there in a conversation and have to to do that and like especially with friends that like don't know about it and what i'm doing i don't want to have to like stop the conversation to explain what i'm doing so it does feel weird that's why i like if i was to do something like that i'd keep it like by my lap and like try to like figure it out there is your form of ocd a way to keep control within a chaotic world no i don't think you're off base with that i think that um yeah in like a weird way yeah i i think that you know i i can't speak for everybody you know who has ocd i can only speak for myself hello i want to ask real quick we're gonna go off on a tangent yeah but anytime i interview anybody they always say i can only speak for myself why is that so important why does everyone say that i i because you know especially in you know the mental health community there is still so many stigmas there's still so many things that we're still researching so many things we don't know and so i never want to say something especially for a community that doesn't get a lot of representation or at least good representation i don't want to further um exacerbate those stigmas and and talk about things that you know when people see this they're like oh that's just another generalization about ocd from someone who says they have ocd so is there a fear of representing a group that doesn't get a lot of representation because that representation is so rare so you feel the need to continuously say i'm just one person right and that's that's another reason why i was so nervous to like to talk to you and the why i was surprised in the first place that um that you wanted to talk to me was that like again i'm not an extreme case um but i like stream to who though because it's extreme to you right right and i and i do have that but i think in like a like a like for most people again and that might be feeding into the stigma too and it's it's so backwards and convoluted that like you know who knows what the levels are of of what but for me when i look at other people you know i always think that like oh i don't have that that bad but then i look internally i'm like oh no i'm really struggling today with certain things so like again it's hard to see from the outside because everybody is good at hiding it you know or some people are good at hiding it so you know it is it is hard to see is it a good thing that you've developed invisible ticks and urges in some ways yes um because there are times where i don't even think i realize that i'm doing it because it's so ingrained um that like i'm sure there are times even talking right now that i've been doing things with my hands that i don't even realize necessarily like that are ticks but i'm not like registering the mistakes because i'm not necessarily like thinking about it like to the full extent right now um but in a and also kind of like a backwards way because i've shoved it so back in my brain that there are ticks that also come through mentally um like i'll i'll see things um like like i'll see things in everyday life that like i can't necessarily change but like i try to change it's almost like like i'm trying to change it with my mind i i also like had this weird thing when i was younger that um every now and then and it's weird thinking about it now because it kind of popped back in my head because i haven't thought about it for so long but um i used to have like this thought of like this spinning wheel in my head that would like spin either direction and obviously it's not a tangible thing i can't like stop it from spinning um so i would like literally sit there and try to like mentally like stop it from spinning and like try to like push it to like a screeching halt and when i did i could like move on with the rest of my day but like it would just randomly pop up in my head and like and that would be like such a weird thing because i can't like physically do something but i have to like mentally like sit there and so i'm just like staring into nothing and like yeah that happened a lot in like high school so like i'm sure there were times that teachers thought i was just like daydreaming but like certain things like that where i'd just be like so focused on trying to like fix whatever mental tic i was doing that like i wasn't paying attention to what was going on most of my friends don't even know i suffer from it um say it's that like suffer in silence kind of thing because like i do have a lot of like my whole family knows um you know my girlfriend knows about it like you know so i'm able to to talk about it you know to people if i if i am struggling when i was growing up i also had a lot of like rituals too um that i would do when i was younger um that you know took up an hour to two hours at a time and you know i had you know different like routines yeah i don't want to be like too deep into that but like you know i would have certain routines before i went to bed i had certain teens um you know as i was brushing my teeth and getting ready um were you capable of not doing these routines and breaking them um at that time in my life no um when i was doing those routines it um was one of those that like i i had to do it um and when i when i was growing up i i mean i definitely had a little bit of a feeling of you know if i don't do this something bad's gonna happen to me or my family which is a very common uh trait in people with ocd and when i would start these routines you know i would i would almost be dreading because you know i never wanted to do it like i i really because it took up so much time i would end up losing an hour to two hours before i went to bed um and so when i would when i would start him it was the whole time i was i was dreading it um and you know if i messed up at any point through it i would have to start all over and that was the most frustrating because that definitely happened on a number of times what's the balance between self-acceptance and self-improvement that's a good question um i think the big thing with the self-acceptance is realizing that no matter what you are going through whether it be mentally physically whatever whatever it is is that you are still a human and humans are so complex and they are we're all weird we're all weird in our own rights you know in like a positive way of of saying the word weird and like you know i we you know it the the this semblance of self-acceptance is accepting that yes you you might be going through this thing you might have this diagnosis you might be struggling with whatever you're struggling through but it does not make you less of a person what's frustrating about my ocd is that i don't really have with the exception of maybe like one or two things i don't really have a lot of like set things that like i do like it kind of manifests itself in everyday life and in everything that i do um which in ways are easier but in other ways are harder because i i never know what to look for when i'm walking around or um hanging out with people like certain people's houses affect me differently certain sidewalks affect me differently there are some times where i have to walk on a crack on a sidewalk there are certain times where i can't walk on a on a crack on a sidewalk it just depends on what my brain is feeling that day and i can't control that i i wish i could i do have some symmetry ocd um what does that mean so usually uh like it's not necessarily like you know i have you know pencils on a line it's not it's not like that it's um for me it's more of like patterns and numbers that um need to be even um or uh need to look a certain way uh to make sense of my brain like if i see a color block with like red red blue red red like that's kind of satisfying to me just because like it's it's even on all sides it's such a weird frustrating feeling um knowing that every day i have to look out for something new um and at this point in my life i've gotten so good at hiding a lot of my tics that a lot of my friends that i've known for years if i haven't told them like probably wouldn't even know um i yeah i've gotten like basically like a master at a head hiding them actually it's almost like a weird way like therapeutic to talk about it because i think the more that i talk about it the more that it becomes less of a stigma within myself is this would you classify it as a stigma within yourself right now yes as i've gotten older i feel like i don't think about um when i have my urges my brain doesn't immediately go to something bad that's gonna happen to me or my family that that that hasn't really happened since i was younger now it it as i've gotten older it's more turned into a like a sensation um so if i get a tick and um i have the urge to do it it's my first thought is you know if it's something in my left hand um that i have to do then i start feeling this like energy just radiating through my arm kind of into my shoulder and my neck a little bit so until i do whatever the tick is then i you know then then i i can't get rid of that like that energy in a weird way like yeah i don't love my ocd but i definitely have learned to appreciate it and kind of work side by side with it in a way that like i mean i i you know i can't imagine my life without it you know i've never experienced my life without it and and like in that kind of way like i love it because it it has given me a lot in a way in a weird way like the the creativity levels that have kind of sparked because of it the the friendships i've made because of it you know and you know i i don't want to give like legs legs to it in that way but at the same time it doesn't always have to be scary if a parent has a child with ocd what advice would you give to the parent [Applause] be patient because they also don't know what's happening um it's easy to just kind of assume that someone who like is going through it assumes that they know everything about it most of us don't i mean i'm 24 i've as far as like i it's hard to think of my life without this um i think my like tics that i felt started hitting somewhere around second third grade from what i can remember it might have been before that but that's when i noticed it like really getting bad um and i still don't know everything about my diagnosis i still don't i still struggle to know how to cope with things to know how to live on a day-to-day basis without having it completely debilitate me um and the only reason i'm able to make some of those things like some of my tics small is just because i've worked basically my entire life to make them not as noticeable it's hard for me to come on here and say like you need to do x y and z to feel better um what works for me works for me it might not work for you if you're going through the same thing you know it really just depends on what your level of comfort is like i've gotten to a point in my life where i feel like i can almost like control a lot of the things it definitely can't control it but like um it it it doesn't debilitate me as much as it used to while my ocd from the outside might not look like the most extreme it's it's still valid um and i'm still finding that within myself to let myself know that my feelings and my urges and my my diagnosis is still valid um even if it's not to the most extreme level that that some people have and you know i i feel for those people as well and you know the the ocd community is such a big community like there are so many different types of people out there that that have so many varying degrees of of ocd and the levels in which they struggle with it

Channel: Special Books by Special Kids

Views: 250,436

Keywords: SBSK, OCD, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Chris Ulmer

Id: iOpVSfqfi6o

Length: 22min 6sec (1326 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 06 2021