- cross-posted to:
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- [email protected]
- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
- [email protected]
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This is a surprisingly relatable green text post. It’s definitely a hard situation to be in. I hope that anon and the gf both are in a better situation for their own mental health. It might not always be the key in solving everything but communication is important and can often help.
My wife has severe OCD. She has gotten to the point she has basically 0 symptoms now. Where before she couldn’t drive or leave the house. Here is what I’ve learned through our journey.
- The repetitive actions are often caused by intrusive thoughts. My wife’s stemmed from actions that were tied to her morality, and her memory. Such as, she would drive around the block 5 times because she would have this thought, “What if you ran over a kid but you don’t remember it?” Which was the worse thing she could have done.
- 90% percent of people with OCD are also neurodivergent, namely autistic. My wife wasn’t diagnosed with Autism until after her OCD diagnosis.
Like what actions/treatments/hacks did the two of you end up doing to change things?
Edit: can you like seriously elaborate with the meatof how that came to be…might be able to really help some souls out
For my wife it was mainly a good therapist she saw weekly. I think what helped her improve that most was a form of radical acceptance .
- Intrusive thoughts don’t define me
- Intrusive thoughts do not last forever
- I’m not alone
Or something like:
- I am not my thoughts. They are not my authentic self.
- I am just an observer of my thoughts. I simply watch as they pass through.
Often the reaction to the thoughts is what gives intrusive thoughts power. Accepting the thoughts for what they are takes the power from them. This is hard since often intrusive thoughts are ingrained into your most moral values, so to take that power is difficult.
One thing she had me do at the start of her therapy was to ask her a question when ever she had an intrusive thought: what if? What if you killed that person? What if you said that racial slur? For her it would be the end of the world, bringing it into reality would often ground the thoughts. For the driving example, “What if I hit a child?”
Well, then there would be a loud thump. We would get out and check on the child. We would call for help while we did what we could. We would probably go to the hospital. The cops would try and determine if it was accidental or not. You might be in jail. You might not. That is out of our hands.
Just follow the thoughts to the logical conclusion. That aspect of her work stopped shortly after we started, though.
She also did some trauma therapy. OCD can be rooted in childhood trauma. My wife had a sister with bi-polar, and owho ften got violent. Her parents wouldn’t speak to the kids about it. So my wife’s childhood was filled with this constant unacknowledged stress and tension, because she knew something was wrong but everyone pretended it was all okay. Coupled with her autistic hyper empathy, this sent her into a anxiety driven downward spiral.
Another thing she said that helped was EMDR. It’s sort of a pseudoscience but my wife swears it helped a ton. So, anicdotal but worth a shot.
Anyways, thats all I can think of. I would recommend trying to find a therapist who specializes in neurodivergent people and go from there.
Can you ask her how she employs/uses EMDR on a practical basis? Like if I go for a walk and do the eyes back and fourth to left and right thing (like REM sleep), is that the secret sauce to EMDR besides havingthe adequate prompt/thought in mind whilst doing so?m
Edit: is the dominant form of intervention CBT with a little EMDR?
She never did it unguided. And the way the therapist did it was different than what I’ve seen online. She would lay down and the therapist had her hold two paddles. One in each hand. The paddles would vibrate or lightly shock her, alternating between left and right. She did this while she was reliving old traumatic moments from her childhood. It was supposed to help process the information differently or something along those lines.
Neurobiofeedback?
Thing is, nobody can help her but herself. It takes a lot of accepting and patience and this often seems to be the best help.
Does she go out for walks and spontaneous trips to the store at all? I feel like a lot of anxiety is not helped when people stay inside, get no movement, and doomscroll or do anything mindless that is just a quick fix but actually exacerbates it
I also despise having roommates and I hope thats not proximal to whatever the root of the situational pathology is here…cuz I get there’s no pretty solutions for such a problem but having your own space.
