OCD: Self-terrorization

Obsessive-compulsive disorder is a debilitating mental disorder that impacts your life in ways that actually terrorizes you. The impetous of OCD is fear, which is possibly the impetous of terrorism. OCD becomes a form of self-terrorization.

Whatever it is you fear takes on a life of its own within you, like a virus affecting your mental functioning. You're constantly running from it.

The difference between a phobia and OCD is one of location.

A phobia is a fear of something outside of us, and we avoid it--a fear of heights, or crowds, or spiders, and so forth. As long as we can avoid it, we can function in a normal way. Of course, we're always only one step away from what we fear. The possibility of what we fear confronting us is always in the background--in the backs of our minds--so we're always on guard against it. But, as long as we're not in contact with it, we function pretty normally. When we come in contact with it, our fear erupts and takes control of us until we can escape the object of our fear.

OCD is fear not only of the thing itself but also of the thought of the thing. The thought of the thing and our fear of it become connected in such a way that the thought of it becomes it. Because we cannot control our thoughts, our thoughts take control of us and we react as if the object of our fear is actually present. We think about the object of our fear, it becomes present in our minds, and our fear erupts. We cannot stop it. Fear takes control of our minds and we begin the ritual of trying to rid ourselves of the object of our fear and fear itself.

Our fear is initially a form of self-protection. We need our fear or we will succumb to the object of our fear. But fear is also the basis of terrorism. While our fear serves to protect us, it also terrorizes us, and we are caught in a bind. The rituals we perform are self-protective, also, meant to remove the object of our fear from our minds. Our rituals are our way of dealing with this double bind.

All of this is disruptive to our lives, leading us to bizarre behaviors. We do not function normally. We enter a different reality until the thoughts of the object of our fear and our fear subsides.

Do depressed writers take their writing more seriously than the non-depressed?

In my opinion, writers suffering from depression do take their writing more seriously than the non-depressed. The depressed person probably takes many aspects of life more seriously than do the non-depressed. They tend to see the world in black and white terms. Or, maybe they are more deeply affected by various aspects of life. A person suffering from depression does not see the world objectively. He sees it in a very personal way--a negative way.

Some forms of depression can be combated with talk therapy, because the person's views of the world are warped by some kind of misconception. Clear up the misconception, and the depression clears up. Some forms of depression are caused by traumatic experiences that the sufferer has to work through to clear up the depression. The key is that, eventually, they both find relief. But the chronic sufferer of depression, the one who's disease is caused by brain chemistry, has a different problem. Talk therapy isn't going to clear up her depression. It may help her to deal with the depression better, but the depression will continue. Somehow, brain chemistry has to be improved, and only drugs can do that. But drugs which relieve depression have side affects that can be depressing in themselves (if not depressing, then aggravating.)

The writer may suffer any of these types of depression, which will affect the way she views her writing. The story can be an attempt to understand her depression without talking about it directly (she may not even realize she's suffering from depression). The writing becomes a kind of therapy, which may be successful in relieving her depression. Her entire writing career can be a method of dealing with her depression, which might save her from suicide. I think depressed people tend to be obsessive; for writers, the obsessiveness probably flows into their writing. If their writing is a form of therapy and the therapy doesn't work, they may see suicide as the only way out.