The Boy Who Couldn’t Stop Bleaching

by Andy Behrman

It’s a snowy day. I’m trapped in my apartment in Manhattan – - bleaching the tub, toilet and tile floor in the bathroom.

I’m scrubbing like a goddamn madman until everything is sparkling white. Killing all of the bacteria in the small six foot by six foot room.

It’s not just that I’m a germaphobe or a clean freak. It’s just that I’m a certifiable obsessive compulsive. And I have been for years. I’ve been trapped in my apartment for three days doing similar neurotic things. I’m inside, ready to move on to the next task on my list (yes, I do keep crazy long lists of chores). It’s time to do the laundry. Actually, I’ve already done five loads and it’s only noon, and now I’m folding underwear, socks, t-shirts, jeans and towels and making perfect piles on the bed – the same way my father used to do when I was a kid growing up (yes, he is an obsessive compulsive too).

I spend the morning rummaging through my closets, throwing out all of my clothes that no longer fit or are the slightest bit worn or damaged. I’m obsessed with the idea of consolidating my entire wardrobe, and so make a list of all the clothing that I will donate to charity – jeans, pants, suits, jackets, sweaters, shirts and shoes. Everything else I will burn in a big public bonfire somewhere in Union Square.

I make a brief list of everything that I will need to purchase to survive in my new minimalist lifestyle: seven pairs of underwear, one pair of jeans, three t-shirts, one pair of shorts, one suit, one pair of shoes, one pair of sneakers and one jacket. Oh God, I feel cleansed. Relieved. Free. I head into the bathroom and take a half-hour shower and use a whole bottle of shampoo. I also attempt to use an entire bar of soap and lather my body, but it’s impossible to use the whole thing. I give up, but still I feel extremely clean. I scrub every part of my body, rinse and then dry off. Then I get out of the shower and shave and get back into the shower (a habit that I’ve had ever since I started shaving) and rinse off again. I dry off and put on my bathrobe.

I sit down in front of the computer and go through all of my new e-mails, answer them, and then delete all of the junk e-mails that have collected before sending out another e-mail to everyone on my mailing list. It’s just a short greeting, but enough to let everybody know that I am “alive and well.” (I question how well I really am).

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Growing Up with a Parent with Mental Illness

By Candida Fink, MD.

I grew up in a household with mental illness in a parent. The illness was never fully identified or named, yet it decimated our family life. I was enormously relieved to realize, over time, what was going on in my family when I was growing up. It helped me understand my parent more and to tell my family story in a way that is less judgmental and critical and more compassionate – toward my parent with mental illness and toward me and my siblings and my other parent. As a professional and as someone who lived with this, I feel strongly about the need for honest, open communication in families when a parent is struggling with mental illness.

The battle to fight stigma in the outside world is important but can’t be done without first facing it at home.

Growing up with a parent with mental illness impacts children at many levels, but too often the effects on children and the children’s responses are pushed to the side. Sometimes there is simply no time or energy left in the family system after taking care of the parent who is struggling with mental illness. More often, it is simply too hard and too scary to deal with.

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7 Ways to Keep Going

By Therese J. Borchard

A woman who lives with chronic pain said to my mom the other day, “You can’t sit around and wait for the storm to be over. You’ve got to learn how to dance in the rain.”

That’s a perfect description of living with depression, or any chronic illness. But what do you do on the days you don’t think you can take the pain anymore? When you want so badly to be done with your life … or at least be done with the suffering? What do you do when anxiety and depression have spun a web around you so thick that you’re convinced you’ll be trapped forever in those feelings?

I’ve compiled a few tools for moving past that harrowing darkness, suggestions on how to emerge from a place of panic, and techniques on how to dance in the rain.

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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #7

by Anonymous

Lesbians Everywhere: A gay spiker confronts her pure-O theme about getting an answer to her sexual orientation question

This particular tale of OCD begins with a crush on a boy named Sam.

I was a very happy girl. I was about to graduate at the top of my high school class, spent bags of time with my friends, and was enjoying my crush, of course. Sam, however, didn’t like receiving my attention as much as I liked giving it. About four months after we met, I heard from a mutual friend that Sam was gay.

I was a bit depressed and slightly embarrassed. Sam hadn’t turned out to be the love of my young life. Mostly, though, I felt relieved to know his true colors, and hoped that he (and I) would be happy with future boyfriends.
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #6

by Anonymous

From prisoner to gate keeper…A woman exposes her children to perceived risks so that she might liberate herself from the confines of OCD and pursue a career in psychology.

During my second pregnancy, at age 18, I experienced the onset of OCD. This 18 year time lapse is due to the following reasons. During this time period there was progressive expansion of peculiar feelings, fears and behaviors and I had no concept that these symptoms related to any disorder. I didn’t even know there was such a disorder as OCD. I thought I was overprotective (giving away my children’s puppy to keep them from harm), a worrier (spending fruitless hours problem solving what hazards threatened them), and a little off the wall (I wouldn’t let them visit friend’s houses who had pets).
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #5

by Anonymous

A responsibility OC combats her obsessive concerns for harming others while managing medical school.

I was born with OCD. My mother tells me that as a toddler I would pull out my hair. This was probably baby trichotilomania, which is associated with OCD. For almost 30 years OCD caused me mental anguish that I’m sure only few people can appreciate. My story is probably not an unusual one for sufferers of OCD. It’s replete with pain and confusion, difficulties with family and friends, and extreme fears that strike others as ridiculous and bizarre. Professionals misdiagnosed me more than once.
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #4

by Anonymous

I was a happy little baby until it was time for first grade. I woke up everyday with a knot in my stomach that was only relieved by vomiting. I was scared of the teacher, of my fellow students, and of doing poorly. My first obsessive incident soon followed, and although I don’t remember, my father tells me that I used to throw fits every morning because I could not decide what to wear. Dad took away all of my outfits except two and the problem was solved. Unfortunately, there was more to come, as I began to develop physical habits; I breathed strangely, I did things with my feet as I walked, I crossed my eyes and I made noises in my throat. I did these things because I wondered “should I make a noise?” Or maybe I shouldn’t make a noise. Do I need to make a noise? I would make one and feel fulfilled for about three seconds. Then the voices would return, and the process would continue every second of every day. My parents and I began therapy but only discussed my nervousness and my daily separation from my mother.
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #3

by Anonymous

I am grateful for the opportunity to give a testimonial about my therapy with Steven Phillipson. I’m not a person given to hyperbole. But to say that Steven Phillipson changed my life is no exaggeration. My big problem was responsibility OC: an intense feeling of responsibility for the safety of others (and myself). I would check kitchen gas jets countless times to see if they were off. I would warn family members and friends about possible adverse effects from illnesses or drug combinations — and repeat my warnings many times for fear they didn’t understand my point. I would feel an urge to call the city transportation department every time I saw a pothole or a broken traffic light. Of course I knew that my thoughts and actions were problematic and undesirable. But I was powerless to change course.
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #2

by Professor Mike

I am presently fifty-four years old and have suffered from OCD since I was fifteen. Although originally a native New Yorker, I have been a college professor in the Deep South for at least twenty years. During my life my OCD has focused on different issues: e.g., concerns about scratches on eyeglass lenses, whether eyeglasses were properly adjusted, wristwatch straps that might cut off circulation, inappropriate noises in the environment. This last concern became so severe that eventually chronic obsessing about the origin of neighborhood noises prompted at least one relocation.

I have seen several psychiatrists. None of these really offered a therapy that worked. I have tried the following drugs at one time or another: elavil, limbitrol, sinequan, Ativan, Valium, Xanax, Prozac, Zoloft. Although some of these drugs relieved the anxiety and depression which accompanied my OCD, none eliminated the root cause of my distress which were obsessive thoughts and rituals. They also had bad side effects. Currently I take no drugs.
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Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Success Stories – #1

by Margarita, a graduate of Dr. Phillipson’s Behavior Therapy Group

My OCD. This is how I refer to this “Disorder.” I put it in quotes because I have a very hard time accepting that it is a condition that I did not bring on myself. I mean, I always thought that my obsessiveness was me — brought on by me. But I guess it doesn’t matter whether it is a mental condition, or a way of thinking which became a habit. What is important to me, is that I take steps to change.

By steps, I mean risks. I learned of the concept of risk taking for treating OCD in my therapy sessions with Dr. Steven Phillipson, a clinical psychologist at the Institute for Behavior Therapy, in New York City. The key element of the treatment is learning to live with uncertainty. It is taking the risk of not ruminating (problem solving) about things that I am afraid might happen. If you will notice, most obsessions concern things that we are not sure about. For example, I can obsess endlessly about people that I think may not like me. The subjects of my obsessions are usually people I don’t know well but that I come in contact with on a regular basis (e.g. neighbors), so I could never really know whether they do or do not like me. With therapy, I learned to say “Yes, maybe the neighbors don’t like me, but I’m not going to take the risk of ruminating about it, and I will not attend to any other thoughts related to these people.”
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