I'm sitting here and - quite simply - trying to decide what to say and how to say it. This is not the first time I've had to create a monologue in my mind - I've mastered the art of conversing with myself, plotting all the paths the conversation could go towards, creating multiple endings to the narrative. It's a tricky, yet somehow simple, topic.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

Those three words shattered my world apart, and I'm still - slowly but surely - gluing the pieces back together. It's something I've dealt with for as long as I can remember. Recently, I participated in a video documentation of various mental illnesses, sharing my story with a small pool of YouTube viewers. Although I remained anonymous, it gave me a bit more courage to share my struggle in a more direct way. Here.

It's an illness, something that doesn't go away. I will have OCD all my life; it's ingrained in me. Through exposure therapy, I am able to overcome my fears, but it's painful. Not physically, but mentally. I am in a much better place than I used to be. The truth is, I ended up leaving college for a semester because I was incapable of maintaining my health. I was drowning in depression as a result of this disease, and was barely maintaining normal physical behavior. Eating was a task, leaving my room was nearly impossible. I was scared of the world. That's changed over time, thankfully.

Something that people don't realize is that OCD isn't just a way to explain how "anal" or "picky" you are about something. It's an actual fear or obsessive thought. It eats away at your mind, redirects your focus from the more important parts of life like family, friends, and fun.

Please, if you don't have OCD, don't say you are "OCD" about something.

I’ve severed ties due to OCD, cutting off those who tried to be there for me and hiding the truth from them. I was scared I would be seen as strange or not normal; judgment often comes hand in hand with mental illness, whether it’s intentional or not. I chose to retreat to a very dark place inside myself, and it felt like I would never recover. OCD can be a lot to handle, and I shut out any help offered to me. I realize now how wrong I was to do so. You can’t do this alone; this is a mental illness that counts on you to isolate yourself. As I was once told, OCD is a bully. If you aren’t strong enough (yet) to tell it to back off, you’re going to need some backup. Tell your family and close friends. Go and see a therapist. It doesn’t make you weird, it makes you human. We all need a little guidance sometimes, and it’s absolutely okay to ask for it.

I remember sitting in a boring room with white walls, swiveling around in a smelly brown leather chair. My mom would sit in that room with me and explain to my therapist what symptoms I was showing at home. Shrinking into myself to avoid touching chairs and countertops, refusing to open doors, washing my hands until they bled. One time, as I stood at the kitchen sink and cycled through what had become routine, I heard my mom march down the basement stairs and shut off the water to the house. I felt helpless, cornered, with no way to escape my fear of contamination. Another time, well into the night, I was caught in the bathroom, fully clothed and drenched in water. I had felt that my clothes were dirty.

[Side note: by OCD standards, feeling “dirty” or "contaminated” does not equate to being a germaphobe. It can be a fear of contamination of sticky foods, such as syrup, or chemicals, such as windex. Anything can become the cause of fear for someone with contamination OCD. It manifests itself, hones in and latches on something specific, and although every person with OCD experiences fears of different things, the thought process is still the same. This is just for contamination OCD: there are many other forms, all of which can be just as debilitating.]

OCD is a way of thinking. What once was clean can be made contaminated in an instant. It travels from one touch to the next. In some severe cases, OCD minds believe that they can be contaminated through the air; I have felt before that what I was scared of being contaminated by could be airborne and reach me that way. It’s irrational, yes. Yet those with OCD, despite acknowledging the irrationality, cannot stop these thoughts. Not without help.

It’s a sick mind game. It’s almost akin to an addiction; without remediation, there’s no clear path to quitting. If you are struggling with OCD, or relate to any of what I said, I highly encourage you to seek help from a therapist. I’ve only touched on a few of the symptoms and experiences I’ve had. There’s so much more to this disease, and a lot of it is difficult to put into words, but you have to know that you are not alone. I’m living proof of that.

I guess what I want to say is this: OCD is real, it's challenging, it's life-ruining, but it's not life-ending. You can overcome it. You are stronger than it.

I finally did it. I am exposed. Even if it's just me that reads this, I will have jumped a major hurdle: I was not afraid to admit out loud that this is me, this is what I have, and this is what (no longer) defines my life.

If you have questions about my OCD or want to share your own experiences with me, send me a message. I'd love to talk!