Willful....

   

If given the option to be willfully ignorant or willfully indigent, I choose to be willfully defiant.

   I am willful. I am one intrusive thought away from becoming the hillbilly hermit, the troll underneath the bridge, or the creepy castle recluse in some antiquated children's book..... Sometimes, it takes pure will power to just live. I have to fight or this disorder will take over and I will be damned if I am going down without swinging.

    Am I willful? You fucking bet I am. Willful, spiteful, ravenous.  with a stubbornness that burns stoic and impertinent. I am the loudly whispering insolence that only comes with a mindful defiance that burns itself with embers so hot it has etched itself in to the recesses of my soul. A spider like web of pure pigheadedness and sheer inflexible iron-will. I will myself out of bed in the morning. I will myself to brush my teeth. I will myself to leave the house and go to my appointments. I will myself to shower, shave, to brush my hair. I will myself to cook dinner and to eat. I will myself to walk outside and feel the sun on face. I will myself to help with homework, to do laundry, to talk to strangers. I will myself to sleep after an exhausting day of doing things I did not want to do.  

    I am not going to be told what I can and can not do. Not by my own disorder and not by anyone else. I am not afraid to stand up for myself anymore.

   I was being willful when I disagreed with was a friend  who claimed that I was privileged for being only mental ill.  I was being willful when I told her that I refuse to accept that something that has ruined my life should ever be called a privilege. I was being willful when I told her to go fuck herself when she continued to argue with me as if she had any idea what hell my life has been.

   I earned this dysfunction with hard work. Before this dysfunction was me being unable to function at all. My life may be screwy but it is now a life because of pure stubbornness.

  Yeah, I'm willful walking past those who choose to be ignorant with my gaze held forward and my head held high. I am not ashamed to be me anymore and the likes of supposed friends aren't going to change that. I accept no one in my life trying to tear me back down where I used to dwell. I will not go quietly into the night. I will scream, yell, claw, grab, and scratch my way back into the light. I am not a whisper but a sonic boom. I will not be unheard.

     I want to live. I want to taste the snowflakes on my tongue. I want to feel the breeze in my hair. I want to go out of my house and be out of my house which is both exhilarating and yet terrifying all at the same time and I am doing it one day at  a time... unapologetically, unabashed, unashamed, unafraid.

Because I am willful, therefore I am strong.

    This is my life and I will carve it out as best I can with whatever shitty tools I find along the road. I will claw at it with my bare hands if need be. I will tear out chunks with frozen fingers and broken skin. I will carve out my life regardless of pain, discomfort, or complication.   That could be the "crazy" in me, or my red hair talking, or just that I am very much my grandmother's granddaughter in that way.  I am busy carving my life out, with lopsided shovels, broken down spades, plastic forks, and tarnished silver spoons.

Yes, I am willful....and there is dirt under my fingernails again.

Neurotic Nelly

Wow Just Wow...

     I am not really a supporter of the media and Hollywood. I have issues with what I can only describe as hypocrisy.

   The way they present people with mental illness is defaming and misguided and has been such for decades. I have a hard time being supportive of a community who is certainly not  supportive of people like myself.

  Hollywood has claimed to have made it's cause to fight for minorities, the underprivileged, and the supposed ignored. They complain about how women are treated and paid in the arts. They even talk at award shows about how disabled people were referenced by outsiders with passion and frustration. But when it comes to depictions of the mentally ill coming out of their own camp, they are strangely silent. They have a lot to say and a lot fingers to point at others but where is the outrage when it comes to how they portray us?

   In the last twenty years Hollywood has put out maybe four movies that have represented mental illness and stigma with dignity and compassion. The Hurt Locker, The Aviator, Silver Lining's Playbook, and A Beautiful Mind were some of the most representative movies of the plight of people that suffer from mental illness released to date. In that same twenty years, they have released countless movies where those of us that suffer from mental illness are presented in a  magnificently misinformed way, steeped in stigma, and left to boil over on the stove with a side of bullshit that only some place like Hollywood could fashion.

    Hollywood does not usually depict us at all but most of the time when they do it is as mentally ill maniacal murderers, creepy stalkers, or the cruel  dangerous monsters that maim and rape. I just have to ask where is the outrage for that? Where is the shame for participating in the stigma spreading of our disorders for profit?

    How can Hollywood be pissed about a man being made fun of  for a birth defect and yet not be pissed about it's own people making movies that end up perpetuating a belief that ends up killing people by making them afraid to get help? A belief and representation that hurts so many by labeling them with false presentations?

   This....this is what they stand for? They will stand for everyone else and be mad for everyone else and yet remain silent when it is about mental illness that they actively contribute to. Really? Wow, just wow.

    I was horrified to see a movie trailer today called Split. It depicts  a person with multiple personalities abducting women and scaring them.

    First off, the actual diagnoses for that is called DID or Dissociative Identity Disorder. If you are going to make some big bullshit movie about it, at the very least get it's name right.

    The thing is, DID is not something that makes you a serial killer or mass abductor and honestly, I am beyond irritated about this movie.

    Lets be honest, There is no other disability  that Hollywood would allow to be used to imply dangerous behavior.

   This movie would never be called "Wheels" and imply that a man was a phsyco murderer because he was in a red wheelchair.

   It would never be called "Dresses" and infer that  the  character was dangerous because he was transgender.

That would be inappropriate and wrong.

It is the also just as inappropriate and wrong to make movies about the mental illness community and labeling them dangerous simply because of that diagnosis.


   There is nothing else that receives the unfair and biased damning that  Hollywood does to the mental illness community for entertainment purposes and profit.

   Movies are exciting. I get it, and I know that statistics aren't but that doesn't make them any less right. When the facts show that mental illness sufferers are twice as likely to be victims of violence rather than to cause violence, one would think Hollywood would get a new script and leave us out of the killer/slasher/murderer roles.

   And I am sure people will say that I am just being over sensitive to it but I live this life under the full weight of the stigma that movies like these help promote and propagate so yeah, I may be a tad bit fucking over sensitive about it.

I am angry and I don't even suffer from DID.

   I am angry that in 2017 we are still fighting to end stigma so we can save people that need help  but are too afraid to get it because of how they will be looked at, judged, and treated. I am angry that in 2017 movies are still being made making us all out to be dangerous maniacs when something as simple as a google search could prove how inaccurate that draconian thought is. I am angry that is 2017 and people will go see this moronic film call it horror and then go home to their normal lives and not think about the struggle someone with actual DID is going through. What everyone with the moniker of being mentally ill goes through daily.  As we try and do the best we can with stigma and misrepresentations all around us not only just blindly being accepted but also being actively promoted as entertainment. Especially, by the very people who claim to be tolerant and understanding of everyone's hardships, that is unless you are mentally ill I guess. I suppose when you struggle with mental illness it is not important or, at the very least, not as important as movie ticket sales.

Wow, just wow.

Neurotic Nelly

I Dwell There No Longer...

I have dwelled in the shadows for so long I can accurately describe the taste of darkness.

Musty dampness with a hint of mothballs.

I have lived in the recesses of my mind to the point where I know ever mark on the walls, every dent, every scratch, every happenstance pen mark.


I have treaded what seems to me like oceans of guilt and shame. I have drunken so much water while trying to keep my head above it's waves that the salt content has etched into my esophagus like finely frosted glass panes .

Surely that is why when my anxiety flows away from me, I am unable to speak. It is why I do not utter a sound lest my glass throat shatter.

I have absorbed those oceans through my skin and that is why my tears are salty and why there is so many of them able to fall in one setting.

That must be why.

I know what it is to live but be lifeless. To exhale but not be really breathing. I know how badly soap stings when  it seeps into the dried hardened cracks of overly washed hands.


I know what it is like to be so exhausted just breathing seems like a monumental task. To be so tried that one can not sleep. To pray to dream about something other than what is going on in my life. To dream of being someone else. Someone more whole.

But I also know what the sun feels like on my face. I know what warmth feels like. Like a hundred million tiny glimpses of light beaming on me from the clouds. I know how little condensation drips when the light of life thaws your soul.

I know what it feels like to laugh. Like the coziest fuzziest hairs on your favorite blanket touching naked skin. The prickles of glee penetrating my consciousness.

I know what happiness is and I cling to those moments like a buoy to a person in the act of drowning.

I know what life can be and what it will be. It will be hard. I will always tread water. I will cry myself to sleep some days. But other days I will laugh too. I will hold on. I will keep going. I will overcome. I may lose battles with this mental illness but I will not lose myself.

I am no longer bothered by other people's stigma. They have not lived as I. They do not understand me and that is okay. I no longer allow other people's judgments bother me. Stigma can only control you if you have fear of it and I am not afraid.

For I dwell there no longer....

We Can Not Be Diminished......Rant....Rant...Rant

XXXX.....Language Warning and Possible Triggers.....XXXX


 I read this Gawker article after reading the same story line on three different websites and I felt the need to share.  Trigger warning on the article linked.

     This, this right here is part of the reason I write what I write. Because people are ignorant and can do more damage than they realize. Because this sort of ignorance has to be put in it's rightful place (the trash can). Because we need positive articles and posts about mental illness survivors not knee jerk reactions to diagnoses by morons with access to a keyboard.

     I am not even going to touch on what all this colossal twat face says in her poorly written article about the death of her "frenemy" with mental illness and what a blessing it was to her. She has no idea what she is talking about and her ignorance is nothing new to those of us who struggle to live in a world full of self absorbed idiots that think they have a talent for talking about something they have no fucking clue about. She is typical, she looks typical, her writing is typical, and her stigma inducing misconstrued attention seeking behavior....is typical. Big deal, she is old news.

I will, however, comment on the blog site that printed the piece, and their so called apology....

I apologize for an article that was posted here yesterday, entitled "My Former Friend's Death Was a Blessing.” I deeply regret the hurt that this article has caused and understand that it has perpetuated stigma and diminished the lives of people with mental illness. I am committed to immediately reviewing our vetting process to ensure that this experience has a positive influence on the ways in which we at xoJane present all women going forward. I appreciate all of you who took the time to let us know how you felt about this issue.

http://www.xojane.com/relationships/my-former-friends-death-was-a-blessing

First of all, thank you for noticing that your article was not only offensive but damaging. Thank you for it removing after being told repeatedly how upsetting and stigmatizing it was. But don't ever make the mistake of thinking that an article written by a sniveling twenty something know it all who, in fact, truly knows nothing could diminish any of our lives because she is a fucking moron. You didn't diminish anything except the validation of a an online magazine many of us have never heard of and many of us will never read again.

You can not diminish the lives of strong, creative, unique, people and how dare you insinuate that this idiot could do so by a thoughtless article as if we were so damaged and have so little to live for, that it ruined our lives. It didn't ruin our lives, it pissed us off because once again we are having to fight against stigma from yet another place that in the year 2016 should absolutely fucking know better.

How dare you make a half attempt to say, "oops my bad" after letting such a completely inappropriate article headline your site. Something that says the death of a mentally ill person was a blessing. You did read her article before posting it right? I mean, that is what you do......

Why would it even be acceptable to post something like this? If we were talking about any other minority in place of the mentally ill you would have balked and never posted because you would feel like it was uncalled for. You would have been afraid of being seen as bigoted, intolerant, and prejudiced; but because it was just us that made it okay right?

You can't diminish us. We have already been stigmatized, lied about, cast aside, ignored, rebuked, insulted, and blacklisted. Do you really think your little corner of the web can really do anything that hasn't already been done to us for the centuries that mental illness has been unfairly punished, misunderstood, and demonized. Do you really?

Because I have got to tell you, as a mental illness suffer, I don't think that you hold that much power.

Her apology was a complete backpedal. I know that when I write something, some people may not like it. I don't cry about it. I stand by what I say. That is what real writers do.

 She didn't care that she hurt real people or may have put real people in real jeopardy, she is concerned by the backlash she got in rejoicing in the death of someone she deemed to be less than. She then played the victim and blamed the reaction on the readers claiming that if they were that sensitive they should not read it.....
Because she, clearly the victim in not only her own stories but also apparently the backlash for them, is overwhelmed. Well, I am too. I am overwhelmed by her lack of compassion, for her self imposed self importance, and for her lack of respect for other people. I am also overwhelmed that you as a website that hosts blogs felt that this was perfectly acceptable....which you, clearly, must have or it wouldn't have been posted.

I think her rush to be relevant and edgy is pathetic and I think that your rush to gain click bait for yourself regardless of who it hurts in the process is contemptible.

I just hope that no one read her article or her equally full of shit apology,   and ended up hurting themselves because that is what we are really talking about here. Not some stupid woman who has no idea what a real struggle in life is, but people losing their lives everyday. Good, decent, dearly loved people that commit suicide everyday because they feel less than, because they are told that they are a burden, because of shitty articles written by shitty writers who think they know all about mental illness from fucking facebook.  It bothers me, that online sites like yours  do not consider the wake of devastation they are allowing because they too want to be relevant. It is all about relevance in this world of self absorbance and self importance.

No one is really considering the loss those families feel. No one there, clearly, is considering the loss of the woman your writer complained about. No one is considering the reality that is living with a mental illness and just how fucking hard it is and just how fucking brave we are for doing it.

Writing a piece that slanders a dead woman that had mental illness  is low. It isn't brave. It isn't informative. It is pathetic. It is inappropriate and it is wrong.

You want edgy, you want courage, you want spectacular then look at us. Cause we are not hiding in the shadows, we are not sitting on the sidelines or cowering under the bleachers. We do not back down from paltry articles like this, we do not break under adversity. That is all we have ever known. This "story" is no different than the drivel we are force fed everyday about how different we are or how someone can't look past themselves long enough to understand what we go through.

You want to know what is a real blessing?

Living..... Living when it is hard because we know that we are worth it. Fighting on the worst days when you are exhausted and broken and numb. Having real friends, unlike the writer of your article, that stick by us and help us and support us. Knowing that we are creative and wondrous human beings that are capable of so much. Seeing the beauty in this world and knowing that it is something that we too possess. Knowing how important we are because we are just important as everyone else. Standing up for ourselves in the face of stupid people, and God help us, there are so many that we seem to run into. That's living. That's a blessing.....something that your writer obviously has no idea about.


No, we don't back down when we read or hear about discriminatory fluff pieces  like the one you posted but I will tell you what we actually do. We shine. We shine in the face of stigma, and lies, and petty people writing petty things while trying to seem not as petty as they actually are. We are better than that and we are better than them. We are the warriors of our own minds and some of the best damn people you will ever meet.

So, no, you didn't diminish us by posting that article. You diminished yourselves and whatever it is you claim to stand for.

That's all on you, bud....that is what your online site strived to be when you allowed her post to be on your page.

I don't want to say how badly you suck for that but, hey, if the shoe fits....lace that bitch up and wear it.

Neurotic Nelly

I Am Not Ashamed...

There is a hashtag on twitter going around  called #imnotashamed. It is a symbol to fight against the stigma that many of us face on a daily basis. When you live under the diagnoses of having a mental illness a great deal of emotions come with it. One of those is shame.


        I am not ashamed. I used to be. I grew up being extremely ashamed of how different I was. How odd I seemed. How weak I felt. I grew up thinking that I was damaged. I was broken. I was worthless.

       It was not my choice to be born with a mental illness. It is, however, my choice on how I perceive myself to be because of it. I perceive myself to be just as unique and important as everyone else.


    When I was younger, I had delusions of my ability to control everything in my life. I felt that I had the power of willing myself into normalcy if I really wanted to. When I couldn't, I felt that it was my fault because I just didn't want it badly enough.

I blamed myself as if I had woken up one day and just decided to have Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. As if I had ordered it as a side on my plate next to the eggs and hashbrowns. As if it were something you picked up by design.

 I just couldn't understand that my mental illness was not my fault. That it was simply a misfiring in my brain.

       I prayed relentlessly in the hopes that the bad thoughts would cease. When they did not I beat myself up because, clearly, I was doing something wrong. I wasn't praying right or hard enough. I was ashamed that I had failed to become normal even with my constant prayers.

      As a child I thought that if I could just be the best little girl I could be, that the OCD would go away. If I did my best at school, if I tried my hardest to listen, if I was sweet and kind and always followed the rules the thoughts would simply vanish... but they never did. I thought that deep down I was a terrible girl, a bad person, a horrid child. I continued to strive to be what I thought good little girls were supposed to be but the intrusive thoughts did not vanish, no matter how desperately I tried to be good enough and I blamed myself for that too.

       It took me years, literal years, to accept that my OCD was not the product of my failure as a person. That it was not a punishment for some unforeseen or long forgotten sin.

That it had never been my fault nor could I simply will it away with the good deeds and desperate prayers of a small naive child. I never had control of whether or not I would have this.

It simply is.

      And with that acknowledgement I began to realize that shame has no place in my life because to feel ashamed would mean that I would have to accept the blame for having something I never asked for nor wanted to have to begin with.

The guilt is not mine to carry. The blame does not rest at my feet for this.

        Living in shame just because I was born with a mental illness is no longer acceptable to me....and I rebuke any implication that says otherwise.


Mental illness does not define me as a human being. It does make me different in some ways  but it does not in any way lessen my worth.

It has changed my life but it does not get to own it. It does not get to control everything. It is there but it does not outshine who I am as a person. It does not get to make me feel guilty and it will never again make me feel ashamed.

Because I am more than just a diagnoses and I am not ashamed.

If you are interested in the #imnotashamed hashtag look it up on twitter and read all about their fight against stigma.

Until next time, stay strong and be kind to yourself and never be ashamed.
Neurotic Nelly

It's Not A Sidebar.....

        I was watching a news channel yesterday and came across a story about a man cycling for awareness of a disease that killed his wife. He wants to promote awareness and raise money and I applaud him for that. My problem was the way the news sanitized his wife's illness and death.

        First, they both called her Depression a mood disorder. They did it repeatedly and then said that Depression had killed her. At no point did they mention mental illness anywhere in this supposed news article. At no point did they say that she killed herself.

        My problem with this is that it seemed very sanitized, very PC, very scrubbed clean and there is nothing clean or orderly about Depression.

        Is Depression a mood disorder? Yes, but lets call a spade a spade shall we? Depression is a MENTAL ILLNESS. Say it. Say it often, roll it around in your mouth until it feels familiar. Stop being afraid of these two words. Stop shying away from this term. We as sufferers have learned to use it without attaching stigma to it and so should everyone else. This woman didn't have Leprosy, she had Depression. It doesn't need to be dumbed down or sugar coated. It certainly wasn't sugar coated for her when she was suffering from it. She killed herself. Her Depression made her life so unbearable, so unspeakable, she was so desperate, she suffered so much that suicide, to her, seemed like the only option. Don't you dare sugar coat or undermine what she went through.

         You see, as a mentally ill person, I find the sanitizing and politically correct scrubbing of the struggles we go through on a daily basis an insult. It represents that what we go through is somehow less painful or less ugly or more acceptable.

         This woman didn't die from Depression. She committed suicide. There, I said it. I know it is hard for other people to hear that word, or read that word, or understand that word but you can not and should not whitewash that word into something less awful, less devastating. Because there is nothing beautiful or soothing about suicide. Yes, Depression is the reason she killed herself but say that. Don't over look the choice she made and the horrors she faced by saying she died from Depression and not explain what it made her do. If for some reason, you can not bring yourself to say the word suicide then simply say she lost her battle with Depression.

            Look, I am sorry that the words mental illness and suicide make other people uncomfortable. You should try living with them and see how uncomfortable that is. The point is, we don't have time to scrub away the ugly thoughts about these two words. Mental illness and suicide are ugly. We should know. In a country where suicide takes away somebody's loved one every 13 minutes, I hardly think we need to waste time trying to sanitize  something that needs to be talked about openly because only then can we get real and start making changes to a broken system that allows good people to fall through the cracks. This system is damaged and defunct and until we start looking at this problem as an actual problem nothing will change and it has to. Suicide is 100% preventable. And yet we as a society are too afraid to look into the dark abyss where it dwells because we are scared. Our society is cowardly when it comes to anything that deals with mental illness or suicide and it is proven and reiterated every single time this subject comes up. Because they white wash it. They sweep it under the rug. They look for other excuses. Or like in this case, they simply exclude these three words altogether.

            If you want to help us, if you want to change the system than you have to stop making excuses. You have to stop shying away form reality. A reality that all of us that suffer are very familiar with. You have to say words like mental illness, pain, suicide and you have to own them when you speak. You have to look people in the eye when talking about them. You have to stop promoting the stigma with your fear and be fearless. After all, we are fearless when talking about these things because we have no choice and if you want to be part of the solution than you have no choice either. We are not a side line. We are not a cutline. It is not a sidebar. It is the story. We are the story. We are real and our suffering is real and we deserve to have it talked about it, exactly like how it is. No sanitizing, no white washing, no scrubbing clean.......you cannot diminish the pain of mental illness by minimizing it's affects so you are less uncomfortable with the reality of it.

Neurotic Nelly

Why OCD Is Not Funny....

Hurt.
That is what I feel when someone makes fun of my disorder. We live in a time where information is just a click away and yet such ignorance abounds us all, it is amazing to me we can see through the fog of it. On a weekly basis I am confronted with people making light of my disorder or minimizing it's effects with dumb t-shirts or ignorant coffee cups and I become disheartened and offended.  It seriously happens to me all of the time. And as frustrating as it is, I can not totally blame the people that do it. They just don't know any better. So I ask myself how I can change the perceptions of things like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder to the masses. Granted, I will most likely not change the world with my posts on this blog, but if I can help just one person understand OCD a little better or help a fellow sufferer feel less alone, then I feel all of this has been worth the struggle.

 In looking through several videos on youtube about OCD, I have noticed that although there is a great deal on OCD, they aren't necessarily specific. There are several videos on compulsions that go hand in hand with Obsessive Compulsive disorder but not many on the obsessional or intrusive thought part of OCD and I would like to change that.

So, I have decided to make a few videos about my life with OCD and the things I have learned while suffering from it for almost thirty two years. They wont be anything spectacular. There won't be any animations or flow charts. No, art work being drawn as I speak or anything fancy. Just me talking about the things many of us OCD sufferers are afraid to talk about (the scary, guilt inducing, upsetting intrusive thoughts that rule our lives). I will be discussing what it is like to be a PureO because we are OCD sufferers too. Just not the ones most people think of when they think about OCD because our symptoms are not readily seen to the naked eye. I will be discussing why OCD is just as serious as every other mental illness and just why we do not find your Obsessive Cat Disorder shirts or Obsessive Coffee Disorder coffee mugs hilarious.  I will admit I am a little terrified of doing this. Writing is one thing, being on camera talking about it is quite another. I may even have hives and a panic attack before, after, or even during filming. Who knows. But I do feel it is important to try and I hope that it helps even in some small way.

So, here goes nothing...


             (you may need to use headphones the volume is low).

     (( I apologize for the overuse of the word "um", I was nervous))

Neurotic Nelly

UnValidated...

" Sometimes the people around you won't understand your journey. They don't need to, it's not for them." -Anonymous

         Deflected. That is what it feels like when someone makes excuses to not sympathize with how you are feeling. I get irritated when someone assumes that because I am upset about something, that it is because of my mental illness. As if, I am not allowed to have true feelings unless it is related to my OCD. Like somehow my OCD means that I can not truthfully be angry or hurt. It matters not what has transpired during my day or what situation I am facing. Crying or showing otherwise perfectly normal emotional responses to something is thrown back in my face because, surely it is my mental illness's fault and not because I am truly upset over something. It can't be because I had a shitty day. It has to be because I have OCD. And since I do have OCD, my feelings are just overreactions. My diagnosis has fundamentally colored the way I am perceived. And I am apparently perceived as someone who can not feel unless my mental illness is dictating it.

I know it may be hard to believe, but just like everyone else I am a human being. And being a human means that on occasion, I actually have human feelings. And they can be trampled on or hurt. (Go figure.)

         Few things hurt  more than when I am discussing my feelings on something and someone's response to it, is that I need to get back on my medicine. (I have medication resistant OCD). I don't think it is meant to be insulting on purpose but it is insulting all the same.  What you may be saying is that I am really passionate about whatever we are talking about or that I am really upset, but what I hear is the soft click of the door of communication as it closes tightly shut behind me. What I hear is that you do not care about my feelings. What I hear is that you can not get on my level and understand where I am coming from. What I hear is that my opinion is not important and my feelings are annoying and should be kept to myself, lest I bother anyone else with them. You may not know it, but these few simple words have effectively swept my emotions under the heavily stained, moth eaten carpet that everyone has trampled and wiped their dirt covered feet on.  It pushes my feelings away and crushes them down. Leaving me to feel misunderstood, extremely frustrated, unbelievably isolated, a tad bit devastated, and just plain sad. No one likes to feel ignored or swept aside and it is no different for those of us that suffer from mental illness.

       
       Even when I was on medication, if I had a moment when I was struggling or upset with something that had nothing to do with my mental illness at all, I would be asked, "Did you take your meds today?"

       I wanted to scream,"What the hell does my medication have to do with the validation of how I am feeling? Is it not possible for you to see me as a whole person? To see me as someone who is hurting? What does it matter even if it is my mental illness making me feel this way, are my emotions any less important? Any less valid? Do I not still feel them just as deeply? Why are my emotions ignored and overlooked and dismissed just because I suffer?"

I want to yell these things, but I usually end up just ending the conversation. Because once my feelings have been rebuffed by someone, I have a very hard time trusting that someone with them again.

        I can not begin to tell you how incredibly hurtful the medication question is. If you really think about it, it is more of a statement rather than a question. It says you are judging me. It says, albeit subtly and well hidden, that I don't have a right to have feelings let alone express them because they clearly aren't real. It implies that no one that has mental illness has any real emotions. They are a figment of our fractured minds and therefore do not need to be validated or listened to. They are immediately suspect and mistrusted. They are almost always looked at with a wary eye and a half closed ear.


        I mean yes, sometimes my mental illness affects my mood or causes me to react a certain way. But that is not every single time I feel an emotion. When someone has been a complete asshat to me and it hurts my feelings, I get pissed. I do not get pissed because I have OCD. I get pissed because someone has been a complete asshat to me and has hurt my feelings. I should not have to explain that. I should not have to validate that to someone else. I have a right to feel the way I feel about things.

 We are not emotional zombies. We are people.


       Asking me if I have taken my pills when I am upset makes me feel like I have to constantly validate my feelings when I feel them. It makes me start to feel as if I am not trustworthy of my own emotions. Like somehow, I am defunct and incapable. That my feelings are not important on the basis that I am mentally ill and because of that, those feelings have no merit.  Your feelings count and are treated as such. So should ours.  There shouldn't be this overwhelming need to explain why we aren't faking it or not overreacting. There should be no long drawn out explanation we have to give every time we are upset by something. Our feelings matter and they are very real to us. That should be more than good enough for everyone else.

         Somehow people with mental illness are always asked to defend how they feel about something and I hate that. I hate that I have to feel like my emotions are not my own and it is okay for them to be sterilized and whitewashed over simply because I have OCD.  My feelings are not a old barn door that needs to be reclaimed and painted over. They are not grimy bed linens that need to be washed clean with bleach. They are not distasteful and something to look down upon. They are simply feelings. Not something to be scrubbed away or sanitized.  Being told I need to water down my emotions when I am hurting is total bullshit and I vehemently resent it.

We are not exempt from feeling things. We are no different than anyone else.

            I am not asking you to understand every single thing we feel. We don't expect that from you. What I am asking is that you be compassionate. That you be kind. That you listen without ridicule or judgement. That you offer support just as we do you when you are upset or hurting. That is all I want. That is all any of us want. It really isn't that complicated. We just want to be heard. We just want to not have our feelings glossed over, ignored, omitted, or have them remain unvalidated. No one deserves to remain unvalidated.

You wouldn't like if we treated you like your views and emotions were pointless, so please don't do that to us either,

Neurotic Nelly

A Letter.....

I didn't post last week because I was working on this post. Not because I had writer's block (as I sometimes do) but because I wanted this post to mean exactly what I wanted and needed it to mean and to represent something that I dearly wished someone had said to me in the beginning, when I was first diagnosed. It would have been a help to know that life was going to go on and that I would be able to handle whatever mental illness threw my way, even when many times I was not sure of that fact. Maybe this is but a small window into my life but also maybe it could help anyone else struggling to make sense of their diagnosis and all of the unknowns that follow when you live your life under the label of being mentally ill.


Dear self,

When you are first diagnosed with a mental illness, there are some adjectives you are going to hear that are unflattering and a tad bit scary. You will wrestle with whether or not these adjectives are true. It will be hard and humbling and frustrating. It will be an eye opener to how differently people treat you with your diagnosis instead of how they treat you if you had something physical happen to you like a heart attack. There will be those that do not understand and shun you. There will be those that pity you or fear you. It is almost as if your diagnoses has changed who you are in their eyes and they are blinded by the words "mental illness" and unable to see you through those words. It won't be everyone in your life (thank God) but you will see it. Then and only then, will you come to understand the stigma that surrounds carrying around the moniker of being "mentally ill".

Not to fret, we all have walked down this path and learned which winding roads to avoid and which ones are safe to cross. We have all heard the negative adjectives describing our umbrella diagnoses and we are not impressed. We know them to be false and about as scary as two years old's favorite teddy bear. These adjectives are not based in reality and are completely created by ignorance and apathy. We are not bad, or dangerous, or freaks. We are not weak, or lazy, or attention seeking. We are not broken, or ugly, or damaged goods. That is the stigma talking and we need not listen to it's lies and unfair and untrue accusations. It doesn't matter where it comes from or whose mouths it pours from. We are none of those things. You are none of those things.

Having a mental illness is not something to beat yourself up about. It isn't your fault or because of something you did or did not do. It is not something you can help or something that you choose. It is not indicative of your strength as an individual.  It does not speak for your personality. It does not mean that you have all of a sudden become weak, less than, stupid, worthless, or undesirable. It changes nothing about who you are as a person. All it means is that you have a different struggle to deal with.

Yes, there will be times you are on the floor balling your eyes out and wiping away the snot with sleeve of your sweater wondering ,"What the fuck am I doing? What good am I to the world? What life can I possibly lead? What is the point in all of this?"

There will be times when you believe the negative adjectives stated above because it is so much easier to believe the bad lies about yourself rather than the good truths. Because you now doubt who you are, now that you have a label placed upon your head like a two day old ham hock or a discontinued piece of Tupperware. And there are always ignorant people willing to step on you further when you are already down....be weary of those that trample on you and use your diagnoses as an excuse to treat you like dirt. You deserve better than that.

I can not tell you that life is going to be easy or that you will come out of being mentally ill unscathed. That is not reality. Reality is, that you will struggle against the tides until your arms ache and your chest hurts and you are out of breath. You will try and try and try and fail. You will pray and beg and plead and get discouraged. You will.... and then you will get off your ass and up off of the floor and slowly and deliberately carve out a life for yourself because you deserve a good life. Because you are strong. Even though you can't see it yet. Even though you doubt the validity of that strength. Even though, right now you look in the mirror and fail to see yourself as anything but weak and broken. You will prevail. You will one day see that you are never broken and are incapable of being something as paltry as weak. Because being mentally ill doesn't define you anymore than being diabetic does. Because you were never a quitter and failure is not an option. Because struggling against stigma makes your muscles stronger and your responses wittier and you always have liked a challenge. Because you can only see what you are truly made of in the face of adversity.  Yes, you will struggle....but you will also learn who you are during that struggle. You will learn what is important to you and how much courage it takes to be someone with mental illness and still be present in your own life. To still be who you are in the face of stigma and ignorance. To still be compassionate and kind and brave and honest and open. Because mental illness can do many things but it can not change who you are deep down and neither can other people's judgments and stupidity.

So, don't fret. You are going to be fine. No, you are going to better than fine, you are going to be strong. And you are going to realize that you have a purpose with mental illness. It could be to have your dream job in spite of your struggles, or raise happy healthy kids, or to go back to school and learn something new, or to advocate and fight for others that are just like you. And all of those purposes are just as good as any other purpose in life.   Because, fundamentally, this is your life and it is you who gets to decide just how much you are willing to surrender to stigma and bias. Only you can stand up for you. It doesn't matter if you are in a room full of other people that believe in you, if you don't believe in yourself, it will never work. So believe in yourself, because you can do this. In fact, you already have.

Neurotic Nelly

Inhuman....

           May is Mental Illness Awareness month! I am glad that mental illness is being more openly talked about because to get help and eradicate stigma we have to be more open and be more in the spotlight to further awareness of all that we go through.

And while we are talking about ways to be more aware of things like mental illness, I wanted to touch on a topic today that isn't directly about mental illness but often times has a negative affect on those of us that suffer. I read comments on news stories often. I play video games occasionally. I am on the internet almost everyday and I have noticed a trend that highly disturbs me.

Apathy is rampant. In this country and in this world, there is a great amount of apathy and that bothers me. It has gotten so bad that I felt the need to sit my twelve year old son down and have a discussion about apathy, not because he is insensitive but because in a world where so many people are I want him to be able to see it for what it is. I want him to be able to pick it out so that he never becomes apathetic to someone else's suffering. Because pain is pain and no one is immune to hardships. Something that I think is paramount to keeping all of us connected and to remind us all that we are all human.

I can not tell you how many times I have read comments about how mentally ill people should all be rounded up and put somewhere like an asylum. I have read comments calling for the sterilization of all mentally ill people. I have read indifferent posts about how mental illness affects it's sufferers but also their loved ones. And my son needs to understand that when people negatively talk about mentally ill people they are talking about me and my mother and my grandmother.

I can not count how many times I have read stories about drug addicts overdosing and read comments that say it is a good thing or that the person deserves it. I have even read a few where people have said they don't feel anything about it at all. And that bothers me because all loss of human life due to drugs and or violence is a tragedy.

It is a shame to me that I have to have this conversation with my child so that he doesn't do what many children have done and just slowly accepted the apathy of the world towards other people and their plights. Not because they mean to or are inherently bad people but because they simply know no better. Whether it be because of race, religion, age, social status, mental stability, life ideals, sexual orientation, or upbringing we are all subject to comments and opinions by those suffering from a bad case of apathy. There is a lack of responsibility for what people say because those that are apathetic hide behind the excuse that it is only the internet and the internet is where such things are acceptable. And that is a bullshit excuse in my opinion.

We live in a world where just stating an opinion or playing a video game can get you bullied or threatened. And often times, it is ignored by those that hear or read it because they feel vindicated that it only being on the internet makes it okay to do so and to not stand up for that person being victimized. In a world full of keyboard warriors, people have become apathetic to the things that are said and that is wrong.

So, as I sat there talking to my child about apathy and bullying I had to find a way to explain that bullying on the internet and those that turn a blind eye to it, are just as guilty as people who would bully you at school or at work. It is the same pain felt as it would be being attacked in person. Because words are words there is absolutely no difference between hearing them and reading them. They have the same affect to the person they are wielded at and we as humans need to recognize that.

I find that people are more prone to being rude and mean online because they sit behind a computer screen and do not have to face the person they are hurting. So, it feels acceptable to them to do harm to others and live behind an excuse that is really no excuse at all.

And to make my point clear that apathetic people often times do not even realize that what they are doing is wrong at first, I used an example.

The horrors of the Nazis did not start over night. If it had, people would have never accepted what was happening to their neighbors and their friends. It started with ostracizing and little yellow stars sewn into innocent people's jackets. Making them stick out and become something to be seen as different. Then it was the removing of their personal property and destruction of said property and propaganda claiming such things were acceptable. And then it was moving them to the ghettos where many saw them starve and die and yet many felt nothing because they were led to believe such atrocities were not only acceptable but the way things should be. And then it became the mass murder of those innocent people whose only crime was that they had been judged to be different....and yet still many were indifferent to their plight.

All of this was allowed due to apathy. Because indifference causes excuses and lack of responsibility. Apathy propagates misinformation and ignorance. And when no one takes responsibility and no one refuses to be indifferent to other people's pain, it is the same as condoning those actions and that is wrong. Apathy is deadly and it must be seen for what it is and never accepted as the social norm.  Even on the internet. Because apathy is apathy and it makes no difference what device spreads it or what source it is written on.

And in truth, we will never truly eradicate ignorance and stigma of any issue as long as apathy is accepted.

It makes me sad to have to have this discussion with my child because in a perfect world he would see these things as being bad and hurtful and yet in this world he sees it everyday. So much so, that people become oblivious of it and blind to it. And I do not want him to ever be blind to someone else's suffering. Because one person's suffering should affect us all and should make us all strive to be better people.

"The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity" - George Bernard Shaw

To be human is to feel. To be inhuman is to turn away and do nothing. The real question is which one are you willing to be?
Neurotic Nelly

The Facebook Test....

Sorry for the absence last week. I have been recovering from being under the weather. I am recovering, albeit slowly and with great determination.

_______________________

The Facebook Test...


I was minding my own business on Facebook and came across a "how OCD are you" test. I clicked it to see just what ignorant things are supposed to bother me to make me "so OCD". Ya know, because I don't already know what my OCD triggers are. And it was just as I expected. A bunch of things out of order and color coded incorrectly and dirty dishes. Because to people this is all OCD is and it is infuriating.

I took the quiz and because most of things were just asinine and about cleanliness and organization of other people's things, they don't really bother me. Apparently according to the test, I am not so OCD.  Phew, what a relief! I guess I can stop blogging now and stop getting therapy because Facebook thinks I am not a severe OCD sufferer.

And  friend had shared it and I don't want to be as ass but this stuff really pisses me off and it is so inaccurate. Ugh!

And then when I made a comment about how angry these things make me and how they are extremely insulting, I am told by the person that posted, that she too has OCD. And I am so "what the fuck" right now. I mean if you actually had it then why would this be acceptable in any way? How does this not piss you off because it pisses me off to no end. I was asked if I couldn't have been nicer about it, and I guess I could have been but then again sometimes I am fucking sick and tired of being nice about something that I fight to live with everyday. Sometimes I am just tired, and frustrated, and down right pissed. Yes, it is a free country and yes it is Facebook, and yes people are allowed to post whatever the hell they want. But if you are going to post such stupidity then expect for someone to call you on it. Expect someone to get pissed. Expect someone to stand up and call you on your shit because there is nothing funny or amusing about mental illness. Nothing. And my friend said something that really touched me. She said she just has learned to smile through it. And I had nothing to say about that because how many times have I plastered a fake smile over my face and just smiled through it like it wasn't bothering me? How many times have I left things go because I didn't want to upset anyone even though they were really upsetting me? How many times did I let things like these stupid and stigma producing tests go by and acted like they weren't affecting my mental illness in a negative light to others, and I was perfectly okay with it. Or even worse, maybe found it amusing? How many times have I helped to spread the stigma and bias that surrounds all mental illness because it was the easier thing to do? To not stand up. To not rock the boat. To not speak out. How many times have I done that? Too many times to count.

And I have been wrestling with being totally honest lately. I mean, I am honest to a fault but with OCD I tend to not be honest on things like Facebook when I see these tests. I let them go and say nothing. I do things like not explain my mental illness when people find out. I sometimes just go along and pretend that they know how it works and I just let it go. And that is a problem for me because I preach honesty in my blog. I say that silence is condoning the ignorance and yet here I am willingly allowing ignorance to pass before me and I am allowing myself to be afraid of other people's condemnation. Because I am a people pleaser. Because I don't want people to think badly of me or differently about me.  And it has to stop.

I have to stop these tests and explain why they are bad or ignorant or both, every time I see them because it hurts us as sufferers and it promotes stigma. I have to stop being afraid of what my neighbors think, or what the people I went to school with think, or what strangers think about me simply because I take not only a stand but a passionate stand and refuse to be silent. I have to because it is not about me. Not really. It is about all of us. All of us that have this shit handed down to them everyday under the guise that OCD is amusing or fodder for jokes. I have to stand up every time because just as it is about me and you it is also about my youngest son who also has OCD and HE DESERVES BETTER. We all do and the first step is to stop condoning by being silent when we run across things making sport or are spewing ignorance about our disorder. I have to stop wrestling with how much I should say on Facebook and just take the plunge. Let the chips fall where they may and if someone doesn't like it or can't handle the truth then they can just unfriend me because if they can't handle the real me then they don't really deserve to be my "friend" anyway.

Because life is not a Facebook test. This is life and I want my life to stand for something. I want my life to help others and to maybe make life just a tad bit easier for other OCD sufferers. I want my life to help, in some small way, pave the road to a future where we are taken seriously and treated equally. Because all I have is my life and I refuse to allow fear to overcome my truth of what OCD is and is not. No matter how unpopular or uncomfortable that makes other people. Because we are all uncomfortable everyday and maybe it is time for everyone else to suck it up. Maybe it is time for the people that promote this garbage to put on their big boy pants and cowboy up like we do everyday. Because I depend on truth, we depend on truth, my son depends on truth to get better. And that means way more to me then a few people getting upset at me for being honest.

Neurotic Nelly

10 Ways You Can Help Your Child/Teenager/Loved one With OCD.........

I read an article today that really bothered me. The author wrote about the suicide of her teenage daughter due to OCD but it seemed to me to be very one sided. It read to be more about how much the treatment for her child's OCD cost the author, how long the drives for her child's treatment were, how her child's OCD destroyed her marriage, how it took and took and took from the author. I read this and as a sufferer from severe OCD for over 32 years, all I could think of was the teenager. What about all that she had gone through? What about all that she lost, because I can tell you from personal experience it was a hell of a lot more than the author did. After all, she lost her life to it.  It bothered me that it seemed to be more of an itemized list of things that affected the author and inconvenienced the author but without it really touching on the absolute agony OCD is. This article bothered me for many reasons, but the biggest reason for me was the inability to get on the same level as the sufferer. Don't get me wrong, I believe the author loved her child very much. Maybe she was just unable to understand the immense pain and guilt that OCD causes. Maybe she was pressured for time and just wrote how OCD affected her personally and not how it personally affected her child. I don't really know. What I do know is that the article made me angry and sad all at the same time and it just clarified for me how most people just really do not understand Obsessive Compulsive Disorder very well.

To rectify what I read and found to be almost offensive, I wrote down 10 things that helped me when I was younger and still continues to help me today. This is not advice as much as it is  MY OWN PERSONAL OPINION.

1. Don't say that your loved one's OCD tore your family apart and destroyed your life.
Not everything is about you so do not try and make this about you. A person's mental illness is just about them. You suffer because they suffer but make no mistake, your suffering is no where near the suffering we are going through. If you feel OCD is tearing your family apart, just imagine how much devastation it is causing us. Now imagine being told you are the one tearing apart the family on top of all of that devastation. You can't say something like that and not have the sufferer think it is their fault and that they are somehow responsible for having it. It only makes us feel like more of a burden to you. OCD is different from other mental illnesses, in that, we can tell that our disorder is negatively affecting our families and lives. We do not need you to point that out and make us feel less than because of it. Our OCD isn't something being done to you, it is something being done to us. We feel guilty that it affects you as well but it is not our fault we have OCD and saying something like only makes us unfairly blame ourselves just that much more.

2. OCD does not just pop up overnight.
 We may have less obvious symptoms. Mine started at the age of four. My parents saw it and knew something was off, they just didn't know what. No one wakes up one day and just randomly starts touching door knobs twenty five times. Their symptoms may be more obsessional and less compulsive. Less noteworthy than others. It is not like catching the flu. The signs are there, hidden as they may be.

3. Please DO NOT say that you just wish they would be normal again.
 That is a loaded statement. Once a person has OCD, normal is no longer a possibility. There is no cure. There is manageability. There is learning to live with it. There is having a good life and being OCD although, there will always be both good and bad days. The "normal" part of that person is a fun house mirror. A parlor trick. An illusion with smoke and mirrors. There is no normal, only normal for him/her. Drop the "just be normal" crap. It causes guilt we don't need and only further makes the sufferer feel bad about themselves. We aren't normal and we can learn to live with that fact. It is you that is holding on to an illusion when you say those things. It is your problem of accepting our mental illness, not ours.

4. Being a "tough love" parent is not always a good idea.
 OCD is an anxiety disorder. When we are suffering from anxiety, the very last thing we need is to have more anxiety thrust upon us because you are frustrated. We are frustrated too. Frustrated that we suffer. Frustrated at the pain and agony that accompanies our suffering. And frustrated that clearly you have a lack of understanding of what we are dealing with here. Listen to their doctors/therapist's advice on dealing with your loved one's anxiety disorder even if they point out that something you are doing is wrong. Even if it isn't what you want to hear. Again, this is not about you. Nothing says "I blame you" like yelling and pushing the OCD person to do something they feel they can't do with snide comments or condemnation in your tone. You push them gently, with many supportive discussions. You slowly egg them on with love and affection. They will have to do things they are very uncomfortable with and your job is to be there for them. Not lording over them with judgment on as to why they are failing at it and with contempt in your voice. You do not simply badger and belittle OCD away. It does not work that way and if anything it can make it worse.

5. Stand up for us.
Stigma is real and there be will people who do not believe we have what we have. They will say derogatory things to us or about us. They may try to trivialize or minimalize what we go through. They may make remarks about us being over dramatic, lazy, and or looking for attention. They may be friends, coworkers, or even family members. They do not understand but that does not give them the right to assume they know anything about our disorder or how it works. OCD is very complicated with, often times, several different symptoms. To support us, you need to stand up for us to these people. Educate them if you can. Tell them to fuck off if you can't. No one needs to be accused, discriminated, badgered, judged wrongly, or stigmatized further when they are already suffering from something that makes them feel bad about themselves. This kind of thing can make a bad situation even worse and make a toxic atmosphere for both the sufferer and the one's that love them.

6. Stop rationalizing.
OCD has no rational components. Someone who is afraid of germs may have issues with one place or object deemed dirty to them and not with another. Some one might fear being touched by a white cat and not an orange one. Someone may have to open and close the front door ten times but not the back door. We are aware it makes no sense. That does not make it any easier for us to deal with. Case in point, I am a germ-a-phobe and I hate grocery stores. I don't like to touch shelves there or sometimes even the products I want to buy. I, however, have no issue with the shopping cart even though, I know that the handle of the shopping cart has all kinds of germs on it. My OCD is not triggered by this one object but triggered by other things in the same store. There is no rhyme or reason for our fears. Don't rationalize as to why one thing bothers us and the other things don't. Just accept that the fears are what they are.

7. Educate yourself.
OCD is a mental illness and as such has many different symptoms. There are also varying degrees of severity. Some may be more text book i.e. excessive washing, fears of contamination or germs, touching, counting, checking. There are also less talked about symptoms i.e. fears of being homosexual (or if you are homosexual fears of being straight), harm fears, medical fears, reassurance. There are outward compulsions and inward mental compulsions and just when you think you have your symptoms figured out they can and do change around on you. Unwanted intrusive thoughts and images often plague the OCD sufferer. There is an over abundance of guilt and shame. There are phobias and triggers to panic attacks. Some people do outward repetitive actions to calm their anxiety and some do repetitive compulsions inwardly in their minds. No one is exactly the same and no one's fears are exactly the same. So, what freaks one OCD person out may or may not bother the next OCD sufferer. To help, you should be familiar with the behavioral therapies that tend to be helpful with OCD and also the medications prescribed for OCD. You can educate yourself easily with websites, books, blogs, and doctors. Basically, if someone you love has been diagnosed with OCD then you should be educating yourself to how OCD works. It is so easy to find out more about OCD in this day and age that there is absolutely no excuse for walking around being wholly ignorant about it.

8. Be Patient.
There is no one all to be all cure for OCD. It does not go away over night. It takes years of therapy and finding the right medications to help the sufferer cope....Not months, not weeks, not days but Years. Be patient as we figure out our triggers and work tirelessly to get over them. Be patient when we have set backs, because everyone does. Be patient while we learn how to stand on our own two legs to fight the monster of our nightmares (anxiety). Be patient when we look for reassurances, repeat ourselves or our actions, get upset with something because it doesn't feel right or takes too long. We know these things are frustrating, they are frustrating for us as well, be patient. Be patient with the drug side affects that can make us cranky, bloated, exhausted, or weak. Be patient when we have to do therapies that push the borders of our comfort zones and we freak out. Be patient as we repeat this cycle over and over and over and over and over again. We can't help it and we are working really hard to be more functional.

9. Silence is not golden, it is deadly.
OCD is often thought of something humorous or quirky. In reality, it is a devastating mental illness that brings with it self doubt, frustration, immense pain, shame, and guilt. It can lead to other mental illnesses or coincide with them. OCD needs to be treated, listened to, and talked about. It is just as deadly as depression or any other mental illness. The weird things we do may seem funny to others but they are agonizing to us. They are painful to us. We need to talk about them. The deadliest thing about OCD is silence because if we remain silent we do not get the help we need nor do we help erode the reality of the stigma and bias that surrounds it. Shame keeps us silent. Guilt keeps us silent. Fear keeps us silent and silence is a killer. Let us talk. Listen to what we say. Continue to discuss it with others. Continue to educate to the masses. Never, ever remain silent.

10. Remember we are people too.
Sometimes the anxiety seems so all consuming that people can forget that we are more than just our mental illness. We are people too. We like to do things. We like to be happy. We love, we laugh, we play. We are not just OCD, we are also human beings. We are still the person you love even though we struggle. That never changes.  Remember that although we have a mental illness, we are not just our diagnosis. We may need help but we are strong and resilient individuals. We are productive members of society. We are doctors, lawyers, moms, and dads. We are children and teachers and bus drivers. We are bloggers and authors and painters. We are factory workers, retirees, and mailmen. We are everywhere. We can be anyone. We are humans with dreams and desires and families. We are loved ones who have loved ones. Remember that we are not just OCD people. We are people who just happen to have OCD. And everything that applies to being human also applies to us as well because although we suffer, we are people too.



Neurotic Nelly

We All Are...

My youngest is just like me. He is sweet, intelligent, sensitive and he has an anxiety disorder. Lately, his aversion to going to school has gotten worse. He now has anxiety attacks, just as I did with school.

But he has a chance that wasn't available to me at that age. Now, they actually treat children for anxiety disorders. Thirty years ago they did not. So, while my OCD is firmly ingrained in my brain.....we may be able to really improve his. We may even make his anxiety much less or much more manageable. To do this though, he will have to be in situations that make him extremely uncomfortable. Like going to school.

Last night he was crying as he thought about school and I went through a long list of people that love him. I told him how wonderful he is. How important he is. That he can do anything in this world that he wants if he really wants to. And that these feelings that he has are called anxiety. That they feel yucky and scary and they seem impossible to overcome. But just because something seems impossible doesn't mean that it is. I told him that mommy has the same issues and then I explained to him that anxiety is an emotion that is not based in reality. That whatever he is afraid of when leaving me is not the truth. That the scariest thing at school is a possible paper cut or the cafeteria lunch that smells funny and that he can certainly get over those two things easily. Then I reminded him that tomorrow's day at school would be like all of the other days at school and that just like all of the days before it, he will come home and we will do it all again the next day because if he stays home, the anxiety wins. And it can not be allowed to win because it can make him unable to do the things he wants to do and that is unacceptable. Anxiety doesn't get to have that kind of power over him. It can only be powerful if you let it become powerful.  I told him that we have to be warriors and that warriors do the scariest things in the world. They stand up. They fight for what is right. They never back down. They are scared when they do these things but they do them anyway because they have to. We are warriors because we battle everyday and sometimes we will not win, but we will always get up the next day a try again because that is what warriors do. They fight. They never give up. They are always battle ready. They are always fierce.

And then I took out one of those rectangular pink erasers that you use for school testing and I drew a large "W" with a sharpie marker on one side. Then I wrote his name on the other side so he could take it school in his pocket and if at anytime it seemed like the anxiety was taking over, he could hold it in his hand and it would remind him that  he can do this. He can make it one day at a time. Because he is a warrior and warriors will always prevail.

Everyone has a story and everyone gets the chance to be the hero in their own story. He is the hero of his and in no small way he is also the hero in mine. Because if an eight year old can conquer his greatest fears with the courage of full grown adult armed with only an eraser with a "W" written on it, then I can too. The only thing holding me back is me and my fear and that is also unacceptable because deep down I too am a warrior. We all are.....we just have to stop and remember that sometimes.

Neurotic Nelly

The Truth Is......

It seems to me that whenever a tragedy happens people rush to judgment. They rush to make excuses for one's behavior. They use words like mental illness to describe what could have been the possible culprit. I think it is to make a gap in humanity. To make it seem like normal people could never do what these people have done. I think it is to make others sleep better at night. To label someone who has hurt others so that they don't have to look at themselves and the possibility that they could do something like that as well. It isn't a diagnosis to understand what has happened. It is a diagnosis to separate themselves from those that have harmed. A label. An umbrella word. Infecting everyone who has a label even though it is unwarranted.

The man who drove the plane into the mountain and killed 150 people was labeled depressed. Yet he was on anti-psychotics. Depression isn't psychosis but most people don't know that there is a huge difference. That anti-psychotics are given to psychotics not typical depressed people. The media seems oblivious as they spread out the might be's and why's someone might do such a horrid thing. Someone said depression and now even though, we have no actual proof of his depression, depressed people are getting the side eye. Now, everyone with depression is suspect of being a possible mass murderer. Not because statistics support such a bias claim but because the media and ignorant people are in such a rush to make an excuse for inexcusable behavior. It wouldn't happen if he had a heart problem but because it was a mental problem, it is okay to publicly speculate.

Calling someone's diagnosis something that it is not, is like calling someone's toe cancer, finger cancer. Yes, they are both cancers but they are different cancers. Just like calling someone's mental illness diagnosis  by a different mental illness diagnosis name. They are both mental illness but they are different mental illnesses. It is not one size fits all.


This happens every time some person does the unthinkable. Adam Lanza murdered innocent children and teachers and before the investigation was even finished he had a label. Aspergers. No actual documentation of his disorder and yet it was spread over the news and media as fact. Why? Because it made people feel safer that his evil had a name. A name they put on him to make it seem like his actions were because of an illness.  It did not matter that Aspergers is not violent usually. It didn't matter that the statistics don't support what the media claimed. All that mattered is that it sold more papers, got more views, and riled people up against mental illness. All that mattered is that there was a label to assign. And so they did.

And in doing so, such a label brought a great deal of discomfort to good people that suffer from Aspergers. They were all looked at like they were capable of such horror. They did not deserve such judgment.

There seems to be a great deal of speculation as we reel with emotions of such horrid events and yet what seems to be lacking is a great deal of truth. Truth that sets people straight. Truth that sets people free.

The truth is, people suffering from mental illnesses are more than twice as likely to be victims of a violent crime rather than to be the person committing one. The truth is, that depressed people are far more likely to be a danger to themselves rather than to others. The truth is, that the media slanders the mentally ill anytime something tragic happens because it fits the general consensus that it is us against them and that we are somehow dangerous or different. The truth is that bad people can and do bad things and not all of those people did bad things because of mental illness. Sometimes they just do what they do and no one else with any diagnosis that may be similar has anything to prove. We are not the monsters that go bump into the night. We are just people. We are not dangerous anymore than anyone else.  This isn't our shame to bear. It's their's because they did the unspeakable and devastating things, not us.

The truth is, that mental illness is promoted in falsehoods, quoted with misconceptions, and wrapped in a cloak of invisibility and stigma. If we want to get people the help they need, than we have to stop labeling people that hurt others by their diagnoses. Which only promotes more ignorance and stigma. We have to see that these people did an unforgivable thing but in no way does it mean that other people with those same diagnosis need to be suspect or feared. No one deserves to be punished by other people's actions and no group of people should be sullied by the horrid acts of the few that do not represent us. And I urge you to remember that, as the media continues to peddle it's misconstrued propaganda and sensationalism of our illnesses.

Neurotic Nelly

Excuse Me....Rant...Rant...Rant

        I love how people say they have experience with mental illness and then start talking about it in a way that lets you know they haven't the first clue how devastating and demanding it is of your time, your space, what little is left of your sanity, and your life. The soul sucking hole that laps up your very thoughts and drains your emotions like a mummified vampire from the worst B rated horror movie ever created. I love it, I truly do.

I also love feeling like I need to get into a "whose mental illness is worse" pissing contest with someone who thinks because they might have had small case of the "Debbie Downers" once or whatever they claim to be the mental illness  they "know" about is. And it makes me feel like yelling that mine was so bad that I almost killed myself so maybe..... just maybe.... I may know what the hell I am talking about. Because I am not talking about making excuses, or over exaggerating, or being dramatic. I am talking about thirty one years of carving out a path to walk down because each road in my life has big boulders of shit blocking every way I turn. I am talking about shit balls, here. Giant shit balls that roll down hill and threaten to smother you or crush you underneath them.

I don't need to be schooled on what is and isn't an excuse of mental illness. I am pretty sure that over three decades of dealing with it, I should at least have a bachelors degree in being mentally ill. Seeing as you only need around ten extra years of school to be a neurosurgeon, I think I have earned the "right to talk about what it is like to be mentally ill" badge from the girls scouts by now....I have several doctor's sign offs on being permanently disabled because of mine. I have being institutionalized at the age of ten at the local looney bin. I have almost being admitted again at the age of 20. I have not being able to drive, or work, or go to college. I have the fact that I no longer could go to school because of the extreme anxiety and the bullying because I would have panic attacks in class, so I dropped out. I have that I have no formal education past the 12th grade. I have battle scars just from leaving my house just to go to the fucking grocery store for God's sakes. I am actually certifiable because I literally am certified as mentally ill....but no, clearly you know more about mental illness than I. Because you have supposedly "experienced" it.

Well, I haven't "experienced" it, I fucking live it. Each and every day.   And I am not bitter about it, just real. It is not some pretty package wrapped up in a crisp red bow and left on your front porch as a gift. It is not an expensive wine or an artisan cheese. It is not something you smear on an over priced gluten free cracker and choke down with a warm glass of milk as a midnight snack. You do not "experience" mental illness. It is something you deal with. It is something you struggle through. It is something that you work on. It is not a pleasure cruise to fucking Boca. It is an illness in your brain.

Excuse me, for standing up for what I know to be true from not only my experiences but also the many mental illness survivors in my family, and sadly some that did not survive it. Excuse me, for understanding the many friends and bloggers that also have gone through mental illness and taught me things about other mental illnesses I was ignorant about. Excuse me, for saying that mental illness is not an excuse but it is a reality and it needs to be talked about and understood and not vilified or stigmatized because we wear that ugly over coat of shame and guilt and stigma every damn day and maybe we don't want to wear that stagnant, moldered, trench coat of self-condemnation  anymore because it isn't our shame or our guilt to be carried around but yours and ignorant people like you that sit behind a keyboard and make snap judgments and rude comments about something that you claim you may have "experienced" once in your lifetime. Excuse me, for actually knowing what I am talking about and seeing you for your inexperience of something you are so "experienced" in. Excuse me......

and fuck you....

Now please enlighten us some more on how you know about what living with mental illness is like because you have  so much "experience" with it.....

Neurotic Nelly

I Think About.....

My day today started as dawn broke. The light peeking in through the window blinds. Some days I hate the light and others it is my welcome friend. The birds chirp, the clouds hover over head, the smell of coffee fills my atmosphere. My hopes that the morning light would mean a slightly warmer temperature was met with disappointment. It was 21 degrees. Mornings are quiet before everyone stirs and makes the normal morning sounds. I love this time. My time. Time when nothing is expected of me but to simply open my eyes. The few seconds before I roll out of bed and meet the world and all of it's expectations and demands...grudgingly.

Then it is afternoon. Somehow, the day seems like it is slipping through my fingers. I eat lunch, which I have never liked. Lunch always makes my stomach curl. It doesn't matter what I eat. I think it might be anxiety. I jot notes on paper only to lose them in  my cleaning spree. I bet if you opened the desk drawers and cabinet doors you would millions of my half assed thoughts lying around. Not that they would make much sense singularly, all together even less so. They are the keys to the thought narrative in my head. Sometimes a few lines, sometimes just a sentence, mostly just a word or two. As if my OCD  mind is some dark hidden diary that requires a special key to unlock and reads it's secret contents. Although, they really aren't so secret since I write many of them in here. They are just reminders of things I want to write about.....or phrases that touch my soul. Other people's quotes, poems, prose...ect. 

I was thinking about how when I am in the car and looking out the window, I often think about riding horses in the deep green grass. I think about running through corn mazes and having picnics. I think about how money seems like such an odd concept for me. Not because I have ever had much but because I have never had much. Even if I did, I would probably give most of it away. I always want to help others, do for those that have less than me, and I find many things to be ridiculously priced these days. I don't need a bouquet of roses, just pick some wild flowers on the side of the road.  I don't need diamonds and fancy shoes. I hate shoes, they make my feet sweaty. I don't know, maybe that is weird?

I think about how everything seems like people become more and more detached form each other. I used to write long thought out hand written letters on vintage stationary I bought from various resale shops and send them to my loved ones. All of the people I used to write to have since passed. They were the older generation. I receive no letters and send none back. It is kind of sad really. I get bills though....yay. (sarcasm)

I think about how my oldest is turning into a teenager and I worry if I am teaching him the right things. Do I teach him to really listen to the world around him? Do I teach him the importance of liking himself and trusting his intuitions? Because a low self esteem is a horrible cross to bear and a hard one to rectify. Do I teach him how to stand up for himself and the things he believes in? Do I teach him that life is love and music is a representation of life and therefore universal? Do I teach him that of all things in life I find to be important, compassion is the biggest and sometimes hardest thing to learn? Do I teach him that education is something to be serious about? Do I teach him to be fearless in his pursuits and to always question everything and to never give up?.....Hell I don't know. I try.  I hope these things are coming through, but with a teenager it can be hard to tell. He is an amazing kid,so I must be doing something right. After I write this I am going to call my mom and apologize again for being a teenager.....because wow....just wow. They are a real trip. I never appreciated all that she did for me like I do now that I am doing it for my kids. It's an eye opener. 

I think about what it must be like to live unafraid of the things I am afraid of. I think about how some apples were recalled for Listeria. My husband just bought some apples too. I most likely will not be eating them. I might if I feel up to battling the contamination fears. I don't at this exact moment. Maybe later...

I think about blood sugar levels and weight loss. I think about vacuuming the carpet. I think about finding things to write about and this horrid writer's block. I think about my husband's upcoming birthday, and wanting to train to run a marathon, and of learning to be secure in myself enough to go places on my own. I think about what nightclubs must be like because I am a horrid dancer and have never actually been in one. I think about bookstores and antique shops, and how much I love the smell of old musty books. I think about the Winter being over because I detest the cold.  I think about how nice the aroma of wood burning fireplaces and bonfires are. I think about the garden I am going to plant in the Spring as a memorial to my aunt because she liked pretty things and her favorite color was green.... I think about anything and everything in rapid succession and I wonder if maybe I have a touch of ADD with my OCD or if this is just how an overactive brain works.

It seems like thinking is all I ever do. A never ending, never ceasing mumble in the back of my brain much like the sound of a train passing by in the background. Only the train never passes fully, either that or it is the world's longest train track occupied by the world's longest train. If it is a train, then I hope it has a caboose like the ones I used to see as a kid when I played near the tracks of my great grandmother's house. Cabooses are a thing of the past too, and they were so neat looking. Children these days really miss out on some of the old cool things. Makes me feel a tad bit ancient.

I guess this post is about how OCD just never really stops. It is manageable but it is never quiet. Never fully silent. There will always be thoughts, and wondering, and thinking about stupid and or ridiculous things. There will always be that mumble in the back of your brain, even if the loud thoughts and images aren't present. It gets to be where you don't notice it as much. It is just something you learn to tune out. It is part of the OCD experience, I suppose. But hey, I always liked trains so I am not too bothered by it.

Neurotic Nelly

We Are Worth It.....

So, after my last post things started looking up. First of all, I got some much needed support and comments on my google+ page in my blog comment section. You guys are amazing and thank you so much.

Then I read this post from an incredible blogger http://judyjourny.blogspot.com/2014/12/thoughts-on-approaching-new-year.html. Her last few lines hit me in the gut and made me realize that even though I am weathering a bad storm, I have been here before. And just like last time, I will get through this too. Sometimes, you just need to be reminded of how far you have come. Especially, when setbacks rear their ugly heads.

Then this morning I read some stories that made me sad and well, angry. And I was reminded why I started this blog almost two years ago. Through my ups and downs, I started as a scared but yet hopeful mental illness blogger just praying that there were other people like me out in there in the world. Never thinking that that those people understood me better sometimes, than I even understood myself. And it makes sense to me because although we may all have different mental illnesses, pain is universal. And the understanding of that pain and the compassion we show each other is also universal. But even more than that, LOVE is universal.

All of us walk down winding blinding paths. Sometimes the fog rolls in and we become unable to see. We become blinded to all that we offer the world. The negative thoughts set in and we lose the ability to not only see the love we get but also the ability to love ourselves. We start to believe that we don't matter. But the funny thing about fog, is even in the thickest darkest hours eventually the fog lifts. And we can see the path again. Clear not for the first time but clear enough to pass. And that is all life is, a couple of steps at a time. Helping those you meet along the way. Understanding pain, having compassion, and most of all offering Love. Not just for others but for yourself as well, because dammit, we are worth it. (Even if we sometimes think we aren't)

Then this song came on the radio and I just knew that this was what my post needed to be about.




And even though this is a love song and it is about a relationship, I kind of took it to mean something totally different. It made me think of us, all of us dealing with mental illness and the relationships we have with our own selves. And how much we need to support each other because who understands us better than we do? And how many times has it been just one kind word or sympathetic smile that made you turn from suicidal thoughts and made you hold on for just one more day. One more day is all it takes. A couple of steps at a time.

The lyrics touched me and it made me realize that I am strong and it is because we all are strong. That even in the darkest of times, I can never give up on myself and I can not give up on my mental illness community either. We are all in this together. What I do affects others and I need to make sure that everyone knows that that they belong on this earth. That they have a place here. That they are many things in this life but alone is never one of those things. We are strong. We are tough. We are magnificent. I refuse to give up and I hope that you refuse as well.

As the song says:

When I look into your eyes
It's like watching the night sky
Or a beautiful sunrise
Well, there's so much they hold
And just like them old stars
I see that you've come so far
To be right where you are
How old is your soul?

I won't give up on us.
 Even if the skies get rough.
 I am giving you all my love.
 I'm still looking up.

And even the stars, they burn. 
Some even fall to the earth.
 We got a lot to learn.
 God, knows we are worth it.
 No I won't give up.

I don't wanna be someone who walks away so easily
I'm here to stay and make the difference that I can make
Our differences they do a lot to teach us how to use
The tools and gifts we got, yeah, we got a lot at stake
And in the end, you're still my friend at least we did intend
For us to work we didn't break, we didn't burn
We had to learn how to bend without the world caving in
I had to learn what I've got, and what I'm not, and who I am.

I won't give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I'm giving you all my love
I'm still looking up, still looking up.

Well, I won't give up on us (no I'm not giving up)
God knows I'm tough enough (I am tough, I am loved)
We've got a lot to learn (we're alive, we are loved)
God knows we're worth it (and we're worth it)

I won't give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I'm giving you all my love
I'm still looking up

We are still losing good people out there and this has to change. Stigma has to end and compassion has to grow. And the only way to do that is to live for those that could not hold on and fight for those that are not able to speak out from fear. We have to hold on not just for ourselves but for each other. Because simply put, we are all important. We all matter. All lives matter...Everyone. And God knows we are worth it. I am worth it and just as importantly YOU are worth it too.


Neurotic Nelly

Just Stop It Already....RANT......RANT......

Thanksgiving was interesting. My Grandma was sick and had to go to the hospital the day before Thanksgiving. She was in the hospital up until today. She is now going to a rehabilitation to help her regain her strength.  God only knows how long it will be until she gets to go home. I am worried about her which triggers my OCD medical fears about myself. We spent three days at my mom's and I helped clean my grandma's apartment after which I took a shower and then spent twenty minutes trying to remove a comb I was attempting to brush my unruly mane with, from said unruly mane. It was firmly implanted in my hair like I was born with it there. (This is why I carry my own hair comb but I forgot it this time.) Then after we returned home I started to decorate out new Christmas tree we picked up Saturday, only to somehow manage to get the string of Christmas lights entangled in my hair as well. I guess I am just having a bad hair week. Or maybe my hair has Pica or was super hungry...who knows.

The tree is decorated "Old World" style. I used to read Christmas books as a child and I always loved the illustrations with the Christmas trees that had garland and red and gold ornaments. My tree looks good but I need to get those little white candles to put on the tree. Fakes ones of course, because real ones are a fire hazard and I am extremely clumsy. I mean, I got the lights tangled in my hair, just imagine what I would be like around lit candles..

Am I happy with the tree? No because it is never perfect enough. And that is how OCD works my friends. It has to be perfect but it never quiet reaches the mark. It is something all OCD sufferers learn to live with.

Then I got on the internet to search OCD news and I ended up reading this article with the title "Khloe: I'm an OCD Freak."

It's about Klohe Kardashian ( I have no idea why I bothered to read such drivel) and her Thanksgiving table and plans. There were these pictures of a grand and intricately decorated table and here is what she says.


“A sneak peak of my craziness today. I know you see my OCD in high gear when you look at my cookie jars,”

“I have a problem... I know... but I like everything neat and in its place. This kind of stuff makes me SO happy!! #HappyThanksgiving”


Yea, because nothing says happiness like OCD. Hell, I know that my life with OCD is all shits and giggles. I couldn't be happier that I spent six hours today trying not to obsess over whether or not I have thyroid cancer because I am being triggered by holiday stress. I am so glad that Khloe Kardashian knows my pain..... I now feel complete.....*snicker*

I am so sick of hearing how liking things orderly is OCD. Sick to death of it, seriously. Stop it already! You don't have OCD because you like to line up your cookie jars a certain way. What you might have is a plethora of self importance, narcissism, delusions of grandeur, and possibly some serious self esteem issues but the one thing you do not have is OCD. You do not say that OCD makes you so happy, if you actually have it. Because if you actually had it you would understand what a fucking horrible burden having OCD is. Here's a tip, there are actual words used to describe OCD. I won't burden you with the long list of what they are but I will tell you what they aren't. They aren't words like happy, or cool, or fashionable, or fun. It's mental illness and it blows. Okay? Is that so hard for people to understand?

And further more, I really don't want my mental illness to be sullied or trivialized by some small minded idiot who only got famous because her sister is famous for a sex tape and or possibly being peed on. I am so tired of seeing everything these ridiculous self absorbed people say plastered all over the news as if they have a fucking clue what they are talking about. They don't. So please for the love of all things holy, stop it already.

I think what bothers me the most is that this year has been the hardest for me OCD wise. I have been battling OCD for as almost as long as I can remember and I have been unmedicated for over three years now, but there have been a ton of stressers this year. Deaths in my family, diagnoses of medical issues, relearning how to function on somewhat of a schedule which truth be told, has never been my strong suit. And to have to read something so asinine as my mental illness/mental hell being reduced to something as paltry as lined up cookie jars just really pisses me off. As if it would make sense out of all of this pain and frustration if I would only be famous, ridiculously rich and stupid, and just line my crockery in eye pleasing patterns. Then and only then I could be "so happy". So no, I am not really happy right now. Especially, after reading an article that calls OCD sufferers "freaks"....(Gee thanks. That really bolsters my self esteem.) Or having to read ridiculous claims made by morally inept morons as to why their Thanksgiving preparations in any way compare to the absolute hell I have been living with the last thirty one years.

I mean, I think we as sufferers of all mental illnesses deserve more respect than that. We deserve to be treated like what we have is an actual illness and isn't something to be used as a general term for something odd or quirky. Just because you are having a bad day doesn't make you " Bipolar". Feeling paranoid does not make you "Schizo". And lining your cookie jars up in a row clearly does not make you "OCD". So stop it. Just stop.

And just so you know, poorly written news article author: We are magnificent, brave, courageous, intelligent, and strong individuals. We are many things to the many people in our lives. We are important and we matter. We are not "freaks". We are human beings. So, educate yourself because smearing us with words like "freak" shows your ignorance and bias. And I don't think anyone who suffers form mental illness finds your title amusing or cute.


Neurotic Nelly