The first time I was “diagnosed” with OCD, it wasn’t by a psychologist.
In my grade nine creative writing class, I’d written a poem about feeling socially anxious, and what that looked like. I wrote about how I would leave class multiple times an hour to compulsively check my appearance, how I felt like I needed to check my phone, and the paranoid thoughts that just wouldn’t stop when somebody was looking at me. My creative writing teacher returned that poem to me with a comment about how it was “a wonderful description of living with OCD.” I thought I was describing your typical teenage social anxiety–she apparently disagreed.
I laughed off her comments quite quickly, because at 13, my perceptions of mental illness were almost entirely based off of TV, movies, and a few books, and I did not meet the expectation that any of those sources presented about OCD.
TV Mental Illness is very different from Actual Mental Illness, but at the time, I was pretty unaware of that. TV Mental Illness has a spectrum, with some illnesses being better than others. There are Good Mental Illnesses, like anxiety and depression, which lazy writers use as a character trait. Invariably, anxiety and depression are attributed to the (usually female) love interest, who is generally very pretty and very white. Her depression and anxiety are cute little quirks, something she needs to be “saved” from, something that makes her “beautifully broken.”
Next up in TV Mental Illnesses are the Bad Ones, generally schizophrenia and psychosis. These are what lazy writers use as plot device, because it’s nice and simple to say that the bad guy was schizophrenic and that’s why he did it, while conveniently ignoring all the actual realities about schizophrenia and ignoring the fact that people suffering from it are not serial killers!
And then, last but not least, is TV OCD. This is the illness given to the quirky background characters, you know, the obsessive clean freaks and germaphobes. And so, with this very comprehensive knowledge of mental illnesses, my teacher’s observation that the symptons I wrote about sounded remarkably like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder was easily brushed aside. I mean, I couldn’t have OCD, my bedroom was a mess.
(Comic by Susie Campbell)
The next time I was “diagnosed” with something was when I was 16, when a school counsellor spent three minutes listening to me describe how I felt before saying it was just simple social anxiety, and that maybe I should try meditating. This made a lot of sense to me, because I still didn’t really understand what mental illness was. I was known at the time for always wearing heels, always having perfectly done nails (Lies. I’m actually a compulsive nail biter, those nice shiny ones were always fake.) and being an excellent student who did a lot of volunteering.
Basically, I looked like I had my shit together. Probably because of the heels, I’m great at walking in them. However, while I looked and sometimes felt like I had it together, I really didn’t. Maddening thoughts would get into my head and refuse to leave:
Did I lock the door? Check for the 5th time, just in case.
Is my heater off? Better wake up in the middle of the night, just to be sure.
Does everybody secretly hate me? Yes, of course, stupid question.
All day these kind of thoughts would go around in my head, and yet, I happily accepted the idea that I just had “social anxiety” because it was easy and because it made me feel normal. I was not a ‘crazy person,’ a clean freak who couldn’t leave their house, a person speaking to people who aren’t there, or a depressed loser who laid in bed all day. Were my thoughts on mental illness deeply rooted in stigma and ridiculously problematic? Absolutely. And so, I tried to meditate, to eat a bit better, to volunteer more. I was not one of “those” people, and it would be easy enough to feel better.
Spoiler: A mental illness does not go away just because you think positive and eat a lot of fruit and do breathing exercises.
At 17, I started university. I had graduated high school with honours, had my first year paid off with scholarships, and had even made a local paper for my humanitarian award. I was so ready for university! Except, the campus was huge, there were people everywhere, I had just broken up with my long term boyfriend, my family had just left my childhood home, and every single thing in my life felt upside down and scary.
(Aw, Rubytec made a picture of me when I started university!)
First semester, I was surrounded by high school acquaintances. They went to fun parties every weekend, loved their classes, took cute pictures around our scenic campus, and just generally seemed very happy. I was not happy. I spent most of my first semester having panic attacks in washrooms, feeling so nauseous I could barely eat, and spending all my free time in bed. I became one of “those” people. It fucking sucked. What about all the meditating, the volunteering, the fruit?!? None of it mattered, and I felt like I was losing it. More than that, it dawned on me that, maybe I hadn’t really had it at all. Maybe this wasn’t a sudden surprise attack of awful feelings and compulsions and anxieties; maybe it had been coming for a few years now. I booked an appointment at the counselling center.
This time, the diagnosis was real, and it didn’t feel like a slap on the face. When the counsellor told me I had OCD, I felt relieved. I had a name I could attach to the bad feelings, and, more importantly, I had a treatment plan. First, we tried Cipralex, and group therapy. Some people love Cipralex, but for me, I felt like I wasn’t even myself, everything was blurry. The group therapy didn’t do much, because I wasn’t really there. And then, we tried Sertraline (brand name: Zoloft) and cognitive behavioural therapy. I started to feel happy, something I hadn’t genuinely felt in years, and slowly, I got better. Day by day, I began to feel like I was at least a little bit in control, like I was at least sort of functioning. It felt great.
(I love this comic. Also, this artist is great and draws a lot of cats.)
OCD, like other mental illnesses, is not something you cure. Rather, it’s something you manage. This looks different for everybody, and what helped me feel better might make somebody else feel awful. But here’s the thing: I believe everybody with a mental illness, including myself, needs to reach out. To get help, and to feel like mental illness isn’t some horrible and shameful thing to go through.
The idea that mental illness is a character flaw, something that can be done away with by thinking positive and living well, is complete and utter bullshit. Society has come a long way in regards to mental illness, but we still have so far to go. I still see people sharing posts shaming those on antidepressants, suggesting that people taking them are weak, and that isn’t right. When I take my pills, it’s the same as a diabetic taking glucose: we are both treating a health issue. And when I see a therapist, I am not paying to whine about my issues, as some would suggest, but rather to take control of my mental health and work through problems. By no means do I want to suggest that all people with mental health issues need medication and therapy, that’s just my path. But I do absolutely suggest that in 2017, we lose the stigma that still surrounds mental illnesses.
People with depression are not beautifully broken; people with OCD are not “crazy clean freaks”; and people with schizophrenia are not violent nor scary. We need resources other than lazy TV writers to provide information about what mental illnesses really are, and we need to teach young people in particular that they do not need to feel ashamed about it. Medication, therapy, and other methods of treating mental illnesses are all valid, and different approaches work for different people. But telling somebody to “think positive and eat clean” is in no way helpful. Mental health is real health, and people with mental illnesses are not defective, lazy, frightening, or any of the other awful stereotypes associated with mental illness.
My name is Alexandra. I walk in high heels like a boss, I am a great student, I actively volunteer in my community, I have a steady job, and every single night, I take my anti-depressants, because I have OCD and they allow me to achieve what I am capable of achieving. I have OCD, a mental illness that I take medication and see a therapist for, and I am just as smart, witty, beautiful, and capable as anyone else. I have OCD, and I will not hide it away like some dirty little secret, because my mental illness isn’t something to be ashamed of.