Walking in the Shoes of OCD

My husband and I created a little something in honour of OCD awareness and inspired from the Christmas season for Dr. Baer's website. Check it out  here

Below is the response I posted on a local radio's Facebook page regarding the Target sweater controversy. I have OCD.   I wholeheartedly embrace humour. Heck, I make jokes about my OCD. I make jokes to bring some lightness to a disease that can be so debilitating. People often say "I'm soooo OCD" because they enjoy a clean house or they enjoy having things in order. OCD is not about enjoying having things in order. If there's enjoyment involved, it's not OCD. OCD involves intense emotions like fear, guilt, regret and anxiety. People do compulsions in attempt to find relief from the torment they are experiencing. In reference to the Target sweater, I've noticed a lot of people saying things like "get over it," or " i t's the Internet. Everyone is going to be offended by something." To me it's not about being offended. It's about feeling passionately about raising awareness regarding a mental illness that has many stereo...

It was a typical morning, feeding the cats and eating my oatmeal.  Typical, until I read a text from a friend reporting on her journey. I've witnessed the overwhelming doubt that has thrown her off balance. I've witnessed her adjust to situations, adapt to the cruel yoga poses assigned by OCD. Her text that morning was an example of her maneuvering into a new pose, a pose that worked for her.  So I grabbed a pen and notepad and scribbled this out:  Doubt was known to topple her, the unsteady territory of courage revealing cracks in her armor.  She feared the Richter Scale as fragments of hope shattered around her.  With the dulled glimmer that remained, she mapped out blueprints to board up her soul.  But she never let it become an earthquake.  Beside the dictatorship of doubt lay a fighter. She didn't need the armor.  She was the armor.  I later realized I also wrote it for me . How is ...

Having OCD used to be my dirty little secret. No one could know. No one would understand. I wish I had known about OCD Awareness Week. The International OCD Foundation (IOCDF) got the ball rolling in 2009. We were past MySpace by then. Maybe Twitter had taken the spotlight. How long have hashtags even been a thing? Was it too early for worldwide trending topics? Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake definitely hadn't done this yet. OCD Awareness Week may have began in 2009 but it took years for the power of social media to send me the memo. So let's use our imagination to re-create a new 2009. Let's pretend I was a pioneering Tweeter and hashtags were as common as periods and commas; let's pretend I saw the hashtag #OCDweek while crammed in the OCD closet; let's pretend it helped me feel less alone; let's pretend the shame dissipated earlier; let's pretend I chose to disclose earlier; let's pretend I received treatment earlier. We may have to prete...

I am lucky to have wonderful in-laws (yes, it's possible.)  They visited my husband and I this weekend. It's become their tradition-the Canadian Thanksgiving Trek (except this year they were rebellious and came a week early). The visits are always pleasant but also tough. No, not because of them. I assure you they've got the parent-in-law role down pat.  Why are they tough?  Take last year, for example:  When heading out, I'd wait for Brandon and his parents to be ready to open the front door while I did a frantic scan to make sure our cats were safe and not about to book it into outdoor turf.  Anytime they'd use the washroom, I'd try to casually saunter upstairs to make sure they closed the door afterwards so our cats wouldn't get into something and die.  Brandon's dad joked that I hid things. He'd place a half eaten chocolate bar down and I'd swoop by to store it in the cupboard to prevent feline death by chocolate.  Y...

I first tried meditation when I was around 8. My mom brought me to a meditation guru who assigned me a mantra. What's a mantra, you ask? He advised it was a word to focus on while meditating. It was meant just for me but in the spirit of challenging magical thinking, I'll let you in on the secret: eng. The sound "eng" said in a slow and ceremonial way. I didn't like meditating. But I did it for my mom. I was a  responsible child. My mom tells me stories of how I'd unpack my backpack upon returning from school to get started on my assignments. Never once did she have to ask whether my homework was completed. It was done before dinner. I meditated as the responsible 8-year-old I was but I hated when she meditated. When she meditated when I had friends over, that is. If my friends and I had to maneuver through our home, it often involved walking by my meditating mother. I felt mortified that they would get a glimpse of her in an upright, stoic position, ey...

Beyond the Doubt , a Facebook page, recently posted quite the gem of an article which you can find by clicking  here But I've summarized the meat and potatoes: The Intolerance of Uncertainty Scale was created back in the nineties by a Canadian psychologist who refers to a higher score as a "cognitive vulnerability." This, more specifically, was my favourite quote from the article: [The psychologist] compares extreme intolerance of uncertainty to an allergic reaction. "If you’re allergic to nuts, and you have a piece of birthday cake that has a drop of almonds in it, you have a violent physical reaction to it,” he says. “A small amount of a substance that’s not harmful to most people provokes a violent reaction in you. It’s like a psychological allergy. What a find! Like mining for metaphors! I recently had allergy testing and watched as hives transpired across my forearms (please excuse the veins.)  Side note: I posted this photo on my Instagram ac...