The Escape Route Is In The Words In The Pages Of My Latest Read - How else do I escape the world where OCD exists?

The last few mornings I have grudgingly pulled myself away from the cosy bed covers and quickly pulled on my fuzzy bathrobe and slippers. The air is getting cold and fast!

Motivation to do anything especially while being under the early influence of Fluoxetine with its horrible toll it has taken on me *Damn you side effects! Damn you! You make me dizzy, you give me headaches, or was that from me walking into the door last night on my trip to the bathroom?*

They should market these pills as an effective diet pill of all things. I have lost my binging rights and my real hunger for food. Ignore me in the same way that my real mind does. Believe me for it is much better that way!

Anyways. The side effects have been relentless. I try to get up to do something -- anything but I soon find myself sat back down waiting for the opportunity to present itself when I can lift myself off of the couch and get back to dusting and the other mundane but important to my ocd tasks of the day.

I did find the motivation this morning to do the task of rearranging the bookcase. No motivation was actually needed because I can often be found in front of it with stacks of books all around me and a notepad, to write down any titles I forgot that I had. Somehow I rearranged it with room for at least another 15 maybe even 20 books to fit in. Okay, that might just be a really bad calculation paired with excitement and I am likely to find that I can only fit another 10 titles in there before it becomes crammed. Will I find that out after my excitement fades or when I find myself with 20 new books to add and where I am left with half with nowhere to go.

Hoarding books is excessive - possibly. Rearranging the book case - excessively - yes - constantly.

On a high note today, I am pleased with my latest purchase of Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. I am in love with the price tag of £1 and I am looking forward to reading it but only after I have finished The Diary of a Young Girl and then I may attempt my second hand copy of Claudius the God and His Wife Messalina by Robert Graves. I am really looking forward to it after I finished I, Claudius but it may be on the back burner if I can't bring myself to pick it up and open the pages. I am tempted to buy some latex gloves but then I read that they become porous after 20 minutes of wear. I know that I would be better off to face the fear but it is crippling me. It is a goal, let us finish at that!

The fruits of my labour. Don't be fooled, there is
a second row of books behind each shelf!

If only I could lay in bed and read for the day
-- But I would only fall asleep despite how
much I am enjoying the book!

  

Hello Fluoxetine, My Name is Margaret - Can we be friends?

Last night after my usual bedtime routine I sat down on my side of the bed. Glass of water on my night table and the box of 30 capsules. Slowly I took one of the pills out of the packet and even though it took me a few minutes of staring at the red and yellow capsule and thinking to myself 'is this really what I want to do?' I did it. I just did it, I had to do it. My OCD is relentless and it has given me no other choice. I am not longer going to look at the medication as a 'happy pill'

With nothing but my thankfulness to another blogger for her kind words, her view of the medication and I quote off of the comments page
''I will tell you one thing though... in my experience my meds are not happy pills. They are "help me move the thoughts along pills." I still feel depressed, sad, happy, silly-- everything I used to feel. The only difference is that instead of an OCD episode knocking me out for a few weeks, I only suffer for a few days and I can handle and identify the symptoms better to help myself more during those few days''

I don't think anyone has said anything as frank as this about the pills. It gave me a different way to look at them and without it I don't know how much longer it would have taken me to get there. I don't care what my past therapists think when it comes to their disapproval of OCD sufferers speaking to each other, without those other sufferers I would be in a much worse place then I already am. No one knows your OCD like another sufferer.

So here I am, glass held up with another pill to take tonight ''here is to good mental health and a way forward'' It is all gradual steps and this is one step that was gradually taken but better late then never. I am in no hurry to get back into treatment. I want to try this approach with the medication first and to at least find a way to help myself before I ask others to help me. Treatment is hard. I wouldn't put anyone off of going for treatment but I think that I just wasn't strong enough to cope with the demands but when I am strong enough to cope with the demands of treatment then I can see it being successful. Until then, I have a book called 'Brain Lock' by Jeffrey M. Schwartz that may be helpful. It is also a second hand copy and that alone is something that I have trouble handling and breathing once I open the pages are not only difficulty from a panic attack but I become too frightened to breathe in case I breathe in the germs off of the pages. I have not been to a library in over 2 years. 2 years of books that I could have borrowed wasted. I would have had to move on to another library to get my fix.