Trying to find a balance.

[MelRoseGarten]

Hi everyone! New to this website/community, this is my first post. I’ve had intrusive thoughts and compulsions for as long as I can remember, although I wasn’t officially diagnosed until I was 16...I’m 35 now. I recently had a baby girl and I’m happy to say that my mental health is very good at the moment.

A little background about my mental health:

My OCD has an inverse relationship with my depression; when I’m down, I don’t have the energy to obsess, and when I start to feel better, my OCD comes on pretty strong. It’s a Catch-22. It’s very black or white/ all or nothing. I don’t live in the gray area.

For instance, my entire life prior to my pregnancy, I was “obsessed” with my appearance- literally!

I spent most of my waking hours staring into a mirror, inspecting my face, body, and hair. That’s where the majority of my obsessions lived. I spent too much time, too much energy, and worst of all- too much money- on “perfecting my appearance”.

When I got pregnant and started gaining weight, I couldn’t watch my body change and continue to care about my appearance so much, so I went the opposite direction and really let myself go.

I ended up gaining 100 lbs! My thought was “if I’m going to gain weight anyway, I might as well eat whatever I want!” (Obviously not a healthy way to think).

I’m wondering if anyone else has a similar experience with an “all or nothing” way of thinking.

I’m trying to be okay living in the gray area, not to have such an extreme way of thinking.

Thanks all!!

[Hidden]

I would like to invite you to the OCD Support Network.

We are here to help and offer hope.

We are in this together.

[sligoguy]

Great to hear you are in a nice place at the moment ,I find my ocd acts up when I'm down ,and is quiet when I'm up ,if that makes sense ,,keeping busy and not dwelling or checking is the way to go for me ,,so enjoy your new arrival and for sure you will be busy with all that comes with a beautiful new life in the world

[Luna-blade]

Hey hope you’re doing better. I used to be obsessed like you with my looks. I have pure ocd but my obsessions are doubts about my appearance though I’m nice looking. That’s what I have been told many times and that’s what my mirror mirror on the wall told me 😂😂😂 it’s like I have lack of confidence about my looks stemming from low self esteem probably from childhood. This causes me obsessions that whenever I see another woman prettier than me or that what my ocd tells me, her image haunts me and my mind haunts me with jealousy and I end up having panick attacks. To calm down I have to take a tranquilizer and start praying to divert myself from the obsessive thought. I hate ocd altogether. It’s an invisible war between a person and their mind. Once my psychologist told me that what I feel is all part of my pure ocd and the fact I’m aware of my involuntary jealousy and I judge it to be bad means it’s all related to my ocd not to me as a person or character. In short, I think childhood education is the basis for preventing any mental illness from developing if one is prone to it. I’m 40 now still struggling with pure ocd changing meds struggling getting sick of life and myself hating myself altogether but I still have hope that nothing lasts forever!! Stay strong!

[LuvSun in reply to Luna-blade]

I can relate a lot with what you said

[MelRoseGarten in reply to LuvSun]

It’s nice to talk to people who understand

[MelRoseGarten]

Thanks for your response. It def helps to feel less alone. Nobody else in my family has these feelings. My husband tries to understand, but it’s a foreign concept to him. He is as supportive as one can be though, so I’m definitely lucky!

[micaylam]

I relate to this so much! I was 16 as well when I was diagnosed with OCD and I have struggled to find balance in all areas in my life...I always wondered if my OCD had something to do with it! When I was eating "healthy" I was on a 1200 calorie or less diet. Super strict. Then one day I would crack and just spend the next few months eating whatever I wanted, healthy or unhealthy, I didn't care. Oher times its my hobbies. When I'm working out, I need to work out every. single. day. And each day more intense to feel better. But then I crack and just stop working out for months at a time. I cannot find balance in anything! I'm always going from one extreme to the other. I envy people who can just eat a little dessert than stop, have a workout a few times a week and not feel guilty for skipping a day. Any advice on how to find more consistency? I've been to a phycologist and she was helpful, but anything else I can do?