What’s It Like Living With Obsessive Compulsive Disorder?

(On Mental Health Awareness Day, we are bringing you stories of those who are living with Mental illness and how they battle with issues every day)

I was asked to write this article on Wednesday morning, with a deadline of Friday night. Here I am, at 10 pm on Friday, finally getting started. From the moment I had this task assigned, up to now, I’ve spent all that time, over 40 hours, thinking, do I actually know about the very thing I am diagnosed with?

Like sure, it has been debilitating often, it has hampered my work and relationships badly and has a part in maintaining a poor self-image, but, do I REALLY know what it is like?

With time and a little research, I was able to pair my experiences with clinically vetted statements.

From making detailed notes to thinking about the narrative I’d put forth (and doubting it), to cleaning my room and the house while thinking about compulsions, (ironic sigh), to setting up my room, space and things I’d need to write this article, you should get a good idea what a need to control the outcome to the last detail seems like. That is the heart of OCD. A need for control.

Over two years ago, I was at one of my busiest, and also the most suffocated of places in life. I had a full-time teaching job, I was part of two bands that gigged around regularly, I was composing on commission for two college-choirs which I also had to travel a lot to train. I was at a tender stage in my own musical learning and was studying (trying to keep up really) with everything. Around the same time, people in my family were struggling with physical and emotional health. Everyone was hospitalised at some point that year except me. I was also in a relationship where it was getting difficult for me to maintain even basic lines of communication.

While trying to keep up with all of the above, I was perplexed by the constant anxiety, incessant intrusive thoughts and a few compulsions. I could not trust my own instincts, could not accept myself as anything less than the ideal person I tried to be. I was confused and frustrated, tired and sad.

After doing so much I still felt powerless. I wouldn't take decisions that would be in my self-interest, because I thought that would be selfish. If I don't do the things that I can, the bad things that happen because of me. (Thank peter parker/tom holland for that line). I was always running around to hold up a big tent of my image to others where I felt the insides were hollow.

That need to take care of the things for everyone left me in a cornered place, unable to get out from the weight of my assumed responsibilities.

I knew I needed help, and I started therapy after a tough few months where I dealt with a break up in addition to all the above. It was then, that I realised how much OCD (and anxiety) actually affect my every waking moment and plans made therein. Everything from driving, teaching, music practice, performing, I was obsessing over something going wrong. Or trying to control everything I could and couldn’t to prevent that from happening.

Obsessions ruled my head for most of the day, Worried about my work, family, finances, health etc. I hadn’t normalised my own sexuality, which led to very distressing obsessions.

I’d obsess over sitcoms and project heavily, feeding a saviour-image, Projecting my experiences on the narrative depicted. Clinging to the ideal.

While teaching I often felt powerless, I thought that I’d be incapable of making the student understand that concept because I am not skilled enough.

I thought a lot about my perception in other people's heads. Analysing every single thing from a facial tick to a sigh or an eye roll and what that meant.

I also thought “no matter what I do, my life is unsalvageable, I will always be lost because I am powerless, unable to control anything.”

My OCD is mostly “O” or obsession based.

I did have some compulsions, for instance after having driven for a few minutes from my home, I’d stop midway and check my bags for things I might have missed even if was getting late, I’d walk back to the car after locking it more than once to check the locks/ unlock then relock the doors. I couldn’t enjoy reading or even read when I had to study because I’d read a section again and again and again till my head started hurting from the stress because I wanted to make sure I understood what was written there to the deepest extent I could.

For this article/blog, I was worried I'd tell my own story wrong, so I researched a bunch of things, went through two years of my therapy notes to see where I started and what I went through because that fear of telling things wrong or not remembering important things made it difficult to remember ironically.

The lockdown brought out different sides of OCD I had not experienced before. I’ve had tinnitus since the exact moment they started banging pots and pans for the doctors (who then the government completely forgot but ok). I didn’t clean as much before but after a week of sneezing due to the dust in my room, I went on a cleaning drive, cleaned my entire floor thrice in the first few months of the lockdown, every square inch I could.

Now I clean when I’m in emotional distress, trying to get back control of my seemingly falling apart life.

After channelling that anxious energy into cleaning I am too tired to think of anything else, still sad though. My body pains, I develop thick calluses on my hands, had to take ice baths because my body hurt so much.

I understand I come from a place of privilege in more ways than one, I am a somewhat upper-caste – cisgender heterosexual male with a stable roof and sustenance/income and the things that I need for my work. Even then, many days, I struggle to do the tasks I need to do for the day. I wake up in fear, fear of everything I have to do in the day. I sleep in fear worrying about things that would go wrong in my sleep and mulling over how I am unworthy for not doing everything I should have.

That guilt drives the compulsive actions. Why didn’t I do that thing when I could have when it led to bad things. Like perhaps I could have saved my father (passed away in 2012), if only I had gotten him to the hospital on time.

It takes a heavy toll, on the mind and the body.

Everyone has anxiety about something or the other, OCD makes it an entirely different hell, obsessing over the worst of things, Unwanted thoughts making you question your moral integrity, compulsive actions draining your life energy.

Sometime last year, I was in a cab and not in the driver's seat as usual where I had to be in control. I looked at the route I drove through every day and I couldn’t recognise it. Like sure, you can’t be looking at trees when you drive but it made me realise how much of those things I missed, or didn’t experience, because I was so fixed on controlling the outcome.

It was a question of being comfortable and experiencing life for what it is, vs being safe and in control.

Taking measures, obsessing over different things, things that could go wrong, and what I'd do if they did go bad.

Comfort vs safety.

Beginning the climb out of this pit began with self acceptance, something I work on every day. It helped me realise where I am, and stop trying to stretch myself past the breaking point while trying to achieve an unrealistic ideal self.

Understanding that when life is scary, it is OKAY to be scared and at that time realise/recognise that I have some resources to deal with the situation and some I don’t. It is okay to not control everything. A true measure of strength isn’t avoiding a breakdown due to fear, but falling into the pit and getting out.

Even If bad things do happen, learn from it and move on while realising that it will not destroy you or your prospects for everything.

Adjusting expectations, setting realistic goals has helped as well. Trying to focus on the process itself and not on the outcome has helped immensely. Because the destination is actually a very small part of when compared to the Journey entirely. It needs to be appreciated.

Feelings (of fear) aren’t here forever, they are not all-pervasive. And that’s where OCD comes from, Fear. It also becomes a fear of fear, and then a fear of fear but you see where this is going.

Meditating has helped me ground myself and be aware of my thoughts with a bit more space and perspective/clarity. Therapy has helped me work out a lot of issues stemming from a troubled childhood and a dysfunctional environment. Music has helped me find a way to express my feelings.

Maybe life isn’t that scary.

Like my piano teacher says, “It’s always going to be two steps forward and one step back, it’s still progress. “

I was asked to write this blog on Wednesday morning, I started at Friday night, and here I am finishing it at 6 am. Trying to control the narrative as much as I can while trying to tell you to let go of control.

Guess I still have some work to do on that score.

(Abhishek Gogna is a Musician based in Gurgaon, presently working as a part-time educator. He also holds an undergraduate degree in Physics.)