i dont konw what to do.

[blah27e]

wel i have this ocd thing where i think about my eye somehow coming out, either myself doing it or by something else. sometimes i touch my eye, or even stick my finger in my socket but anyways, its not as bad as it use to be. im in a band and everytime i think about becoming famous and having lots of money,giving to charities,buying new cars, awesome house,pool,theater, all that stuff i get anxious and depressed because i start to think about the eye thing and want to give up because there would be no use. to be honest that happens everytime i think of something fun or interesting. its like im causeing my self to sufer and be depressed. i dont know what to do, any ideas?

[HM]

Hi blah27e,

I used to suffer from OCD, at times it was very severe. Some of my complusions also involved the eyes, similar to what you’re experiencing.

It’s very difficult to explain why I felt the need to ‘push’ my eyes. I basically had to have certain ‘thoughts’ at the time my eyes where pushed the farthest back in order for me to feel ‘OK’ and for the feelings of anxiety to subside.

To people who have never had OCD – that may sounds a little odd. But it’s a very distressing thing to go through. My compulisions had become so severe that I even risked damaging myself!

I know how desperate you can feel and how it’s difficult to envisage a future for yourself whilst feeling this way – but I want you to know that you CAN get better, and that there is a light at the end of tunel.

Don’t let this stop you from pursuing your music career. Or think that if your where succesful and famous, this would be tainted by the fact that your always going to suffer from this condtion.

I now only occasionally suffer from obssesive thoughts and complusions. Trust me, at one point I was as desperate, as desperate as it sounds you are and feeling. It felt like it would never go away - but now my OCD is so mild it doesn’t effect my day-to-day life at all. (I now suffer only from GAD and little bit of health anxiety recently but nothing as bad as the OCD)

I’m not sure specfically how I managed to overcome it, there is no easy aswer. I bascially had a lot of CBT theraphy, I took an SSRI called ‘Lustral’ in the early days (when it was particually bad) and tried hard to change my life and do things that made me feel good and forget about my condition.

Eventually, over the course of a few years (about 7), and once other stresses in my life subsided, it gradually began to reduce.

My advice to you would be to stay with therapy even if at times it may not appeare to be helping, to have faith in the medications you’ve been prescribed (assuming you have been put on drugs), and to also to work hard to get rid any other exterior stresses in you life that may be making your condition worse.

One other thing I found helpful was acceptance and openess about my problem. OCD caused me to feel very shameful, I was embarressed about what it made me do and also embarressed about the thoughts I was having that caused it. Talking to family members and close friends rather than hiding it did me the world of good.

It’s deffinitly not something you can heal on your own, you’ve got to talk to and trust in other people.

If you ever want to talk about this, don’t hesistate in sending me a PM. I’m no expert, but reading your post made me feel a sad because I can whole-heartedly sympathise with what your going through and I want to help in anyway I can, if it only be by offering you reassurance.

All the best

Harry

[Robbed]

You may not suffer from OCD per se. Obsessions are actually a rather common anxiety symptom, and do not indicate that OCD is the primary problem. However, most of the time, obsessions associated with general anxiety take the form of unwanted, repetative thoughts rather than ritualized compulsions. However, they are dealt with in exactly the same way: acceptance. Allow the thought about your eyes to exist until it just doesn't matter anymore rather than trying to fight it. Once the thought no longer matters, your brain will stop bringing it up. Also, this will help to reduce your overall stress levels, which will help to reduce your overall levels of anxiety (which causes this sort of thing to happen in the first place).