Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!

I believe that OCD is usually sugar coated in the media.  We watch funny tv shows and use the OCD term as a joke.   If a person has a cleaning complex or is very well organized they are said to be OCD. OCD can have those qualities, but it can be so much more. Often a person has more than one OCD compulsion. Our lives are filled with trying to appear normal to others. I once had a psychiatrist tell me that I would never be normal. I just don't react or think like the "normal" person does. This news devastated me. I had become what I always feared, damaged. And worse there was no amount of medicine or therapy that could ever make me what I so dearly wanted to achieve. Normal for me was like the prized item on the top shelf at a grocery store. You could stand on your tippy toes and stretch your arm as far as it would go and only be able to graze it with your finger tips. It would never be achievable and I would never be able to grab it from the shelf. I had to come to terms that the dream of being someone without a mental disability was just that, a dream. It took me about two weeks to grieve and pity my predicament. Then I made a conscious choice to not be a victim of my own mind. So I can't be normal, so what! What is so great about being normal anyway?

             I have survived this long due to the love and understanding of my mother,my family, and some truly awesome friends. They accept me in all of my oddness. They love me regardless if I am neurotic or damaged .My mother is my reassurance person. The amount of guilt that comes with having OCD is insurmountable. Am i a freak? Am I a bad person because I have had a bad intrusive thought? Am I a horrible monster because I said the wrong thing? Did I hurt so in so's feelings? The guilt of over analyzing everything can take up hours and sometimes even days. I am lucky because I can call my mom and she reassures me that I am not a monster. I am not bad. It is my OCD and it's not my fault.I often think of OCD as emotional torture. While "normal" people just go on about their lives, I am drowning in guilt.  My feelings are raw. Instead of being able to shrug things off I am full of anxiety. OCD is a cheese grater that has grated my emotions to bloody nubs. Always the fear and guilt is right under the surface of my skin. Ready to expose it's ugly head at any moment. My guilt is so bad that I can not lie. To anyone! If I lie the guilt seems to suffocate me to the point I feel like my pores are drenched with the stench of it. I call my mother or talk to my friends and I can breathe again. I am a confessor and I have to confess or I can not get over my fear of being a horrible human being.

   I often wonder about the people that do not have a reassurance person. What do they do? Who do they talk to? Suicide is really high in people with OCD. They feel alone and are terrified of people finding out. For those people I want to say, You are not bad. You are not damaged, and most importantly You are not alone.. 

                                                                              Neurotic Nelly