RKO
Member
As a long-term sufferer of OCD, who never has never used meds I have developed some insight in just how OCD works, which may be of some use to others suffering with this condition.
The classic description of OCD is this: A negative thought gets enters a person’s mind and gets stuck there. The result of this is a state of increased anxiety. To reduce this anxiety the person develops rituals (compulsive behaviors) to decrease, or to help them endure the anxiety.
I agree with the part that rituals are a mechanism to deal with the negative thought; I have often noticed that when I had some additional anxiety (like a financial problem or a school exam) on top of my OCD anxiety, I would perform my OCD rituals at a greatly increased rate.
First my definitions: I use the term “intrusive thought” or sometimes “invasive thought” instead of “obsession” as the word “obsession” means something quite different in everyday use than it does when professionals use it for OCD terminology.
Unlike the thoughts described as “obsessions” in colloquial language, the obsessive thoughts in true OCD has absolutely nothing to do with pleasure or desire; or have any reward associated with them. I am tired of people saying: “I have obsessions too. When I see a good looking girl . . .” or “I am obsessed with sweets or alcohol, etc.”
In OCD the obsessions, hereby referred to as intrusive thoughts, have absolutely no pleasure, reward or desire associated with them. They resemble the thoughts of nightmares. These intrusive thoughts are uninvited and unwelcome—and never enjoyed.
Over the years I found I was sometimes able to remove an intrusive thought from my mind. However, soon after another one would take its place and might be totally unconnected or unrelated to the previous thought.
I found sometimes over the years, I could get a thought extinguished at a faster rate (although some stay with me—I usually have several intrusive thoughts simultaneously), but the new ones would develop just as fast to replace the old ones.
In fact, now I generally never totally wipe out an intrusive thought, but I keep it burning at low embers, since I never know if the new one will be worse than the old.
When I wake up, I generally nurse along the one that is going to cause me the least trouble during the day. I usually play off one thought against the other.
Health advocates encourage taking beneficial bacteria (like yoghurt) in your body to inhibit the growth of deleterious bacteria—in other words, good bacteria keeps out bad. In the same way, I use a less pernicious thought to keep out a more noxious one.
Oh how I wish I could replace the intrusive thoughts with pleasant ones—but I have to settle for replacing them with less baneful ones. And what is considered less harmful thought may vary from day to day.
In addition, I noticed another phenomenon with my OCD. When I occasionally eliminate an intrusive thought from my mind, I will get a feeling of relief—briefly. Then all of a sudden a wave of fear engulfs me, but I cannot associate any thought or particular fear with this emotional state.
Usually, the fear will develop into a more particular fear. I noticed that while environmental factors do not cause the fear, they influence the shape it takes. For example, when I first get this amorphous feeling of dread, and later hear of someone getting into a car accident or getting mugged, that will become my specific fear.
While I am not an expert on the biological causes of OCD, I have read through many reliable sources that the problem is caused by bad serotonin nerve receptors in the basal ganglia, the part of the brain that deals with emotions.
With most people, it is a thought, or an event that precedes fear, guilt or shame. Like a situation involving real potential harm or some traumatic event such as sexual abuse.
But I am convinced that with OCD, though it may not seem apparent to a new sufferer, it is the emotion comes first, and then it is the intrusive thought follows. Since these two usually come onto a person almost simultaneously people earnestly believe their emotional state (dread, anxiety, guilt and/or shame) is a result of the intrusive thought.
My belief is that the brain gets stuck in an emotional state and generates a thought to go with that emotion.
Notice that heterosexuals always are the ones to experience HOCD. Yet male homosexuals with HOCD have experience things like fear of getting a woman pregnant. People always will report fear of harming the people most dear to them, their children, their spouses or boy/girlfriends—never their enemies.
Oh the uncanny ability of OCD to just know just what is most dear to you—and then works its destruction on you by utilizing that very thing.
I guess the dictum of Aristotle, “Nature abhors a vacuum” somehow applies to OCD. I suppose your mind cannot tolerate an emotional state like fear, guilt and shame without having a thought associated with it. If one does not come from the outside, one will be generated from within.
Now I say this because for years I never knew that OCD was a recognized disease and was shared by others. Before I learned this, in addition to the horrors of my intrusive thoughts, I used to pile on to my malady even more guilt and shame.
Now I am not saying my OCD is no longer a problem, but at least I am not magnifying it with self-loathing.
I would love to hear other people’s comments on my theory of how OCD operates.
The classic description of OCD is this: A negative thought gets enters a person’s mind and gets stuck there. The result of this is a state of increased anxiety. To reduce this anxiety the person develops rituals (compulsive behaviors) to decrease, or to help them endure the anxiety.
I agree with the part that rituals are a mechanism to deal with the negative thought; I have often noticed that when I had some additional anxiety (like a financial problem or a school exam) on top of my OCD anxiety, I would perform my OCD rituals at a greatly increased rate.
First my definitions: I use the term “intrusive thought” or sometimes “invasive thought” instead of “obsession” as the word “obsession” means something quite different in everyday use than it does when professionals use it for OCD terminology.
Unlike the thoughts described as “obsessions” in colloquial language, the obsessive thoughts in true OCD has absolutely nothing to do with pleasure or desire; or have any reward associated with them. I am tired of people saying: “I have obsessions too. When I see a good looking girl . . .” or “I am obsessed with sweets or alcohol, etc.”
In OCD the obsessions, hereby referred to as intrusive thoughts, have absolutely no pleasure, reward or desire associated with them. They resemble the thoughts of nightmares. These intrusive thoughts are uninvited and unwelcome—and never enjoyed.
Over the years I found I was sometimes able to remove an intrusive thought from my mind. However, soon after another one would take its place and might be totally unconnected or unrelated to the previous thought.
I found sometimes over the years, I could get a thought extinguished at a faster rate (although some stay with me—I usually have several intrusive thoughts simultaneously), but the new ones would develop just as fast to replace the old ones.
In fact, now I generally never totally wipe out an intrusive thought, but I keep it burning at low embers, since I never know if the new one will be worse than the old.
When I wake up, I generally nurse along the one that is going to cause me the least trouble during the day. I usually play off one thought against the other.
Health advocates encourage taking beneficial bacteria (like yoghurt) in your body to inhibit the growth of deleterious bacteria—in other words, good bacteria keeps out bad. In the same way, I use a less pernicious thought to keep out a more noxious one.
Oh how I wish I could replace the intrusive thoughts with pleasant ones—but I have to settle for replacing them with less baneful ones. And what is considered less harmful thought may vary from day to day.
In addition, I noticed another phenomenon with my OCD. When I occasionally eliminate an intrusive thought from my mind, I will get a feeling of relief—briefly. Then all of a sudden a wave of fear engulfs me, but I cannot associate any thought or particular fear with this emotional state.
Usually, the fear will develop into a more particular fear. I noticed that while environmental factors do not cause the fear, they influence the shape it takes. For example, when I first get this amorphous feeling of dread, and later hear of someone getting into a car accident or getting mugged, that will become my specific fear.
While I am not an expert on the biological causes of OCD, I have read through many reliable sources that the problem is caused by bad serotonin nerve receptors in the basal ganglia, the part of the brain that deals with emotions.
With most people, it is a thought, or an event that precedes fear, guilt or shame. Like a situation involving real potential harm or some traumatic event such as sexual abuse.
But I am convinced that with OCD, though it may not seem apparent to a new sufferer, it is the emotion comes first, and then it is the intrusive thought follows. Since these two usually come onto a person almost simultaneously people earnestly believe their emotional state (dread, anxiety, guilt and/or shame) is a result of the intrusive thought.
My belief is that the brain gets stuck in an emotional state and generates a thought to go with that emotion.
Notice that heterosexuals always are the ones to experience HOCD. Yet male homosexuals with HOCD have experience things like fear of getting a woman pregnant. People always will report fear of harming the people most dear to them, their children, their spouses or boy/girlfriends—never their enemies.
Oh the uncanny ability of OCD to just know just what is most dear to you—and then works its destruction on you by utilizing that very thing.
I guess the dictum of Aristotle, “Nature abhors a vacuum” somehow applies to OCD. I suppose your mind cannot tolerate an emotional state like fear, guilt and shame without having a thought associated with it. If one does not come from the outside, one will be generated from within.
Now I say this because for years I never knew that OCD was a recognized disease and was shared by others. Before I learned this, in addition to the horrors of my intrusive thoughts, I used to pile on to my malady even more guilt and shame.
Now I am not saying my OCD is no longer a problem, but at least I am not magnifying it with self-loathing.
I would love to hear other people’s comments on my theory of how OCD operates.
