This week is OCD Awareness Week, and here's a snippet from one persons account of their OCD:
OCD all started for me on Christmas Day 1980. I was eight years old and, after the excitement and over-indulgence of the day, vomited in the late evening. I recall my Mums' words very clearly; “you've eaten far too much and made yourself sick”. From there, I developed an irrational fear of vomiting. Every evening I would lie in bed waiting for my Mum to check on me so I could ask “I'm not going to be sick am I Mum? It's all in my mind”. OCD was born.
I look back on my childhood with sadness. A time which should be protected from fear. A time which should be carefree and without worry was a time of endless angst. I feared electrical plugs being left in and would sleep at night with the plug from my electric blanket against my face. It seemed the only way to be sure it wasn't still plugged in. I rocketed from one anxiety to another with no respite in between. Nobody recognised a child who was suffering. I was “just a worrier”.
In my late teens my anxieties receded. I was able to complete a psychiatric nursing qualification and met and married my husband aged 21. I secured a job and purchased my first house. Life was just as I dreamed.
And then OCD returned.
The fear of vomiting returned. I became preoccupied with the need to repeatedly check best before dates on food. I would seek continual reassurance from my husband that my meal was okay for me to eat. I lost count of the number of carefully prepared meals which had to be thrown away as the fear could not be quashed. I began to develop fears in my work. “What if I give someone the wrong medication”, “What if I give someone an injection which paralyses them”. The compulsion to check my work to quell my anxieties was overwhelming. I felt trapped in an endless cycle of anxiety, check, anxiety, check. It was exhausting.
It was in 1995 where I reached breaking point.
read the rest here
OCD affects about 750,000 people in the UK. For many of these, the fear of what others will think prevents them every telling anyone else, and stops them from going to their GP. Removing the sense of stigma will mean that 3/4 of a million people don't need to suffer in silence.
Short notice I know, but if you're one of my millions of Somerset readers (ok, you both know who you are) there's an event in Bath this evening. Other events later this week.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Mental Health: "Often the stigma is worse than the symptoms"
Following on from yesterdays piece, good to see Alastair Campbell supporting the Time to Change initiative that got £20m of government funding yesterday. Time for Change aims to reduce stigma and bullying around mental health issues. Campbell blogs "for many, this was an area where the stigma and discrimination were often worse than the symptoms, and that the campaign was focused on one of the hardest things of all – changing attitudes. Mental illness is perhaps the last great taboo, and we need to break it down."
The Independent on Sunday reported a survey of mental health sufferers, where 2/3 of sufferers said they found it harder to cope with other people's attitudes to their illness than they did the illness itself. One in 4 of us get hit by mental illness at some stage, but fear of what other people will say or think means that many suffer in silence. Occasionally someone will break the silence, but that still takes quite a lot of guts. Saying you get depression, OCD, panic attacks etc. should be as normal as telling people you've got the flu' or a broken leg.
Back in February Nick Clegg announced £400m of government money would go towards mental health, so I look forward to seeing where the other £380m is going to go. At the moment, this is pushing water uphill - the stress of redundancy, debt and economic uncertainty is massive, whilst those in work are putting in longer hours and wondering when their time will come.
But targeting the stigma of mental health looks like a good move. Normalising mental illness, putting it in the same social bracket as physical illness, can ease the distress of those who suffer. And with very few exceptions, my experience is that if you tell people what's really going on in your head, they may not completely understand it, but they do accept it.
The Independent on Sunday reported a survey of mental health sufferers, where 2/3 of sufferers said they found it harder to cope with other people's attitudes to their illness than they did the illness itself. One in 4 of us get hit by mental illness at some stage, but fear of what other people will say or think means that many suffer in silence. Occasionally someone will break the silence, but that still takes quite a lot of guts. Saying you get depression, OCD, panic attacks etc. should be as normal as telling people you've got the flu' or a broken leg.
Back in February Nick Clegg announced £400m of government money would go towards mental health, so I look forward to seeing where the other £380m is going to go. At the moment, this is pushing water uphill - the stress of redundancy, debt and economic uncertainty is massive, whilst those in work are putting in longer hours and wondering when their time will come.
But targeting the stigma of mental health looks like a good move. Normalising mental illness, putting it in the same social bracket as physical illness, can ease the distress of those who suffer. And with very few exceptions, my experience is that if you tell people what's really going on in your head, they may not completely understand it, but they do accept it.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Mental Health & OCD: Watching our Language
Yesterday was world mental health day, and this week is OCD Awareness Week. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is rated by the World Health Organisation as one of the top 10 most debilitating illnesses you can have. It affects around 2% of the population at one time or another.
a few links
on the role of churches in mental health, good piece from the Huffington Post.
A Mind campaign to tackle the stigma of mental health problems has just had extra funding from the government and Comic Relief
The MOD has just launched an initiative aimed at supporting those suffering mental illness as a result of war.
Good primer on OCD here, it's aimed at teenagers but pretty good for adults too.
BBC piece on how we use terms like 'obsessive compulsive' and 'schizophrenic' as adjectives for other things, often reinforcing mistaken views of what the terms mean, and what's involved in having these illnesses. A snippet:
The flippant use of such terms nowadays may offend some and not bother others. But such a dynamic is part of the words' evolution, says Joel Rose, director of OCD Action.
"Five years ago people wouldn't have known what you were talking about if you mentioned OCD," he says. "Now they have a sense of what it is about and use it, but don't really fully understand it. The next five years will be about working to fully educate people.
"What we want people to understand is how serious and debilitating OCD can be. We're talking about people who might clean a floor repeatedly for eight hours or someone who can't leave the house. It's not having a tidy house or arranging the tins of food in your cupboard. We also want to get across that it is treatable."
Indeed, many of those diagnosed with the condition have successfully learned to manage it. Overcoming its metaphorical use, however, may prove more difficult.
a few links
on the role of churches in mental health, good piece from the Huffington Post.
A Mind campaign to tackle the stigma of mental health problems has just had extra funding from the government and Comic Relief
The MOD has just launched an initiative aimed at supporting those suffering mental illness as a result of war.
Good primer on OCD here, it's aimed at teenagers but pretty good for adults too.
BBC piece on how we use terms like 'obsessive compulsive' and 'schizophrenic' as adjectives for other things, often reinforcing mistaken views of what the terms mean, and what's involved in having these illnesses. A snippet:
The flippant use of such terms nowadays may offend some and not bother others. But such a dynamic is part of the words' evolution, says Joel Rose, director of OCD Action.
"Five years ago people wouldn't have known what you were talking about if you mentioned OCD," he says. "Now they have a sense of what it is about and use it, but don't really fully understand it. The next five years will be about working to fully educate people.
"What we want people to understand is how serious and debilitating OCD can be. We're talking about people who might clean a floor repeatedly for eight hours or someone who can't leave the house. It's not having a tidy house or arranging the tins of food in your cupboard. We also want to get across that it is treatable."
Indeed, many of those diagnosed with the condition have successfully learned to manage it. Overcoming its metaphorical use, however, may prove more difficult.
Monday, October 10, 2011
Lessons in Forgiveness from Take That
I was struck by this part of an interview with Gary Barlow in the Radio Times, talking of the moment he and Robbie Williams decided to make up:
"..I was 38 and he was 34 – and it’s like, ‘Let’s talk this through.’ All those years I’d just imagined this moment to actually be sat there opposite this person who’d said so much worse than anybody else had ever in my life. Done so much damage and said so much bad stuff.”
To your face?
“No, that was the thing. Not to my face. In records and in print.”
What hurt him most?
“Nothing hurt me most, it was the way it was being done I didn’t like. And to eventually be sat there opposite the person was liberating. And you know what? A lot of people don’t get that chance; they spend their whole lives as enemies and don’t talk. So for me that was a victorious day. And we came back to it a couple of days later and did some more and then we were washed and we were clean.”
Fantastic. It's liberating to forgive, and to be forgiven. Heard that before somewhere... It takes courage from both sides to face up to things like this. I'm aware both of a need to deal with things from the past, but also of a fear which stops me from doing it.
"..I was 38 and he was 34 – and it’s like, ‘Let’s talk this through.’ All those years I’d just imagined this moment to actually be sat there opposite this person who’d said so much worse than anybody else had ever in my life. Done so much damage and said so much bad stuff.”
To your face?
“No, that was the thing. Not to my face. In records and in print.”
What hurt him most?
“Nothing hurt me most, it was the way it was being done I didn’t like. And to eventually be sat there opposite the person was liberating. And you know what? A lot of people don’t get that chance; they spend their whole lives as enemies and don’t talk. So for me that was a victorious day. And we came back to it a couple of days later and did some more and then we were washed and we were clean.”
Fantastic. It's liberating to forgive, and to be forgiven. Heard that before somewhere... It takes courage from both sides to face up to things like this. I'm aware both of a need to deal with things from the past, but also of a fear which stops me from doing it.
Sunday, October 09, 2011
A Tribute To Steve Jobs?
Fridays Guardian had a full page advert from Diesel, which read "The best way to forecast the future is to invent it. Thankyou Steve. Steve Jobs, 1955-2011" and ended with the Diesel logo at the bottom with a signature (the CEO?).
Is this....
1. Cynical exploitation of a mans name and death by a brand and a newspaper to make money/increase brand sympathy?
2. A fitting capitalist-style tribute to one of it's most successful sons?
3. Both?
Is this....
1. Cynical exploitation of a mans name and death by a brand and a newspaper to make money/increase brand sympathy?
2. A fitting capitalist-style tribute to one of it's most successful sons?
3. Both?
Saturday, October 08, 2011
Latest Revision to CofE Wedding Service
Hats off to the Liturgical Commission for being so up to date with this one
Friday, October 07, 2011
Thursday, October 06, 2011
Wikio Top Religion Blogs for September
Wikio have just put up their list of top blogs for last month, here's the top 10
1. echurch blog
2. Islam in Europe
3. The Freethinker
4. Thinking Anglicans
5. Bartholemews Notes on Religion
6. Nick Baines
7. Pete Saunders, Christian Medical Comment
8. Lesleys Blog
9. The Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley
10. Phil's Treehouse
You can find the full list here. The most influential blogger in this field, Cranmer, is missed off because it doesn't look like you can be in 2 categories at once, and he's mixing it with the Politics blogs.
Comments:
- This list is more diverse than it was a couple of years ago, when it was dominated by Anglican and Catholic blogs.
- Nick Baines seems to have replaced Bishop Alan as the chief blogger in the purple, which has resulted in various religious correspondents now having him on speed dial, just beneath Terry Sanderson.
- I've left Anglican Mainstream off the list, even though they're technically in the top 10, because it's not a blog. They cut and paste news stories from elsewhere and don't allow comments. At least Nadine Dorries writes her own stuff.
The ranking is mainly calculated by links from other blogs, rather than traffic, and you have to be registered with Wikio to qualify. So it's pretty limited, and doesn't register links from Twitter, Facebook or other social media platforms. But as the man says, life's complicated enough. If nothing else, it's a good starting point for discovering blogs you've never read before.
1. echurch blog
2. Islam in Europe
3. The Freethinker
4. Thinking Anglicans
5. Bartholemews Notes on Religion
6. Nick Baines
7. Pete Saunders, Christian Medical Comment
8. Lesleys Blog
9. The Beaker Folk of Husborne Crawley
10. Phil's Treehouse
You can find the full list here. The most influential blogger in this field, Cranmer, is missed off because it doesn't look like you can be in 2 categories at once, and he's mixing it with the Politics blogs.
Comments:
- This list is more diverse than it was a couple of years ago, when it was dominated by Anglican and Catholic blogs.
- Nick Baines seems to have replaced Bishop Alan as the chief blogger in the purple, which has resulted in various religious correspondents now having him on speed dial, just beneath Terry Sanderson.
- I've left Anglican Mainstream off the list, even though they're technically in the top 10, because it's not a blog. They cut and paste news stories from elsewhere and don't allow comments. At least Nadine Dorries writes her own stuff.
The ranking is mainly calculated by links from other blogs, rather than traffic, and you have to be registered with Wikio to qualify. So it's pretty limited, and doesn't register links from Twitter, Facebook or other social media platforms. But as the man says, life's complicated enough. If nothing else, it's a good starting point for discovering blogs you've never read before.
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