Coming Out

Bet you thought this is the beginning of a moving article about the trauma of Coming Out as an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Sufferer - try saying it fast after a double Pimms.

And you’re wrong.

Here I am, doing Dawn Press-Ups for the eyes: holding the door of the airing-cupboard open, staring at the door jamb with forensic attention, peering left at the metal water pipes which run down the wall, then flicking my gaze up to the ceiling light which, incidentally, is off.

As I hurriedly close the closet door and begin breathing again in the hall, a separate door – this time of a sordid cerebral lock-up – rattles open.

Technicoloured visions swirl out - of a cat caught in the cupboard door, the light clicking on and igniting bed-linen on the top shelf, while the water pipes spring a leak which would alert Noah. H20 might help to extinguish the blaze – but what about the poor cat?

I whip open the cupboard door for the fourth time.
‘Last time,’ I say firmly aloud. It’s getting chilly, standing around staring at things.
‘What?’ asks my partner absently from the sitting-room.
‘Just talking to myself,’ I manage, outwardly resembling Lot’s wife, After. Inwardly, I’m thrashing around in a Tarantino mind-meld.

This time I do breathe, which improves the quality of life no end - but the OCD sneakily retaliates with the certainty that the vacuum cleaner is planning to topple sideways onto the water pipes under cover of darkness. I look down, to introduce a bit of variety and also to check for water seeping under the closed door. The hall floor is blessedly dry.

Taking a deep breath, I ease open the door to catch the Hoover at it; all is dark and quiet.

Stare, peer, flick – slam door hurriedly. March into sitting-room, perspiring with anxiety, but exhaling noisily with relief.

Partner looks up quizzically from the sofa, where he’s nursing coffee and a hangover:
‘Aren’t you cold?’ Damnit, even my knees are goose-pimpled.

I forgot to unhook my dressing-gown from inside the cupboard door: the whole reason for the past 15-minute farce. The Gremlins, who’d sneaked off for a tea-break, groan as they see me approaching the closet.

I’ve had enough: a girl can only cope with so much at 7am, it’s time to cheat.

‘Honey, would you mind getting ..?’

Helen Poskitt
www.helenposkitt.com

Deep Breathing

Is it at puberty when people – let's face it, girls in particular – begin worrying that they smell bad?

What I'm leading up to is Addictive Sniffing. … Okay, there was a little Snorting during the Experimental Period, but I didn't inhale.

I'm one of those annoying people who hits the ground running at 6.30am, but who
head-buts the keypad just after lunch from sheer fatigue – partly due to an effortful lung-expanding Sniffing Schedule. I could patent it for anyone avoiding the gym, but wishing to develop a big chest and dispense with diving equipment.

Daily schedule goes something like this:

(Sound of duvet cover being thrown briskly back and reaching with feet for slippers.)
Self: Euck! Ouch. Bloody hell!
(Bang of cat-flap as Tomcat speedily exits.)
Self: Entrails, between the toes, aghkk!
(Begins hopping towards bathroom, trying to do up dressing-gown.)
Self: Ow! What was that? Oh, a beak! Gross ...

I gingerly remove the beak, then wipe mess and blood off feet frantically with loo paper, simultaneously adopting a lemon-sucking expression. This strengthens face muscles.
Raise lid of lavatory gingerly, due to fear of faeces and drop in tissue (of both types) from great height. Rinse hands thoroughly under bathroom tap, rinse tap, rinse hands, turn off tap. Sniff fingers three times. Let's not get neurotic about this; they smell fine.

Dressing-gown was on the floor, has cat done something horrible to it during the night ..? As well as slaughtering things nearby, of course. Vivid mental vision of feline spraying his territory, despite not having a hormone to his name since the Trip to the Vet. He's never forgiven us – hence the head under the bed payback.

Remove dressing-gown and inspect it minutely, in chilly dawn light of bedroom window. I gradually become aware that our Paramedic neighbour, returning from his night shift, is staring across. Drop to floor below window level clad in annoyed frown and ancient sleeping vest. Can't see any blood on dressing-gown. Sniff at fingers three times each hand, front and back.They smell fine.

I neurotically sniff the whole of dressing-gown – 19 sniffs in all – it doesn't seem to smell horrible. Perhaps my olfactory nerve isn't working. Yes it is: I can smell the compost bin in the kitchen from here. Crawl on hands and knees past bedroom window to bathroom. Cat's passed along this hall and he probably cussedly slept in the cat litter tray again, despite having a sumptuous cat sofa. Sniff hands, three times front and back and also my wrists for good measure. All seems fine, if a bit dusty.

Exhale hard and feel dizzy. Have shower, paying neurotic attention to washing.
Emerge, reach for towel, then remember that towel was seen left on lid of lavatory yesterday afternoon by partner.

I try and sniff at towel with the breath control of an opera singer, but begin hyper-ventilating and my vision shimmers interestingly. Towel seems fine, but by this time most of the water previously on me is in a puddle round my feet on the floor. Drop towel on it, gingerly mopping with my feet. Get dressed as fast as possible trying to avoid sniffing anything at all, even when nose runs.

Return for towel. I pick it up between finger and thumb and feed it into washing-machine with my foot. Fall over. Hobble to kitchen tap and rinse finger and thumb. Rinse tap. Rinse fingers. Sniff hands 6 times, seems fine- See neighbour staring at me out of his window.

Perspiring with embarassment, I smile unwillingly at him and feel my face creak as the frown furrows smooth out. He gestures wildly; I open the sash window.
He says: 'Sorry to bother you - your cat's just killed something big on our patio. Wouldn't matter, but I need a kip and the wife faints at the sight of blood. Haven't seen such a mess since I had to cover a boxing match. If you wouldn't mind?'

Perhaps the perfect pet would be a nice shiny goldfish ...

- Helen Poskitt

Foot loose and fancy free

Oh Lordy, to try on the beautiful red leather boots with the jaunty bow, I have to remove my old Mock-Ugg boots.

You'd think the fact that I've had my Turd-Detector (that's eyes to you) on Red Alert all the way to the shoe-shop, and that any dog electing to squat amongst the densely-marching ranks of Victoria commuters would have to be built like a Sumo wrestler, would ensure that my boots are immaculately clean. Having OCD though, I'm personally convinced that at some point my concentration has waned on my journey and I've trodden in a Something.

So what? you ask reasonably - not the end of the world. Oh yes it is. The excrement of Dog has taken on mythic proportions in my mind and now has the stature of a nuclear holocaust combined with total social exclusion. Not that there'd be much society left if …

Anyway. Having inspected each foot in a position which would impress Yoga-goers, with pedestrians veering round me on the pavement, I'm still not convinced the soles are completely clean. But, jostled crossly by a unnecessarily abrupt man who also wants to buy shoes in his lunch-hour, I find myself cannoning across the busy shop floor on tiptoe, like a hippo from Fantasia. After bouncing off an assistant, I sit gingerly on to a padded stool – briefly inspecting it for dirt - then discreetly shove my head between my knees to look at my boots again.

Seeing another pair of shoes out of the corner of my eye, I become aware that a dead ringer for George Clooney is standing patiently in front of me, holding out a red shoe.
'Oh, thank you, thanks, I felt faint,' I gabble, hurriedly returning to the vertical and purple from sniffing surreptitiously down at ankle level. Dead Ringer looks handsomely apprehensive and holds the shoe box out towards me, as you might when feeding a Hyena.

'I'm fine now,' I say, convinced everyone in the busy shop is staring at me. Keeping my hands well clear, I yank away at my boots with my toes. Thank heaven they don't have zips: if I had to actually touch the damned things, I'd really faint. Either that or I'd have to find a way of discreetly sniffing my fingers ...

'Shit!' A searing pain tears at my calf and sweat jumps out on my face.
'Are you sure you're OK?'
'Yessss. Fine. Sorry, think I've pulled a calf muscle.'
To his puzzlement, I buy the boots without trying them on, trying to remember not to sniff at my long hair, which I'm sure swung forward and touched my Ugh-Ugg when I was bending down ...
I limp out of the shop and back to work.

Diana at the office says enviously: 'Ooh, let's have a look ... Wow! Someone's been having a self-indulgent lunch-hour - nothing like a spot of retail therapy for making you feel better, is there though? … I didn't realise you had such small feet – did you try them on?'

- Helen Poskitt -

New Blogger

We would like to introduce our next guest blogger, Helen Poskitt. Helen's new book "Rising to the Surface" is available via Amazon and Waterstones and she is currently working on her stage play "Check!" losely based on the book.

- The OCD Action team -

Comming Soon

Thank you to our second blogger - I hope that you have all enjoyed reading their posts.
We have a new blogger lined up and they will be posting from the end of April.

- The OCD Action team -

No cure but not concerned

So this is my final blog and I thought it might be helpful to reflect and what I wanted to achieve by doing them.

I guess the thing that I was concerned about is being negative. I often think that when you read the case studies in books on OCD (as excellent as some of these books are) they can be frightening because some people seem to be so consumed by their OCD. However, that too was me, when I was at my worst. I think the thing I feel they miss, and I wanted to add, is that you can recover from OCD to the point that you don’t even notice you have it! This is where I am now. Sure I still get intrusive thoughts, but so does everyone!!! I react to them differently now.

And if you are doubting how bad my OCD has been, I’ve made two suicide attempts and been in hospital for three months when I was at my worst. If you too find yourself in the depths of despair please just know that each day brings new hope and with the right treatment, you can get better.

In addition, I wanted to encourage those of you whose lives have been affected by OCD and related disorders (and hopefully also those of you who haven’t been) to get involved in making things better in future for all people suffering from mental health conditions. I know we all tut when our colleagues come around with sponsor forms for runs etc. but this is the only way that charities can work to make change. And you don’t even have to give money if you can’t afford to – do a sponsored event yourself, write to your MP, volunteer or donate your unwanted goods to the local mental health charity shop.

As a final note, I know some of you find it disconcerting that there’s no cure for OCD but you don’t need one – we’re meant to have frightening thoughts as part of an evolutionary warning system and with the help of medication or CBT you can see that they are only thoughts!

- OCD Guest Blogger 2 -

Now I Understand

Since writing the first entry to my blog, I have been thinking about the finishing statement of it. This is mainly because several sad things have happened and I also felt some people may feel it over-optimistic or a little insensitive.

The finishing statement was the adage that ‘it’s not the circumstances that determine the quality of your life, but how you deal with them.’ I realise that this seems a little silly as try telling this to people dealing with terminal illness, have lost someone they love or don’t have enough food. A personal example is a friend who died of cancer last month after having suffered from depression all her life. And what about the people who lost loved ones in the earthquake in Italy last week?

However, I guess it comes down to a choice we have to make. Like my mum was told in her positive thinking class, there’s no point in ruminating about the past – take action in the present moment to move towards where you want to be. I have spent a lot of time thinking about why me, why OCD, why did I get it (genes, childhood experiences, etc.)? But, to use another adage, ‘finding out how you fell into a hole isn’t going to get you out of it!’ It may not seem fair or reasonable that you have OCD or are suffering so, but you have to make a choice to deal with it and not look at the past.

I also wanted to add (and you’re going to hate me for this!), ‘every cloud has a silver lining.’ Well, at least I believe the OCD one does. Before OCD, I had little sympathy for people’s frailties. I had no experience of disability and wasn’t that interested in helping any but the most extreme cases of suffering. But now, I understand more about what it is like to have a disability. I feel I can relate to most people more as you realise we’re all a bit mad and most of us need help at some point in life for something. Most importantly, I’m engaged in society and try to do my bit to make things better – I write to my MP about mental health provision, volunteer and donate what I can to charity campaigns. I feel so alive. Life just seems great now because I know what it’s like to have been at the bottom of the valley and – so OCD has given me something positive too!

- OCD Guest Blogger 2 -