Skip to main content

Seeing the humor in OCD

OCD is not funny.

But in a way, it is.

I'm never laughing when I'm caught up in an OCD cycle, but sometimes when I look back from a great distance at some of my thoughts and actions they seem so nonsensical I can see the humor in them.

For sure, there are some OCD cycles -- religious thoughts, for instance -- that are never humorous to me.

But there are other things -- like a number being "bad" or "good" -- that can appear ridiculous in retrospect. What I find odd, though, is that it can seem ridiculous one second and literally the next second be so critical to my well-being -- at least in my OCD mind.

For instance, as I wrote this I noticed when I reached the 9th and 10th lines. In my head, 9 and 10 are wonderful numbers -- they make me feel calm and safe. But after 10, the numbers become perilous in my OCD brain.

Now does that cause me anguish and anxiety? Or is that kind of funny? Yes to both.

And I believe that somehow, maintaining at least a little sense of humor about my OCD brain, is a good thing.

OCD thoughts, images and compulsions dominate my days and nights to one degree or another.  They generally cause great angst and frustration.

But I consider those moments when I can see the lighter side of my OCD a blessing. A chance to breath easily and to give my brain a break.






Comments

Popular posts from this blog

What OCD really looks like

We've all seen those cliche -- and inaccurate -- images of what OCD is: the crooked pencil in a line of straight pencils, the one yellow M&M in the pile of reds. So for my post today I want to try to show what OCD really looks like, at least to me. This proved especially challenging, because my most painful and most consuming OCD is mental -- whether it's "bad thoughts" or religiousity or catastrophizing. But I'm going to give it a try. For the most part, the images that follow probably look ordinary, boring. But to my OCD mind, they have some serious power. A normal bathroom soap dispenser? Yes. But my OCD tells me I have to pump it 7 times, or in multiples of 7, whenever I wash my hands. Just clothes in a closet. We've all seen this. But to my OCD mind, all the clothes "must" be facing to the right. Buttons to the right, prints on t-shirts to the right. I've tried hard to let them face left when I've made an error and i...

OCD's musical mind games

Most everyone gets a song stuck in their head now and then. I certainly do. But recently OCD has gotten involved and it's turned from a simple annoyance to something of a concern. I realize this is one of those things that the general population isn't going to fully understand -- I think you need to have OCD or another form of anxiety to get it -- but I feel pretty safe talking about it here. It sounds like I'm joking, but here goes: For about the past month, I'd say way more than half the time I wake up in the morning I have Wham's "Careless Whisper" going through my head -- instantly. "I'm never gonna dance again, Guilty feet have got no rhythm ... Should have known better than to cheat a friend." Just those words. I admit, this sounds funny. The scary thing is I don't hear this song enough, if ever these days, for it to be so stuck in my head. It was never a favorite song of mine either. I didn't NOT like it, I just never s...

Sneaking in rituals, so no one can see

When I'm around people I still have OCD, I just find ways of hiding it -- or more precisely -- of doing my obsessions and compulsions in ways that aren't so obvious. At work, I have a desk in the corner of the room that faces a wall. It seemed weird at first, but then it was somehow comforting. I now think it gives me a sense of privacy -- kind of having my own office, without the door. At my desk I do have my OCD moments -- counting, staring at things, praying and then of course sometimes hitting myself in the head to get certain compulsions to stop. As much as I think someone must have seen me do this, it's actually quite possible they haven't. I'm kind of an OCD ninja, or an OCD magician -- now you see it, now you don't. Did you see me do something compulsive? No? But I did, and right in front of you. At home I sneak my obsessive routines in when no one is looking -- praying, touching things a certain number of times, looking at things, showering and ...