Silly brain
A poem about ocd + a sermon on purpose anxiety
I hate Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
I’m someone who can silver line just about anything. Give me long enough and I’ll tell some lovely little story about how I learned a valuable life lesson through it.
But OCD?
Nope.
I hate it.
It adds zero value to my life. In fact, it steals my life on a fairly typical basis. I was officially diagnosed a year ago. Yes, right when we were moving from Washington to an apartment in Salem. That was dumb. I made the appointment out of desperation. But the last thing I needed in the middle of a stressful summer were more letters to add to my health chart.
Looking back, I’ve been wrestling with OCD for years. Like so many others, I thought it was just anxiety.
When I learned OCD’s been ranked by the World Health Organization as one of the top ten most debilitating illnesses in our world, my whole body agreed.
If one more person tells me, “Well, we’re all a little OCD,” I’m going to scream.
No, we are not.
One may like a clean surface or triple check a door is locked. Another may hate germs or prefer an even number of steps instead of odd. But a diagnosis of OCD requires the presence of obsessional thoughts and/or compulsion that take up more than one hour a day, causes significant distress, and impairs work or social functioning.1
I’m still trying to find the words to describe OCD in essay form and they rarely come to me. But once in a while, a poem does.
To any of my beloved readers who struggle with anxiety, especially the kind that traps you in loops of ritual and relief, know my brain journeys with you. Here’s to committing to treatment and doing the work to heal our brains. It’s honestly been the hardest healing work I’ve engaged thus far.
Future me keeps saying it’s worth it.
someone said
your brain doesn’t know
you have ocd
it only knows
what’s scary
based on how
you actproblem is —
my brain made connections
she believes are rock solidit takes ridiculous effort
to believe this is true
when my body screams
at me the oppositebut i don’t want to
be sick anymorei want my life back
so i say yes to
terrifying exposures
walking right into
the fear on purpose
and breathing through
the awful anxietyall so i can be free
Thinking about leadership this week
Most Sundays of the year someone hands me a microphone and I tape it to my face.
Ready or not, a few minutes later I best be ready to have something to say.
Some days this feels like a glorious and humbling privilege.
Some days this feels heavy and overwhelming.
I’m thinking today about the responsibility and gift of leadership in this season.
Sometimes we see a few steps forward. We can point ahead and invite many to join.
Sometimes we have zero clue where this thing is going. But we know and trust others around us have an inkling of a next step.
As our country (again) faces unprecedented times, may Love guide us forward.
She knows where to go.
Books
A sermon about purpose anxiety
Purpose anxiety describes the negative emotions and distress that people feel when they’re struggling to find meaning in life.
Author Liz Gilbert puts it this way: "Our culture sends this message all the time at graduations and inspirational speeches that everyone has one special gift buried inside them. Our job is to uncover what it is. A thing that only we can do. Then we’re supposed to spend our life becoming the master of that thing. We become an expert and rise to the top. Then we monetize it and professionalize it so it can provide for our family. We must do better than our parents. We must leave the world a better place. Our purpose and special gift must also uplight people. It must save and rescue them. This is the groundwater of our culture. It’s inhumane, life-destroying philosophy."
Jesus offers us far better wisdom than purpose anxiety. Could it be enough for God that each of us would be and do what we love?
https://www.psychiatry.org/patients-families/obsessive-compulsive-disorder/what-is-obsessive-compulsive-disorder#:
Are there medications for ocd ?