I did hide myself away in the kitchen the entire time, even after the meal just trying to focus on the clean up but the main thing is that I was out and staying relatively calm enough through out the evening.
So today it was another doctors appointment. Once a week every week says it all doesn't it? severity and all. I felt slightly pressured though to give the medication a try so I now have a prescription of a months worth of fluoxetine. Whether I start taking it is another matter. I am not keen at all and my monster of ocd is just filling my head with a ton of nonsense and I am aware that it is just that but I have moments where I give in, give it some thought then I start to obsess and then it cripples me some more.
Other than the medication the actual appointment went alright. The doctor seems alright but I don't know how keen I am with her, with being really persistant on me taking medication. I don't think that I want to take it. ugh, when the decisions in my life revolve around pills I must be mad! as mad as a hatter! Clean cup clean cup move down! Why is a raven like a writing desk? Careful, She is stark ravin' mad! Well, after this I should think nothing of falling down stairs.
Keep us updated on if you decided to take the medications. Sometimes it can do wonders, but its not for everyone. :D
ReplyDeleteI tried SSRI's for several years and none of them helped at all. I finally resigned myself to the fact that I have to do ERP in order to get better. Now that I am at that point I WISH I could just take drugs that would make it all go away. ERP is HARD. But it's worth it. Good luck with your decision.
ReplyDeleteI find that staying busy in the kitchen with dinner prep and clean up is a great way to deal with anxiety over social situations that involve certain members of my family. Somebody has to do the work and if I do it, I have a great excuse not to put myself in potentially toxic social situations.
ReplyDeleteAbout meds. Just to give you some background...I have many many manifestations of OCD-- I think I am currently, have been in the past or have potential to be everything OCD but a hoarder. I've got germ issues, checking issues, scary intrusive thoughts, scrupulosity, magical thinking, counting issues, bodily compulsions, lots of phobias, compulsive cleaning, organizing and errand running issues and the list goes on and on. It took me until the winter of 2009-2010 to finally see what medication was all about. I was 31 and finally felt I couldn't do it alone anymore. I was so scared and cautious about trying meds-- for years I refused to even consider it. My doctor knew of my fears and so she started me with Buspar on a very small dose (7.5mg) and my doctor and I gently worked me up on that med until I got to 30mg for the generalized anxiety. Then after a few months we added Lexapro (an SSRI)-- again we started very small (5mg) and now I have worked my way up to 30mg. And now I've got the Vistaril for sleep and day time panic/anxiety symptoms. All the meds my doctor selected for me are non-addictive. I don't think I'll ever want to take a tranquilizer because of my family history of drug addiction. The Vistaril that I take to calm me down is actually an old antihistamine that has secondary use as an anti-anxiety med.
Each time I introduced a new med into my regime, I was very fortunate to notice immediate benefits. The meds have been miracles for me.
I can happily say that taking medication was one of the best things I have ever done for myself (along with starting Cognitive Behavior Therapy). I often wonder why I was so resistant to the meds for most of my life. What they do for me is help my thoughts move along. Sure I still get stuck and ruminate, I still get anxious and depressed BUT the difference with the meds is I am able to move on much faster and shorten the duration of the suffering. A typical OCD attack that used to take me close to a month to "get over" and even then not really get over, well, now it takes me just a few days.
Good luck with trying the meds and do report back about how you feel on them.
Elizabeth-
http://babysteppingit.blogspot.com/