I didn’t want to die

There’s hope as long as you haven’t tried everything.
And you haven’t.

Link to OCD Conference Video

I only wanted to satisfy my really physically strong compulsion to jump from a window, a train platform or a roof in order to stop the recurring intrusive thoughts, images and movies of crashing my car that played constantly in my brain. I cannot say it any plainer. Or any more plain.  Or plainly. I’m a writer so you get all the options.

I did not want to die. I was not suicidal. Although I literally at times felt I could not continue and often felt no interest in continuing because the quality of basic daily activities of working, commuting, socializing, eating, engaging and sleeping were increasingly compromised. To the point they affected my ability to do things I wanted to do.  Even little things.

It’s confusing because it is confusing. Intrusive thoughts of violence, harm, death, suicide – they sound suicidal, right? But I didn’t want them to happen. I just thought they were inevitable and so I was trying to just get it over with already. If that makes sense. I was frustrated to the point that I couldn’t do anything but try to end it finally.

But when I was finally treated for intrusive thoughts, I got medication and treatment that almost completely stops the thoughts. Almost completely to the point that the rest is pretty eff-ing manageable.

That is why I keep urging you to keep trying to find more helpful descriptive wording to convey what you are experiencing until you feel that doctors and your health advocates and support system understand what you are actually experiencing. Suicidal is not necessarily the same as intrusive thoughts of killing yourself. And the treatment can make a big difference. I am proof. And I can even believe I can say I am HAPPY to report that. Yeah. It makes me happy in an uninterrupted way.

I am happy and I can feel it.  Not every minute of every day. I didn’t discover something magical or illegal. I just discovered effective treatment for my worst symptoms of a condition I never knew I had but really suffered from.

And you might be able to get happy too.

If you haven’t tried everything, there’s still hope.

I’ll add the link to the video above as soon as it’s outside the paywall. It was for the 2023 Online Conference of the International OCD Foundation 

xoxoxo, d and bell