In my last post, I talked a bit about obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in light of one of the passages from the Wen Tzu. I thought it might prove beneficial to discuss the aspects of this condition for those of you who don't have it and for those of you who may have it. but don't know it.
According to the Mayo Clinic,
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a type of anxiety disorder in which you have unreasonable thoughts and fears (obsessions) that lead you to engage in repetitive behaviors (compulsions). With obsessive-compulsive disorder, you may realize that your obsessions aren't reasonable, and you may try to ignore them or stop them. But that only increases your distress and anxiety. Ultimately, you feel driven to perform compulsive acts in an effort to ease your distress.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder often centers around themes, such as a fear of getting contaminated by germs. To ease your contamination fears, you may compulsively wash your hands until they're sore and chapped. Despite your efforts, the distressing thoughts of obsessive-compulsive disorder keep coming back. This leads to more ritualistic behavior — and a vicious cycle that's characteristic of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
I've been OCD almost my entire life. While I don't have an unreasonable fear of germs, I do have one for toxic or potentially toxic substances. Here I'm talking about anything from pesticides to my dogs' anti-flea drops to paint solvent to gasoline to prescription medicine. If I get any stuff of this nature on exposed skin or I even think there is a remote possibility of such, I go freak'n bonkers!
Whenever I have to take oral medications, I'm convinced that, whatever the known side effects are, I will have each and every one of them in spades!!
When I get into debates, I tend to break all known laws of civility and I always have to have the last word.
I'm excessively OCD when it comes to the way food that I will consume is prepared. As I wrote back in November 2008, I love peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Not just ANY PB & J, mind you, but particular brands and each sandwich MUST BE made the same way or I simply cannot eat it.
As a very intelligent and highly rational person, I KNOW these compulsions are irrational. I can dissect them from a socio-psychological perspective and I can often trace their histories back to specific events in my childhood. The problem though is that -- for all my ability to analyze them -- I am powerless to stop them!
To be certain, I try to push them out of my head when they arise, but, in a matter of seconds, they pop back in. I push them out again and right back they come. In time, no amount of pushing does any good and they consume me. When that happens, I must follow my rituals and patterns through to keep from going loony.
For example, when I get into email or blog debates, I read the responses I may disagree with over and over and over again. If I try to force myself to walk away from the computer, in a short amount of time though, I'm compelled to return. I become obsessed with responding point-by-point (which often drives people mad). As other people become irritated with me because I refuse to let things go, they tend to become snippy, short and curt. This only causes me to send back more point-by-point responses. As I think most people can easily recognize, this is a recipe for disaster or, at least, not being the most popular person on the block!!
While OCD is not explicitly linked to Asperger's Syndrome (AS) or Schizotypal Personality Disorder (SPD), both conditions tend to include comorbidity (concomitant but unrelated pathological or disease processes). In my case, along with being diagnosed with AS & SPD, I also deal with depression, OCD, and Social Anxiety Disorder.
To further illustrate my obsessive nature, I've been working on this one damn post for the better part of 2 hours! I keep tinkering with my sentences and changing a word here or there. Each time I think I'm done, I find something else that can be tweaked slightly. So, I read the whole thing one more time...only to find something else to change.
While you, dear reader, may only read this post one time, I've now read it 20 or 30 times. (Of course, since I just added these final two paragraphs, I now have to read it again. ARghhhhh!)
Whenever I have to take oral medications, I'm convinced that, whatever the known side effects are, I will have each and every one of them in spades!!
When I get into debates, I tend to break all known laws of civility and I always have to have the last word.
I'm excessively OCD when it comes to the way food that I will consume is prepared. As I wrote back in November 2008, I love peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Not just ANY PB & J, mind you, but particular brands and each sandwich MUST BE made the same way or I simply cannot eat it.
As a very intelligent and highly rational person, I KNOW these compulsions are irrational. I can dissect them from a socio-psychological perspective and I can often trace their histories back to specific events in my childhood. The problem though is that -- for all my ability to analyze them -- I am powerless to stop them!
To be certain, I try to push them out of my head when they arise, but, in a matter of seconds, they pop back in. I push them out again and right back they come. In time, no amount of pushing does any good and they consume me. When that happens, I must follow my rituals and patterns through to keep from going loony.
For example, when I get into email or blog debates, I read the responses I may disagree with over and over and over again. If I try to force myself to walk away from the computer, in a short amount of time though, I'm compelled to return. I become obsessed with responding point-by-point (which often drives people mad). As other people become irritated with me because I refuse to let things go, they tend to become snippy, short and curt. This only causes me to send back more point-by-point responses. As I think most people can easily recognize, this is a recipe for disaster or, at least, not being the most popular person on the block!!
While OCD is not explicitly linked to Asperger's Syndrome (AS) or Schizotypal Personality Disorder (SPD), both conditions tend to include comorbidity (concomitant but unrelated pathological or disease processes). In my case, along with being diagnosed with AS & SPD, I also deal with depression, OCD, and Social Anxiety Disorder.
To further illustrate my obsessive nature, I've been working on this one damn post for the better part of 2 hours! I keep tinkering with my sentences and changing a word here or there. Each time I think I'm done, I find something else that can be tweaked slightly. So, I read the whole thing one more time...only to find something else to change.
While you, dear reader, may only read this post one time, I've now read it 20 or 30 times. (Of course, since I just added these final two paragraphs, I now have to read it again. ARghhhhh!)
Yes, another self-diagnosed condition, I'm not surprised. No wonder you're into mysticism and other Fairy Land bullshit. I guess it's more fun in Fairy Land than it is here in reality.
ReplyDeleteHey anonymous: welcome back.
ReplyDeleteYou are unkind, but pragmatic.
Reality is actually much more fun than Fairy-Land-Bullshit.
The question is: what is reality?
RT knows a lot about taoism, yet he is not healed by it.
He announces myriad disorders, diseases and syndromes, yet still proudly cuts himself off from the infinite.
We are similar to batteries:
We supply power for a while.
But it is never our own power.
Without a connection to the source, we run down and become erratic.
God has been given a seriously bad name by religions in general.
Enough to cause a disconnection, en-masse.
Call it what you will, if the term "God" offends you.
But it is the power source, without which there is no purpose and no fulfillment.
When you achieve connection, you know it.
I was going to write something about how chicken shit assholes always seem to hide behind anonymity, but then I decided not to.
ReplyDeleteFirst they laugh, then the ignore, then you win.
That comment nicely sums you up, thurman.
ReplyDeletePerhaps "anonymous" has no blogger profile.
Perhaps he is smarter than us, and would rather not make himself a target for people like you.
Who knows?
Gosh, I wrote my previous comment before reading this post...and I am struck by this comment:
ReplyDelete"The problem though is that -- for all my ability to analyze them -- I am powerless to stop them!"
This is a locus of control issue. Taoist philosophy and practices have a lot to say about this. If one doesn't believe one can be healed (by letting go, perhaps by engaging in some of the "esoteric/religious" practices), then one is sealing the fate which one wrote oneself.
Western medicine (therapy included) depends so much on diagnoses that can be categorized in the DSM and treated by the compounds in the PDR. Once we give a name to the diagnosis and a chemical to treat it, it's no wonder people can't let go. It becomes their identity.
Oh, I hope I don't sound like Tom Cruise here....
BR you're getting too good at this.
ReplyDeleteControl issues are the derivative of ego.
Banish the ego, and the need to control is no more.
Taoism offers a foolproof plan for ego-banishment.
But only if the teachings are left intact.
Ego is - by its nature - unable to leave things intact.
For the record -- and I don't know why anon keeps harping on this -- my diagnoses have been made by professionals, not me. I'm on disability because these professionals, paid for by our government, have made these decisions.
ReplyDeleteNow as to the suggestion that this is all bound up in the ego, there may be some truth to that. However, the current leading theory on Asperger's -- in fact, all forms of autism -- is that it involves neurological differences in the way the brain stores, recognizes and transmits information. If this theory is proven out, then this would lead to some strong implications.
It would mean that the brains of neurotypicals and aspies are patently different.
Would some of you say that a blind or deaf person who accepts their condition (for what it is) is blocking their ability to be healed or they have cut themselves off from the infinite just because they can't physically see or hear? Would a person who doctors certify can't physically see or hear be chastised for making a self-diagnosis?
I'm thinking of a cousin of my mother's who was deaf but who did not identify herself as a deaf person. She was a successful, creative, kind person who made her own way in the world. She could have said, "I don't like music, I can't HEAR it. I WON'T hear it." In fact, she learned to appreciate the symphony by using other senses to comprehend it. Helen Keller did not wallow in being blind and deaf...with great will and compassionate assistance, she overcame these things, which were not her "true nature", to understand the world better than many seeing/hearing people.
ReplyDeleteThe "brains of neurotypicals and aspies" may indeed be different. Our true hearts and minds, the Chinese "xin", are not. But this may be a "religious" sort of understanding.
RT: A question has been much on my mind:
ReplyDeleteYou are so evidently polarized toward a certain viewpoint, especially concerning the political...
Why do you not simply delete the comments you do not like?
You don't have to say.
But I am genuinely mystified by this.
Baroness,
ReplyDeleteI'm rather offended and sorry that you seem to think I'm "wallowing". My purpose is to explain for the benefit of others. I'd write more, but your comment really rubbed me the wrong way.
Crow,
It takes one to know one. In my estimation, you are evidently polarized toward a certain viewpoint. (You recently wrote a post that Marxism must be bad because you didn't like the beards -- the beards? -- of Engels & Marx.)
I'm not surprised that allowing comments I disagree with mystifies you. As a die-hard conservative, your knee-jerk reaction would, of course, be to censor what you disagree with. As a leftist, I don't believe in censorship, so anyone can say whatever they desire.
Anon,
ReplyDeleteWhile my dander is up, why in the hell do you visit this blog? If you think it's all "Fairy Land bullshit", why waste your time?
Like Thurman, I it find interesting that the people on the internet who are the most crass and crude tend to hide behind anonymous. What are are you afraid of? The least you could do is use a virtual name like "Bob" or "Jane". The fact that you won't even go that far says a lot about you -- and it's not good.
I was put down as OCD by my first doctor. I disagreed a lot with his statements. But after a long time I've come to terms with the idea.
ReplyDeleteI can only say this: trying to banish unwanted thoughts only seemed to make my problems worse for wear, it seems that I have become better since I have accepted some irrational thoughts to be. My goal today is to recognice the patterns of thought which are related to compulsivity, and not entertain them. Let them 'die' out so to say. It is easier said then done. But it has become better.
*smirks*
ReplyDeleteI have been judged and found wanting, perhaps I should go out back and flail myself for being so crass and unthinking as to stand up for what I believe and proudly display the name I was given at birth beside every statement I make.
Well said, RT!
Suecae,
ReplyDeleteLike you, I too have come to accept that I have to deal with some level of irrational thought. For example, my oral surgery is coming up in 9 days. I've told myself that I'm going to be anxious and, rather than fight the anxiety, I simply need to accept it for what is -- fear of the unknown.
Ihave OCD's and function through them. the Tao takes off the rough edges.
ReplyDelete"I have OCD's and function through them. The Tao takes off the rough edges."
ReplyDeleteYes. Well said.
The fact that I can, um, relate, should show up in the fact that I just edited your quote, above:D
Sometimes I wonder if my husband wonders, "why, with all her practice, does she still participate in all those wacko rituals?" He probably doesn't wonder, but if he did, and if he asked, I'd say, "well, I wouldn't want to imagine me, without my practice, lol!
OCD is OK:)
It's almost amusing RT:
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely nothing you decide about me is true.
Not one thing.
What so enrages you is that I do not display sympathy for you.
And that I do not agree with you.
And that I am not moved by you.
Not that I don't care about you:
I just don't subscribe to your endless capacity to be deluded.
By the way: I do vote conservative, but am not one.
Unfortunately there is no taoist party, calm and peaceful party, genuine party or balanced party.
Thus my vote has to be a tactical one.
Crow,
ReplyDeleteI was trying my best to be somewhat tactful. However, if you genuinely want to know WHY you get under my skin, here's why:
You go down as the most egotistical, pompous ass that I have met on the internet to date. You are so stuck on yourself that it blows my mind that someone could be that self-centered. You view yourself as some sort of worldly sage when, in fact, all indications show that you're nothing more than angry, bitter, lonely, old man.
You think so much of your own opinion (of course, you label anything you think as "truth" or "fact") that you refuse to dialog with anyone who doesn't accept you as some sort of God (Hey, I understand, it's B-E-N-E-A-T-H you). It's no wonder you get don't along with people on your island. I don't understand how they tolerate you at all.
What's even worse is that you clothe your patronizing, condescending crap with flowery Taoist terms. You talk about how you've found "truth" and "balance" while spewing forth with insults, slurs, innuendos and hate.
I feel sorry for you.
Do you ever wonder what your readers make of the things you say RT?
ReplyDeleteDo you wonder what you will make of it when you complete your current cycle and get rational again?
I mean, really: get a grip.
what??? i came her looking for information about taoism! rambling is not the half of the story!!!
ReplyDeleteSorry RT: my profile got a bit scrambled there.
ReplyDeleteThank you for being so "tactful".
I shudder to think what you are like when you are not "tactful".
"...rather than fight the anxiety, I simply need to accept it for what is -- fear of the unknown."
ReplyDeleteReally, that's what we're all trying to do, OCD or not. And once you face a fear, it often diminishes.
I'm grateful for the sense of empowerment and motivation your blog instills in me! Prepare to unleash chaos and hilarity in Funny Shooter 2 Unblocked - it's a game that'll have you hooked from the start!
ReplyDelete