My paper battle

I started to throw down the old bill and run away from the table, literally run away from it.

I could feel the anxiety build to probably an eight, and I told myself that I had to stay until it went down.

That was last Monday as I worked on my pile of mail and paperwork on our dining room table.

I have written about my problem with the stack of paperwork and the way my therapist is leading me to confront it as a part of my cognitive behavioral therapy.

So I stayed and forged ahead. I didn’t clear the table, but I made some headway. I also learned a lot about my reasons for keeping some of the paperwork.

Examples

 Bills: I had to have minor surgery last August, and bills come with surgery. You don’t just pay one person. You pay the hospital, the doctor who performed the surgery, the anesthesiologist and the lab.

The bills are all paid. They’ve been paid. But I haven’t filed the bills and my notes of when I mailed the payments because I like to check afterwards and make sure the payments were received.

I haven’t called. And those papers have been lying on the table. I’ve used the excuse that they’re serving as a reminder that I need to call.

On Monday I thought about that: I wanted to check to see if the payments had been received. I wanted to check. Was that OCD checking?

I think maybe it is in my case. I have not received any notices of nonpayment or phone calls asking for money. My checks have gone through at the bank. That most likely means the payments were received.

So I decided I would not check. I would file all the paperwork in a file folder relating to the August 2011 surgery.

 Requests: I’ve been periodically receiving notices from a national animal welfare organization that I’ve sent donations to in the past, asking me to renew my membership.

This is a wonderful organization, and I don’t fault them for asking me to renew. They depend on donations.

However, I have made a decision, for the time being, to support organizations in my local area. I’ve held onto those renewal notices, though, thinking, I’ll read this and think about it later.

Monday night I considered this: if I’ve decided not to renew the membership right now, there’s no need to keep the notices. When I decide to pick back up, I can find them easily online and send in the money.

So the notices went into the trash.

 It's called avoidance

To aid in the cleanup, I bought some extra file folders and a pack of banker boxes for storage.

I know that waiting to buy what I think are necessary accessories before tackling more of the paperwork is clearly avoidance on my part.

I will do more this week. I need to report back to my therapist. Most importantly, I need to face this.

I don’t officially have my next CBT session until May because my therapist is so booked up, but I’m on the cancellation list, and my therapist told me to call every week to ask about canceled appointments.

Have you ever realized, in the middle of an exposure, some of the OCD thinking that has led you to that place? What did you discover?

Even if you don’t have OCD, have you had to face down tasks that seemed insurmountable? How did you do it?

OCD is hard

I’ve been thinking about what it’s like to have obsessive-compulsive disorder.

How I experience OCD now is different from how I experienced it when I was child, teenager and young adult.

If I compare my life now to how it was when I was in my 20s, I can say with no doubt that things are better now. I cope better. I am able to turn away from the compulsive urges much more easily. I have tools in my toolbox to fight it.

On this blog, I write mostly about what it’s like for me now to have OCD. I continue to have problems with obsessions and compulsions. I am still discovering ways that OCD works itself into my life. My general anxiety and depression can still throw me to the floor and make me think I’ve never moved forward.

But I have moved forward. With medication, cognitive behavioral therapy and personal lifestyle changes, all ongoing, I am moving forward. I am grateful for that.

I know many others are suffering in the depths of OCD, where they are exhausted and in despair. I wish I could wave a wand and take away all their pain.

Because I know how hard it is. That is something I will never forget, no matter how much my own OCD and depression improve.

I’ve had the chapped and discolored hands and wrists from having them in water and strong cleaners much of the day.

  I have stood in front of my stove for hours, looking at the knobs from every angle, touching the top over and over, checking for heat, while I tried to reassure myself that the stove was off.

  I have cleaned the bathroom using bottles of disinfect at a time, then made up excuses—lied—to try to keep others from using it.

  I have driven in circles, back and forth on the street, looking for bodies that I may have run over.

  I have picked up sticks and rocks and anything that looked dangerous as I tried to walk from one place to another, backtracking and bending over to examine something that looked like a weed but might be a wire that could stick someone in the foot.

  I have written research papers that said nothing because I was so afraid of plagiarizing.

  I have failed to finish so many books because I couldn’t turn a page until I’d read it multiple times, making sure I’d really read it.

  I have prayed and chanted continuously, thinking I was somehow responsible for keeping everyone safe by doing so.

  I have confessed my sins, or what might possibly be sins, to anyone who would listen.

I’ve prayed for God to just let me die because I didn’t think I could take one more minute of the pain.

Somewhere inside me was a little hope. It must have been there, even though I couldn’t feel it, because somehow I didn’t give up.

It has taken years for me to reach a point where obsessions and compulsions don’t occupy every waking moment. I am getting better faster now, I believe, because I am doing cognitive behavioral therapy, something I didn’t think I needed before.

OCD will always be with me. It will always be with you, too, if you have it.

Hope will get us through, though. No matter how tiny that hope is, even if it’s just a small thought that there must be something better than this. Even if all the hope you have is the knowledge that someone else got better.

I got better. I’m getting better. And you can too.

OCD: An exposure I didn't plan

In my last post, I said I was going to do some exposures that I would write about.

In that same post, I also wrote about some physical health issues I’ve been having.

This post is about an exposure, but not one I was planning when I wrote that post on Sunday.

And it involves those health issues.

I wasn’t going to write about this. It was too personal, I thought, and my readers might not like it.

But this blog is about my life with OCD and the accompanying issues. I decided to share this exposure because it was about real life issues.

When I saw my family doctor last Friday, she ordered blood tests, a urinalysis, and a stool sample.

That last one got me. I could feel my mouth draw up a bit. I thought, doesn’t she remember that I have OCD? I just told her I was having anxiety from starting cognitive behavioral therapy. And she asks for a stool sample?

The doctor, of course, was interested in finding out what was causing my stomach pain and problems that have been ongoing for a while. So she went on talking to me, continuing to tell me what the course of action would be. She said that the nurse would give me what I needed to take a stool sample to the lab.

After my appointment, I walked out to my car and sat there while I talked with my husband on the phone. Then I realized that the nurse hadn’t given me the stool sample kit.

I admit, I wanted to just forget it. I wanted to take that as a sign that I really didn’t need to do it. Obviously, it wasn’t that important if the nurse forgot to give it to me, right?

But my husband said I needed to go back and get it. He was right. And I did.

Back inside, as the nurse told me what to do, I again could feel my mouth turning up.

“I think I’ll just wait until after all the blood work results come in,” I said.

The doctor had told me it would take about two weeks, so I thought that was a safe reprieve. And—this was my really, really good reason for waiting—the blood work results might reveal something that could be taken care of and I wouldn’t even have to do the stool sample.

The nurse gave me a look. She was probably thinking that I was a very weird woman.

“OK,” she said. “But you need to call me and let me know when you’re going to do it so I can fax the orders to the lab.”

All weekend, I ate very carefully, wanting to get better quickly so, again, maybe the stool sample wouldn’t be needed.

The nurse called me yesterday and said my white cell count was elevated.

“When are you going to do the stool sample?” she asked.

I guess she had forgotten my “wait until all the blood work comes back” excuse. I decided that I would try to make myself look a little more compliant.

“I’ll wait until after the urinalysis comes back,” I said.

It was going to be another couple of days, so I could continue to avoid the problem. Avoidance can be so sweet.

The nurse called me today. The urinalysis was negative.

“Then what’s wrong with me?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “That’s why we want to test your stool.”

I asked her to fax the orders to the lab.

Then I agonized about what to do. With my bathroom and contamination issues, I knew it would be a nightmare.

And there was the logistics matter. I had to get the sample to the lab within the hour of producing it. The lab was a good 45 minutes away.

I just wanted to forget all about it.

But I went to the doctor in the first place to get help. If I wanted help, I needed to follow through. Was I going to let OCD stop me?

I decided very quickly that I had to do it. I wouldn’t think about it anymore. I finished up some work and then went home.

It was not easy. I pretty much freaked out at one point. I wanted to clean the bathroom from top to bottom. I wanted to take a shower.

I didn’t have time, though. I had to get the sample to the lab, or—horrors—I’d have to do it again.

I made it out of the house after washing my hands only twice. I was feeling anxiety at a scale of about 9 all the way to the lab.

I kept glancing at my car clock, calculating how much time I had left. I worried about possible detours, or doing something that would cause a state trooper to pull me over. That would delay me. Then I figured I would just wave the biohazard bag at him, and he’d let me go.

I finally arrived at the lab, in time, and hurried inside, eager to get rid of that bag.

Ah, but there was a problem.

The woman at the front desk looked through the paperwork and said they hadn’t received the orders. Then she didn’t say anything.

I internally freaked out again, thinking I’d have to do all of this again and come back.

“Can I still leave it?”

“Yes,” she said. “But make sure your name and date of birth are on the cup.”

“It is,” I said, pointing to the label on top.

“It has to be on the side of the cup,” she said, and handed me a marker.

So I had to take the cup out of the biohazard bag and write the required information on the side of the cup.

I doubt if the outside of the cup was contaminated, but I did not want to touch it again.

I followed her instructions and then used the hand sanitizer at the door to the lab. I hoped that since it was in a lab, it would be extra sanitizing.

I thought later that I should have just asked where the bathroom was so I could wash my hands there. Anxiety makes you forget vital things.

Back in my car, I could feel my anxiety going down. I had done it. The worst was over. I didn’t have to do anything else but wait for the results.

I’m very tired, but I’m glad I did it.

Easter on the farm



Ducks feeding on cracked corn by the pond. The photos are not my best because I took them with my phone.

   
    My husband and I had Easter dinner at his cousin and her husband’s farm today.

They live about 30 minutes from our house on a big piece of land with lots of trees, flowers, a garden, blueberry vines and a large pond fed by a creek.

They both love animals, and they have quite a collection: three cats, three dogs, one cockatiel, two parrots and a large tank of goldfish.

At the pond, they have six ducks. Two geese make regular visits.



Ducks in the water.

Added to the menagerie are three baby rabbits. A friend of theirs in a nearby town found the babies in his yard and sent them to the farm, where the cousins have bottle-fed and otherwise tended them. They plant to gradually introduce the rabbits to the outdoors until they are ready to be released.

Right now, they lay close together in a cage, with a light blanket around them to keep them warm.

Before dinner, as some of us sat on the screened-in back porch talking, enjoying the sunshine and breeze, the geese flew in, announcing their arrival with loud voices. We watched them angle down to the pond and skim the water before settling in.

After dinner, my husband and I walked down to the pond and watched the ducks and fed them cracked corn. We laughed at their antics in the water, and I told my husband I could sit there all day and watch and listen to them.



Can you see the goose?



Tulips filled a flowerbed, and dozens of iris plants are set to bloom. A few already have.

What wonderful sights and sounds for a day that celebrates renewed life.

I needed this day. It’s been a hard weekend. I’m having some issues with my physical health, specifically with my digestive process, so I saw my doctor Friday.

It seems like everything I eat makes me feel awful, so my doctor is having me make some big changes: less caffeine, little or no dairy, more fiber, less simple carbohydrates. I am also eating less sugar.

My doctor is running some tests. I hope there’s nothing physically wrong, but I’m not too concerned. I’ve had similar problems before. If it’s something more, I’ll deal with what I have to when I have to.

But I know that anxiety can affect the digestive system, and I know I haven’t been treating my body very well. I don’t eat right and my sleep patterns are all over the place.

I am all for the changes, because I’m tired of feeling like I’ve been feeling. But any changes can have at least temporary disadvantages. I don’t know whether it’s the decrease in caffeine and sugar or just being physically worn out, but I’ve been feeling down too.

The trip to the farm helped. Being amidst so much life, being so close to the natural world, being with family—they are all valuable and important components of a well-lived life, don’t you think?

On another note, I’ll be tackling some exposures this week and writing about them. Wish me luck!

Good Friday thoughts

Tonight I attended the Good Friday service at my church. It was a quiet and meditative time, and I carried away some thoughts I’d like to share with you.

I respect people of all faiths and religions, as well as those who have no religion at all. I believe we are all connected by the same Power.

I can only speak from the belief system that I have chosen to follow, and then, even more specifically, from my understanding of that belief system.

My faith is far from perfect. Sometimes it’s feeble. My commitment to my belief system has been spotty and unreliable.

I have many issues with organized religion stemming from my religious scrupulosity, one of the manifestations of my obsessive-compulsive disorder.

I am a doubter, a wanderer. I sometimes look at others who seem to have an unwavering faith and wish I could be like them.

I am in no position to teach anyone else about how to live a good and faithful life.

I still come before the cross.

I come before the cross, sometimes in despair, sometimes with my unending desires to know how to live a good and meaningful life, and sometimes because there is nowhere else to go.

At tonight’s service, we had a time of meditation on the cross, and anyone who wished to do so could go and kneel before the cross to pray and meditate.

Before the cross tonight, I didn’t pray much. I just tried to absorb the moment and think about what the minister had said in prayer: that we learn from Jesus’ carrying the cross how to carry our crosses.

To each of you, wherever you are in life, God’s grace and peace and blessings.

Learning: The power of poetry

April is National Poetry Month, a celebration started by the American Academy of Poets in 1996.

A friend of mine suggested sharing bits of poetry on Facebook during the month, and that got me thinking about other ways I could celebrate poetry and what it means to me.

Why poetry?

I’ve written before on this blog about my love of Mary Oliver’s poetry and the peace and calmness it brings me.

I have always enjoyed reading poetry, and even wrote a lot of it years ago.

I love words, and each word is important in a poem. The entire meaning of the poem can turn on one word and its definition and connotations.

Beyond that, great poets reach into their souls for their words and in turn have the possibility of touching others.

Reading poetry centers me. It’s harder for me to pay attention to the racing thoughts of anxiety when I’m caught up in the cadence of a poem.

Certainly reading poetry is a viable choice for me when I’m trying to redirect my attention away from compulsive urges that go along with obsessive-compulsion disorder.

And many a poem has offered me hope when I’ve been sunk in depression.

Poetry adds beauty and insight to my life, and that’s a good thing for anyone, not just those who suffer from OCD, depression and other anxiety disorders.

Let’s celebrate!

The website for National Poetry Month provides 30 suggestions on ways for individuals and the community to celebrate poetry. Here are some of my favorites:

Celebrate Poem in Your Pocket Day. This day is April 26. You are invited to carry a favorite poem in your pocket and share it with others.

I didn’t want to wait until April 26. I carried a poem in my pocket today. I liked reaching into my pocket and remembering the poem and reciting it to myself. It was an Emily Dickinson poem that reflects the power of words:

“A word is dead

When it is said,

Some say.

I say it just

Begins to live

That day.”

Read a book of poetry. I plan to revisit some poets I haven’t read for a while, and look for new ones.

Memorize a poem. I love memorizing poems. They are available to me whenever I need solace, encouragement or a bit of beauty.

Start a commonplace book. According to the website, commonplace books are personal anthologies. You copy favorite poems and quotations into the notebook. These notebooks “can be a source of enjoyment and solace, reminding the keeper of favorite books and poems, and can even become family heirlooms.”

I’ve done some of this in my journals, but I plan to begin devoting one journal to my favorite poems.

Integrate poetry and technology. This involves including poetry as part of your email signature, on your voice mail message and on social media like Facebook and Twitter.

I plan to share a bit of poetry every day on my Facebook page. It will keep me reading, and, I hope, share some beauty with others.

Write a letter to a poet. I’ve never done this. But I’d like to show some appreciation to poets who have touched my life in a positive way.

What is your relationship with poetry? How does reading poetry affect you? Who are your favorite poets? What poem would you carry in your pocket? Do you write poetry?

Book Review: Oxford Messed Up, by Andrea Kayne Kaufman

Oxford Messed Up. By Andrea Kayne Kaufman. Grant Place Press, 2011. 324 pages.

The Cadence Group recently asked me to read and review a novel, Oxford Messed Up, by Andrea Kayne Kaufman.

I was happy to read the book, because one of the main characters, Gloria Zimmerman, suffers from obsessive-compulsive disorder, and I was curious to see how that would be portrayed.

The novel is about two people who consider themselves messed up. Though very different from each other in background and personality, each shares a love of Van Morrison’s music.

His music serves as a background and almost as a character, as the two help each other to transcend their demons.

Gloria Zimmerman is a Yale graduate and a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where she is studying feminist poetry and serving as a research assistant with an expert in the genre.

Gloria has suffered from OCD since she was in seventh grade. Although she has been prescribed Luvox, she doesn’t take the medicine on a regular basis.

Gloria’s OCD, which she calls Oliver, revolves around contamination. She is terrified of germs and goes to great lengths to avoid them or to rid herself and environment of them.

She cleans the bathroom every day, scrubbing already clean surfaces again and again. She avoids people as much as possible, and finds herself happiest when she’s in the sealed environment of a rare book room in the library.

Gloria keeps a huge supply of cleaning products, antibacterial wipes and, her favorite, hand sanitizer.

As a result of all her cleaning, Gloria’s hands are red and raw, immediately noticeable to others, a visible sign of her inner suffering.

One of the only ways she can comfort herself is by listening to the poetry of Morrison’s music.

Henry is also an Oxford student. He is studying music, but not the music he loves, Morrison’s. He is an academic mess, avoiding the library, research and writing. He has no confidence in himself as a scholar.

Henry is a recovering drug addict, and has the track marks on his arms as a reminder. He has other secrets, too, which keep him from having motivation to do much more than listen to his Morrison records.

When Gloria arrives at Oxford, she discovers that she will be sharing a bathroom, or a loo, with Henry. Oliver is disgusted by this and by Henry’s messiness and “his dirty, feces, germ-infested hands.”

But Gloria and Henry become friends, on Gloria’s terms. She allows herself to interact with Henry but keeps herself distant and doesn’t confide her troubles to him.

They spend hours together talking and sharing their love of the music and poetry of Morrison and others.

In anger after Gloria rebuffs his offer to take her to a Morrison concert, Henry urinates in their shared bathtub. Gloria responds by flying into a rage and then having a meltdown.

This is a turning point in the story, because it brings Gloria and Henry together in a more honest way. They agree that he will be her coach in cognitive behavioral therapy, specifically exposure and response prevention, and she will be his dissertation coach, helping him pull together a new topic based on Morrison’s fatalistic optimism.

Though they have many setbacks and face new issues as they reveal more of themselves to each other, Gloria and Henry are able to transcend the problems that they have and begin to enjoy and find happiness in life.

The novel moves along quickly, with short chapters and lots of different scenes. The viewpoint switches from character to character, each chapter told from the point of view of Gloria or Henry or, in a few chapters, other characters.

The writing is concise and evocative.

Kaufman does a fine job in describing what it’s like to suffer from OCD. For example, her description of the process by which Gloria cleans the bathroom, and the way she rubs her hands together with hand sanitizer while chanting to herself, will resonate with people who have OCD.

Henry is a tortured but loveable character. It’s a little hard to believe that Gloria, steeped in years of OCD, would so immediately be drawn to someone like Henry, but their relationship develops believably.

The book takes place over about five months, and that’s the only real quibble I have with it. Gloria takes Luvox regularly and works on her cognitive behavioral therapy for just two months. Yet, she has almost a complete recovery from OCD. In fact, I think most readers of the novel would say she was cured.

During the two months, Gloria also gets professional help at Oxford, but her quick recovery is still unbelievable.

This may give readers who suffer from OCD and those who don’t the impression that OCD can be easily overcome in just two months, while in reality, it can take longer to reach a place where OCD does not control a sufferer’s life.

I love how the story intertwines with Morrison’s music and women’s poetry. There are many metaphorical layers in the story that enrich it.

Study questions are included at the end of the novel, and these could be helpful for a book club or a class.

Anyone who likes a good love story and who delights in seeing characters overcome great obstacles will enjoy this novel. The book could inspire readers who happen to have OCD and inform others about the disorder.

For more information about Kaufman and about how to purchase the book, go to her website at http://andreakaynekaufman.com/. The book is available as a hardcover, paperback and as an e-book.