If you are coming from Repression.Depression.Redemption welcome. I have started a new blog because I have recently come to the realization that depression has only been a symptom of what I now believe I've had for most of my life, Pure Obsessional Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. Pure-O is a type of OCD, one that manifests it's obsessions almost entirely in the mind. As defined by Wikipedia: "A person with Pure O experiences periods of intense rumination that are triggered by intrusive or unwanted thoughts, sometimes called "spikes.""
I've known that I've had a form of OCD since I was fairly young, I remember feeling compelled to jump over the shadow made by the fridge door as it passed me while closing, or compelled to swallow once for every on-coming car we saw while driving. But what I didn't didn't know was that every time my mother said it sounded like I was ruminating on a thought, this was Pure-O coming out, obsessions that had little outward appearance, but only existed in thought. Again, from Wikipedia: "To neutralize the perceived danger presented by the spike, the Pure O is compelled into rumination, an often intricate mental routine driven by a pressing need to "solve" the fear or uncertainty." I cried when I read this. Finally. An answer.
Recently I came off of Celexa, an SSRI for depression. I'd been getting a little frustrated because while I felt better on the Celexa there were a lot of problems I still couldn't shake. I tried taking St. John's Wort, thinking an MAOI might work better. What I didn't realize at the time was that the Celexa wasn't really helping with depression, it was helping with Pure-O. SSRI's help Pure-O, MAOI's as far as I can tell, don't. In the couple of months after coming off of St. John's Wort I felt myself becoming more and more paranoid, jumpy. It got to a point I felt like I was losing my mind, in a way I hadn't felt since the last time I went to the hospital. I kept have unpleasent thoughts about revenge. I couldn't shake them. I thought them through, I began to know they were not thoughts I wanted, but I couldn't shake them. I was obsessed. This went on for days and nothing was helping. Suddenly, in my ruminations, it hit me. I was obsessing on thoughts as I used to obsess about that refrigerator door shadow. I went online and did some research and discovered Pure-O. The more I read about it, the more I knew this was what had been vexing me my whole life. It wasn't depression. It was Pure-O.
Looking back through posts on Repression.Depression.Redemption convinced me of this. An example from when I went a month without pills because I couldn't track down my doctor: "It had been a month without pills and no paranoia... I quietly began hoping I had bested that part of myself. Other relapses had occurred, irritability, dark moods, but the paranoia had not yet surfaced. The paranoia is a tough one to beat. My heart picks up the beat, adrenaline kicks in. The phone rang yesterday and I jumped out of my chair, terrified of who might be on the other line. It was my best friend. That calmed me for a moment. I tried engaging as many people as possible. Isolation makes the fear grow. I felt the world closing in around me like I've not felt for some time. I did not believe any of what I felt the last two days. I knew it was my mind, not me. I knew things weren't nearly so bad as they seemed. But they were, in my head. It gave me splitting headache, the fear gave me nausea." Sounds exactly like Pure-O, unwanted thoughts were penetrating my mind. In a way I knew it, I just didn't know what it was called: "The black moods violate me. They violate who I am. They slander me. And they are not me."
I found this post particularly eerie in retrospect: "Felt a twinge of that old fear that comes up now and again within me the other day. It's something that to some point has always been there, and I've never known why. What was it in my childhood, infanthood (in the womb even?) that something caused the great fear, the paranoia? I've begun to wonder if it was ever anything at all. OCD is labeled an anxiety disorder. Of course, like with all mental illnesses/disorders, whether the chicken or the egg came first will always be the question. Did the fear cause the obsessive behavior, or was it in reverse? What caused what? We may never know." Now maybe we do. Here's more: "I feel exceptionally frustrated that I'm unable to articulate the fear. It's not an average or common fear, as far as I can tell. Especially because most of it is based on nothing. It's not fear of death, or getting into an accident, or losing a loved one. It's an indefinable fear. A psychotic fear? I almost fear that things are going to jump out at me from no where. What exactly I don't know. It's kind of a fear that the fabric of the universe is going to rip open and reveal some horrid universe." That was a fear I had forgotten about until I stopped taking the Celexa. Then it all came rushing back like I'd never had any therapy or treatment or anything. Like I went back to square one. Finally, it seems I was unknowingly dealing with it better at the time: "I can deal with it for the time being. I acknowledge the fear, and then give it no credence. Like John Nash in A Beautiful Mind, I too have learned to subsist on a mental diet. I indulge some appetites and avoid others. I do not know where the fear, panic, comes from (sometimes it's been so strong I feel I am not in control of my own mind), but I do know it comes and goes like the weather, and if I ignore it for long enough, it will go away."
In my research they give behavioral cognitive theory more importance than medication, though both are helpful. I think this is true. I've learned even now, not being on the medication at the moment as I wait for the St. John's Wort to clear my system, that if I acknowledge the "spikes" and refuse to act on it I don't ruminate and I eventually feel better. Trying to fight Pure-O makes it worse, and the more I tried to deny the thoughts and fears I felt the worse they got. To the point that I felt like a crazy person. But by focusing my mind and compartmentalizing the Pure-O I've found in the last couple of days I've been more productive than when I was on the Celexa.
In the coming months I hope to write more about my experiences and my successes and failures, and what I have learned.