Date:   3/20/2008 11:10:01 AM ( 16 y ago)
Hits:   11,440
URL:   https://www.curezone.org/forums/fm.asp?i=1136428

I really need help. I'm 19 and I have had OCD for around five years now,
along with many other medical problems. It really seemed to start
with my meniere's disease, which started when I was 13, and got progressively worse from there. a teacher that was sort of a mentor to me had passed away from a sudden heart attack the year before, and that had a bad effect on me too. I think the vertigo (caused by the meniere's, the room seemed like it was spinning for 6-8 hours at a time and I kept throwing up) almost drove me crazy. I started panicking about my parents or family members all the time, worrying about them getting hurt while they were out and I had all these rituals to keep them from getting hurt, even though I knew it was nonsense I had to keep doing it. Over the years my obsessions and compulsions have become way more subtle and in some ways worse, I am always counting every step, breath, movement, the number 5 is a "bad" number, etc. It's really driving me crazy. The strangest symptom I have (I have never told anyone any of this, by the way) has to do with my hands; whenever I hear a song that I love or a person that I love speak, only my second and fourth fingers can touch my palm (I know it sounds crazy, and I hate it) so that I do not stop loving it/him/her. I have all these stupid rules about my hands. I know that it sounds absolutely ridiculous but I don't know how to stop. I think I might have "pure o", I'm always worrying, all the time, and sometimes because of this my thoughts get into a really bad "looping" mode for lack of a better term.. the nonsense phrases I keep repeating mentally now.. there are just so many things I could list. I feel so horrible as well, my health is in a very bad state and though I have accomplished a lot despite being sick I am very depressed, I just want to stop it all and feel lighter again. I have extremely loud and constant tinnitus, and sometimes it feels like I just can't think at all. It's very hard to get to sleep, I'm a really bad insomniac. I feel like I'm stuck and I don't know how to help myself, sometimes I worry that my mind is never going to be the same, my body is always sore, and I've lost a lot of the hearing in my right ear to Meniere's. I just don't know what to do. I've tried talking to my parents about the OCD before, but they seemed to think that it would just go away (my mom told me that the counting is "normal") and I never told them about my symptoms in detail. sometimes I pick at my skin, sometimes I can't stop pulling out my hair. I feel like I'm at the edge of my sanity. We moved to this new city about a year ago, and I'm so lonely. The past 2 semesters (both of high school and university) I have had to drop out of, and restart, because I have been unable to keep up with my work (I can't concentrate at all these days, and my health is very bad.) I am afraid to go to a psychiatrist or psychologist because I am not terribly comfortable with the idea of taking the medication that they sometimes prescribe; I did try an antidepressant a few years ago, for the depression, but I was very put off by how it made me feel. Is there anything else I can do? I really need help but I don't know where to go. Sorry this post has been so long..
 

<< Return to the standard message view

fetched in 0.02 sec, referred by http://www.curezone.org/forums/fmp.asp?i=1136428