When I am under stress I get OCD symptoms. I think I probably met the criteria for the disorder when I was in junior high, but things have mostly been better since then. Sometimes I would need to work at pushing back the intrusive thoughts like "the-kids-will-all-get-lead-poisoning-it-will-be-your-fault" in order to deal with the actual painters, but I could do that. It was helpful to learn that scrupulosity is a religious flavor of OCD; it explained a lot and helped me to let go of some groundless anxieties. Like I said, things were mostly better.
They are not currently better.
The last time I felt remotely like this was early 2009: I was newly postpartum, Stella was tiny, and I wasn't sure if I would be able to finish a PhD while also being a competent and engaged mother to five children. I am generally more bothered by the O slice of OCD, the intrusive thoughts, than by the C slice, the compulsion to complete an action. I've had issues with both, but I'm more of an O girl. After Stella was born the intrusive thoughts were all about her: "it-would-be-so-awful-if-you-put-the-baby-in-the-oven" "please-don't-put-the-baby-in-the-oven." I was not experiencing anything like psychosis. It was just jarring and awful and unreasonable and repetitive. I called a counselor.
I only saw her for a few sessions, but she was very helpful. She said, "What if you don't try to fight your anxiety? What if you just sit with it, while not giving it too much weight? What if you imagined that the voice behind your worries and intrusive thoughts had a name? What if you said to yourself, 'Oh, that's just Susie, and she always sounds like that'?"
Things got better.
But this is a bad season for people with tendencies toward anxiety and OCD, and I am struggling: unusually jumpy, unusually weepy. Today I joined a lunchtime Zoom meditation session that my university was offering, but I left it in tears in the middle. They asked us to think about someone dear to us, and I thought of my Alex. He feels so far away right now. I am SO SO GLAD he and his friends left NYC to hole up in upstate joint social isolation, but I am still pretty worried about him. Today's intrusive thoughts: "if-he-died-how-would-you-get-his-body-back-for-burial?" "he-used-to-have-asthma-so-he's-higher-risk-than-most-young-adults" "if-he-died-in-New-York-he-would-die-alone."
Because we're still figuring out exactly how COVID-19 spreads, there's a lot of dubious information floating around. I think it's probably the OCD talking when I repeatedly consider putting the newspapers in a 200-degree oven for 30 minutes before anyone is allowed to handle them. I think it's probably overkill to leave the groceries out in the cold for a couple of days before bringing them in. (Though I've seen that advice in a lot of places. Does that mean no one is buying ice cream right now?)
This morning when I woke up I had a momentary surge of certainty. We do not know what life will look like on the other side of this pandemic, but God does. He loves us and wills our good, and we can trust him. Things went downhill from there, but I'm grateful for that flash of knowing. I'm grateful that Sunday's gospel will be the story of Lazarus. "There will be a stink," they cautioned Jesus. But he doesn't need us to tell him that death is ugly. He loves us; he is with us in our suffering; he has authority over life and death. I believe that.
But Susie, who has been mostly quiet for a long time, has morphed into a 60-foot tall fanged version of herself like the main character in the children's book Frankenstella. Susie is pretty loud right now.
One of my best Susie-shrinking strategies is an early bedtime, so I am going to call it a night. I'd appreciate your prayers, friends.
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