A two-month summary of my absence

Well, here I am again.

It has been a couple of months since I last posted a blog entry and I feel that it is time to reapply words to describe my experiences with obsessive compulsive disorder. But, firstly, I should perhaps explain a little of why I have been absent for so long.

I have been plagued by an intermittent internet connection problem for the last 5 years that has become an absolute nightmare to work with. I have contacted my provider approximately 50 times in that time period and it still has not been sorted. Maybe that rant is for a different blog but the problem has still prevented me from connecting with those of you who read my words, whose opinion and support I value, and my ability to reciprocate on your blog posts.

My main reason for not writing though has been this.

Shortly after I last posted back in January, I got incredibly frustrated by my lack of progress as it seemed that each day I was taking steps backwards towards the darker period of my life from which I was trying to escape. I was beginning to be plagued more frequently by the terrible images, ideas and thoughts, and my compulsions developed into increasingly complex ritualistic behaviour.

Basically my new start to the new year wasn't going as planned.

So I decided to take action and chase up my treatment sessions that I had been waiting three months to start to see when I could finally begin my course of cognitive behavioural therapy. After making an initial enquiry with the receptionist, not even a minute later, a therapist contacted me to say that I was next on his list to make an appointment with.

Call me a cynic but that did seem like a little too much of a coincidence.

But, giving benefit of the doubt, contact was made and arrangements were discussed and, after what had seemed like an age of waiting, I was finally scheduled to discuss OCD with the guidance of a professional.

So that, in a nutshell, is why I have been absent. My full concentrations and efforts have been focused on trying to make progress by carrying out experiments, reading the literature that we have been working with, trying not to spend too much time alone and overall, just trying to get past some of the thought patterns that have caused me such misery and subsequent compulsive actions.

Now that I have arrived at this point some two months and nine therapy sessions later, I feel that maybe I have come far enough to sit alone at my computer with the strength to fight my compulsive urges that used to strike with intensity whenever I was on my own.

So far so good.

But there is still a long way to go on my journey and plenty for me to share with you, both what I have learned so far, my realisations, and what I hope to be able to achieve.

So, here begins my personal tale of therapy, of how it has helped me and developed my understanding of OCD, and how a couple of short months have made a world of difference (internet connection dependent, of course!).

If you have not yet enrolled in a course of cognitive behavioural therapy, or even been diagnosed with OCD, then I thoroughly recommend that you do as I sincerely wish that I did some 15 years ago, a period of time that OCD stole from me during which I only existed as a fraction of myself to how I wanted to be.

Don't make the same mistake that I did.