OCPD: Giving My Thought Three Lives
Just a quick review: delaying my bedtime (see article 1) is a conjunction of many factors: biological because I am not physically tired until late at night, because my brain is more active and efficient in the evening (or at night) and because of the habit of going to bed late which creates a routine for my body; psychological because I have come to love and even prefer the evening-and-night part of the day through, I suppose, certain emotions, attitudes and behaviours. Up until here everything is in the realm of normalcy. What becomes a deterrent though is when I delay not because of those biological nor psychological factors, but because of OCPD (see article 1).
So there it is, this bothering thought. Most people would not be aware of that thought or would worry a bit about it but then forget it. However, Mr. OCPD does quite the opposite: he focuses on that thought!
I could try to go to bed thinking “Well, it bothers me but it’ll still be there tomorrow anyway so I can just go to bed and carry on, status quo will prevail”. I could even dismiss the thought by thinking “How does that particular thought change my life? In no way does it change my life” or “Is the thought of the clot life-threatening or dangerous? No. Does it therefore have an incidence on my life? No.” But no, somehow I have some kind of magic (negatively magic!) thought that dictates that this thing that bothers me should just not be there, it should go away. More precisely, I should somehow get rid of it before going to bed. What?! Just like a daily task that you would cross out on your list once accomplished? “Done. Cured!” Well, I agree with you; nonsense!
In general I can however forget that dysfunctional thought (more precisely refrain from focusing on it) during a certain period of time. I can do my work and carry out all the daily tasks; I can live a normal life. Nevertheless it seems as though those disturbing thoughts are always there in the back of my mind, watching “over me”. I feel as if I always push those thoughts away for a little while and concentrate on what I have to do, only to see them reappear some moment later. I would just like to live without even having to push those thoughts away. In other words, I would want these thoughts not to even cross my mind; I would want to be enjoying my activities, daily tasks and outings to the fullest of their potential while they are happening.
So what makes up an OCPD thought? The layers upon which a thought is built are, according to my observations, threefold: physical, psychological, and metacognitive. I label them as layers or even “lives” because the thought over the course of time does not necessarily “just exist on its own”: we grant it lives; the thought acquires different layers. Let’s use an example: the dandruff that I see on my shoulders is annoying, to the point that it prevents me from carrying out my work. So first, there is the physical fact: I have dandruff, which really does exist, and it is indeed excessive as I am able to verify “objectively”. In other words, a physical condition exists and is not the figment of my imagination. This is already a indicator that I am not dealing with pure OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) as I do not have severely irrational beliefs; for example thinking that I need to wash my hands in order to prevent the death of someone in my family.
The second layer that my OCPD thought will acquire is the psychological layer which evolves from its first, physical, layer. It is this psychological aspect built upon the physical aspect that is actually the layer that initiates the dysfunction. For example, I have excessive dandruff and it bothers me; it bothers me though to an extent that I am unable to work properly. The reason is that I attach to this thought psychological factors that are detrimental: “What if people see my dandruff?”; “I should have worn a pale shirt instead of a dark one”; “I really hate to see the dandruff falling down on my desk”; etc.
The third and last layer added to that OCPD thought is its metacognitive aspect, in other words the fact that I am aware of that awareness, that I am aware of this “weird” thinking process of mine: I am stumbling upon some specific thoughts to which I am now devovling all my attention; or the fact that I have been thinking about it for 13 minutes now; that I have been quite anxious this afternoon; etc. We might be inclined to think that the second layer is the most destructive one as it is the truly OCPD-dysfunctional one, the one where the thought acquires its negative elements. However I have come to realise that the third layer, the metacognitive aspect of the thought process, can be just as or even more destructive. When during an “OCPD attack”, I start being aware that “I am not normal” and that it’s really weird to be doing what I’m doing at the moment and thinking what I’m thinking at the moment, well let me tell you that it surely does not help me recover from that attack; it just worsens it. And when that happens, you’re not even thinking of the dandruff anymore; no, you’re thinking of your erratic thinking! And the longer you think about it, the more you become distressed. It can escalate and escalate in an exponential manner, which in turn makes it even more difficult to reconnect with reality as you sink further and further into your OCPD- attack.
Hence to sum up, my irrational thoughts build upon real, not imagined, situations. Therefore I know that it is not OCD. But then what about Body Dismorphic Disorder (BDD) ? I do indeed incorporate some elements of BDD in my condition but again, it is not pure BDD (I will explain why in a more detailed article on BDD vs. OCPD). When I am bothered by my assymetrical chest, I know that something is wrong with my thinking. Yes I somehow wish my chest would be symmetrical but at the same time I know that asymmetry is totally normal as nature does not necessarily respond to the laws of mathematics as we humans do. I know that my wishful thinking is nonsense and dysfunctional and I will not change any of my behaviours in such a way that it will fit my mental scheme. In other words, I will not buy myself some weights and start weightlifting just to make my right “breast” as big and symmetrical as the left one. Nor will I modify my habits. I am luckily able to keep that dysfunction to my brain! Again, my OCPD thought does not evolve from a purely irrational belief (eg. seeing a “fat and ugly” body while it is actually skinny and not ugly). In my case “the physical defect does actually exist”: I do have a breast bigger than the other; I do have an excessive amount of dandruff; I do have a clot in my right earlobe; I do have a belly. It does however share commonality with OCD and BDD by the degree to which those defects worry me…