These Spring Evenings

Spring has finally arrived in our area. The plants are blooming and blossoming. The days are warmer and the nights are still cool. The hubby recently completed a project of changing over our landscaping to a more water efficient and drought tolerant one. Consequently, our backyard is a joy to be in right now. Every evening that I get home later than the hubby, I find him sitting in a cozy chair on the back patio just enjoying. Frequently he is flanked by a dog on either side, and both of these appear equally as content as their owner.

Along with spending more time on the patio, the hubby has suggested we move several of our evening meals in the last couple of weeks outdoors. I’ve obliged him, and therein lies the issue for Blake. I’ve shared before that Blake’s Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) has played a back seat role to his depression of late, but it is at times like this when it shows itself more.

“Are we eating outside again?” he asks.

“We are.”

“I’m guessing you’d like me to join you…”

“We’d love you to join us.”

I can feel the hesitation, the thinking, the rationalizing, the many things that must be going through his head. When we first realized Blake had OCD it showed itself in fear of contamination. Although it has had many incarnations, his OCD has never quite abandoned attacking him on the issue of things being contaminated. Our patio table is contaminated (it sits outdoors all the time). The chairs are contaminated (ditto). There are bugs out there (they might land on you or, heaven forbid, your food). I think even the outside air feels a little contaminated, but I’m not quite certain about that. It’s no wonder Blake is hesitating.

On one particular night, we have relatives over. We barbecue. I prepare the meal. The hubby prepares the table outside. Blake, as he has for several years now, prepares his own meal. I head outside with my full dinner plate and notice Blake at the indoor dinner table. He’s putting together his plate. One by one, my hubby and our guests all settle in for our meal. I’m guessing Blake will not be there, but I’ve guessed wrong.

Moments later, Blake has a full plate and he carves out space for himself. The rest of us reposition ourselves. He sets his plate down and leaves. He comes back with a can of soda in hand. I know what this is. Soda for Blake is liquid courage; it’s motivation and reward for doing something that is difficult. He joins us at the table. He eats his food. He actually participates in the conversation. At some point everyone except Blake and I have left the table for seconds or for dessert.

“I’m so glad you joined us,” I note. “How are you doing?”

“I’m glad to be here,” he says, and then he answers, “I’m uncomfortable. I’m definitely uncomfortable.”

I ponder this for just a second or two.

“Uncomfortable is good,” I respond – and it is.

A Different Kind of Obsession and Compulsion

Providing further evidence that Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is not always what we tend to think it is, I submit the following experience from Blake’s recent therapy session:

I don’t frequently participate in Blake’s therapy anymore. In fact, if I do come in for something, he’s taken to asking me to leave at some point now. It’s a far cry from when he began therapy a year ago, or should I say refused therapy one year ago.  But that’s another story one can dig into the archives to read. Let’s suffice it to say that Blake choosing to go into a therapy session and talk with his therapist alone is major progress. Recently, though, I asked to come in for clarification on how the therapist had requested that the hubby and I handle something.

The basic issue was this: Blake had returned to his habit of getting back in to bed or falling asleep on the sofa in the morning. I was growing tired of repeatedly waking him and wondered if our plan needed to be modified. Blake’s therapist was looking to understand what gets in Blake’s way of staying awake. That’s when he shared this interesting anecdote.

Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

“I work with a woman who cannot begin work in the morning if she has a certain body ache. So, she’s taken to checking herself every morning to see if she has that body ache, and most of the time, she finds it. So, she can’t start working and she keeps monitoring herself until it is gone. Actually, it’s OCD.”

Do you get it? Do you see the OCD? If you don’t that’s okay; I’ll explain it shortly. First, here’s Blake’s response:

“Oh my gosh. I get that,” Blake says. “I wake up feeling miserable in the morning. I’m so tired and I feel sick. I know if I start on anything that it’ll be terrible and I won’t like my work. So, I won’t work if I feel that way.”

“Then what we need to teach you is to work even though you might have that feeling. We have to teach you to work through that feeling,” replied his therapist.

Wait, did my son just admit to some OCD in his life? I don’t know if he realized it, but his therapist just implied that his issue with getting up in the morning had to do with OCD – and he agreed…

Where’s the OCD?

If all that escaped you, or if you just can barely make out the OCD, let me help. Think of obsessions as something that brings anxiety or discomfort up. Think of compulsions as bringing anxiety or discomfort down. It’s that simple. Now, let’s look at the patient the therapist mentioned.

The woman who works from home believes she cannot work if she has a certain ache. The concern she will have that ache is the obsession. That brings her anxiety up. The checking her body for the ache is the compulsion, as are the monitoring and refusing to work. They bring her discomfort down.

Blake holds the belief that he will turn out what he calls “trash work” if he feels tired or sick. That’s the obsession; it brings his discomfort up. His compulsion? Returning to bed or lying down anywhere and just checking out. He’ll only work if he feels “just right.” And that brings his discomfort down.

Is it a stretch? Could an OCD pattern be part of what is holding Blake back right now? Maybe. Maybe not. It’s interesting how he jumped on the therapist’s comparison. So, I wonder in my mind. Is it OCD? Is it depression? The therapist’s notion that Blake needs to work right through his discomfort fits for both – at least that’s what I think. Now, let’s see if Blake starts to do it…

On Ignorance and OCD

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“Mom, come here. Take a look at this.”

Blake summons me to the sofa where he is sitting and watching a video on YouTube. As I approach, I think he’s going to show me a video or something he finds interesting therein. As I lean in, though, he points not to the video, but to a banner running along the bottom.

“Are you OCD? Take the quiz to find out.”

It’s clearly not a true mental health screening. It’s another one of those things that pokes fun at how much you notice things that aren’t neat and orderly. It’s one of those quizzes that sets me off sometimes (See “Just a Little Rant“).

“Ugh,” I note. “I’ll bet that ticks you off.”

“Actually,” he says, “I find it kind of laughable. It doesn’t really bug me.”

“It doesn’t?”

“No. In the past that stuff really used to bother me,” he recalls. “Now…now I look at it as though they’re just ignorant. What I mean is, I don’t think that this is done with an intent to hurt people with OCD. I think about intent. I like to think that they just don’t realize that it can be hurtful; they just don’t realize what OCD is really like.”

Now, I tend to be a crusader for OCD education, and quizzes like this definitely get under my skin because they ignore the true pain that OCD can cause . Our family knows that pain – and nobody knows it more intimately than Blake. While part of me never wants to see these things, perhaps my son has developed a way of coping with them that is positive for him. He attributes it to people not knowing and he considers it without hurtful intent. One might say he’s giving some folks a free pass, yet, at the same time perhaps it’s better that he doesn’t give it a lot of space in his head. I just might learn something from him.