Before Melody … Snowball the Cat

1994 was the year I was diagnosed with OCD. It was also the year our cat Snowball disappeared and Melody came into our home. The year before OCD hadn’t arisen in my life. I wasn’t having problems with checking the door or questioning my decisions. But something very traumatic did happen. To me it was traumatic anyway. I still don’t know why I got so upset. Perhaps that was the beginnings of OCD, the beginnings of my brain changing.

My son James had gone on a business trip with his Dad, leaving me home to work and take care of Snowball and James’ two pet rats. About two days before they returned I looked in on the rats and was devastated to find them both dead in the cage. They still had a bit of food and water, but I chastised myself for not checking on them enough. Maybe they didn’t get enough to eat. Snowball didn’t really like the rats and it could be they were literally scared to death.

I had to wait over 24 hours to tell my son about the rats because he and his dad would be on the road, traveling back home. This was before cell phones. I cried hysterically, sure he would be upset and perhaps even turn to a life of drugs and debauchery because of this horrible thing. I’d been told, “Yes, he’s a fine boy now at 11, but just wait, he’ll be a teenager soon.” I’d been watching, but so far he was still fine, but this could be the turning point.

Finally, my husband Jim and James called and I told them. James said, “Okay, Mom.” That was it. “Okay, Mom.” When they got home we buried the rats under the tree in the front yard. A few weeks later two plants sprouted. Corn! Maize actually, God’s reminder to us that life goes on.

I learned from this that children are resilient. We often blow things up out of proportion. They not only survive, they thrive. I needed to remind myself of this over the years when I was diagnosed with OCD. James was affected by my OCD. I tried not to burden him with it, but I knew he was. My questions – “Did I lock the door? Are you sure? Should I go back and check? Do you think I hit something with the car? Did I lock the car door?” Calling him into the bathroom to search the floor for a pill that I may or may not have dropped on the floor. Doing without because my income was cut when I changed careers. The list goes on.

Not only did James thrive, he grew to be an exceptional young man. He has compassion for those in need and in college his heart was touched by the AIDS crisis in sub-Saharan Africa, leading him to found Acting on AIDS, an AIDS awareness program for World Vision. He is now World Vision's advisor for college activism and social networking.

http://www.worldvision.org/news.nsf/news/what-is-advocacy-200907-enews

Breaking Free

In the last few years I haven’t had a presence on the Internet. No blog. My website hasn’t been updated. I haven’t been on OCD email lists. Why? It has to do with how I identify myself.
As a Christian I’ve always, first of all, found my identity in Christ, as a child of God. This sustained me through my struggle with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). In 1994, I was diagnosed with OCD. I still identified myself as a Christian and as a wife, mother and nurse, but more and more I identified myself as a person with OCD.

The first book I coauthored was titled The OCD Workbook, Your Guide to Breaking Free from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and I considered myself to be breaking free. When Bruce Hyman and I revised it in 2005 I identified less with OCD because it was taking up so little of my life. Now, as we’re completing the third edition of The OCD Workbook, I can say I have broken free. Not cured – there is no cure and I must be vigilant. But free of the grip OCD once had on my life.

Now, instead of withdrawing from being identified with OCD, I’m more willing to embrace it. With this blog I want to celebrate breaking free and give people hope that they too can break free.