I'm starting a new blog as a challenge to myselfto write more regularly and to get over OCD.
I became aware of OCD in my life in the early to mid 2000s. In 2001, I experienced a lot of stress. Before leaving on a month long trip to Spain, I sensed that something might happen. I wondered if something would go wrong with our flight over the Atlantic. I had lived overseas in my early 30's and I used to travel all the time. My father thought maybe my old cat, Spike, would pass away and we had discussed what he would do if that happened.
My father drove us to the airport in Montreal, came home and passed away suddenly.
I tried phoning him when we got to our apartment hotel in Torremolinos but I kept getting the answering machine. My brother reached us the following day to announce that our father had died at home. Dad, my partner and I lived together and I felt guilty at not having been home when he passed away. It was either a massive stroke or heart attack. I always wondered if I could have saved him.
A few months later in September, my partner became deathly ill and it took 10 months for the doctors to finally suspect vasculitis. I went automatic pilot. I did what I had to do. I spent my time taking care of him at home and later driving into the city to visit him every day after work. I'm a teacher and I would bring my school work with me and do it as he napped in his hospital room. After months of treatments, he was cured. I was wiped.
Now I wonder if along the way, I might have skipped some steps in grief or if I suffered some form of post-traumatic stress.
My mother died from cancer in 1991. She was a larger than life person to me. Her loss propelled towards faith and learning to live by trusting God. I packed up a young Spike and moved to teach on a military base in the Netherlands a few months later.
My father's death and my partner's illness later that same year seemed to have stripped me of my faith. I wanted control. Spike my 17 year old cat and the one constant in my adult life through broken relationships and many moves passed away.
I stopped traveling. I haven't been on a flight anywhere since that fateful trip to Spain in 2001. I've been afraid that my partner would die if I went on vacation some place. Or that the house would burn down.
I think that my checking has been a way to try to control things. I should know better. Life has already thrown me some curve balls.
I've even had trouble going away for weekends or overnight. I tend to call home every day and more than once a day. I've made myself go away for weekends, long weekends, 3 then 5 days seminars.
At some point, I started checking.
I was checking and rechecking things before leaving the house:
1. Is the cat inside?
2. Is the dryer off?
3. Are there any candles lit in the bathroom?
4. Is there water in the bathtub? The cat could drown.
5. Are the computers off in my study?
6. Are the computers off in the living room?
7. Is the the front door locked?
8. Is the coffee maker off and unplugged?
9. Is the kettle unplugged?
10. Is the stove off?
11. Is the oven off?
12. Is the back door locked?
I'm not sure if I wrote about this back then in any of my personal journals, but I estimate that sometime around 2006 is when I noticed that this was a problem. In trying to leave the house, I've checked all of these things up to 12 or 15 times before leaving the house. I've had anxiety attacks in trying to leave the house.
My medical doctor offered to prescribe something. I don't want to take any drugs. I want to overcome this on my own. Or maybe with encouragement from people online if anyone should come across this blog.
I've read 3 or 4 books on getting over OCD. The best has been Brain Lock by Jeffrey Schwartz. But I'm still not cured.
So, I decided that today being March 1st and the start of our March break, that I'd challenge myself to doing everything that I can to get a grip or rather loosen my grip and let go.
I know that eating right affects how you feel. I make all of my own food and eat 95% vegetarian. I swim laps 2 to 3 times a week. Last summer, I let my hair colour go natural to reveal a head of white hair cropped in a short boyish fashion which is a part Ellen Degeneres and part Jamie Lee Curtis.
I started simplifying my life a few years ago and I'm going to keep simplifying if not downsizing per say.
I have a great life. I have many friends. I have a kind life partner who is retired and I have one best friend, the same since kindergarten. We are debt free and have been for many years. I walk 400 metres to teach grade 6 in the school which we both attended and we live in the house where I grew up in a tiny village in the country. There are wide open spaces, hills and forests for snowshoeing, cross-country skiing and hiking out our front door. My friends and I kayak on the mighty Ottawa River just 4 blocks away.
I turned 50 last fall and I feel great.
This morning, I only checked my list once or twice.
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