January 2012
10 posts
Old diaries
A few days ago a friend read me some of her old diary. The events she had written about against the backdrop of the school year were mainly parties, boys and fallings out. It was wonderful and strange to be reminded of the things that happened when we were 16 years old.
I thought back to the diaries that I have managed to keep with the most diligence. One of these was a food diary from the year...
Driving lesson
I am terrified of driving. Partly this is because I am uncoordinated and so in my thus far brief attempts, I have really struggled. I also struggle somewhat with ball sports and dancing. My mum thinks that this is not all about my lack of coordination but rather about my unrealistic expectations for how good I should be at something the first time I try it, a characteristic she claims I have had...
Sh** people say about OCD
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=It3N_-yKwdw
I’m sure I’m not fully aware of all the possible reactions that people have to OCD because (if you can believe it) it isn’t something I often bring up in conversation. I could think of three broad categories or reaction: people who claim they have it too but who really don’t (the most common), people who struggle to hide their...
Thoughts on OCD/childhood sensitivity paper
I have read the paper “The relationship between sensory processing, childhood rituals and obsessive compulsive symptoms” by Reuven Dar*, Dennis T. Kahn and Ran Carmeli published in the Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry. The studies carried out could be improved but regardless, based on my own experience, I am not all surprised by the conclusions drawn. As a...
Sherlock Holmes detects when it started to go...
I said I wanted to convey how a world can fall apart. If it is ever really possible to pinpoint when things started to go wrong, looking back, for me in my most recent episode of OCD there is an incident that stands out because it came so out of the blue.
Christmas 2010. I was at home here in Edinburgh for the holiday, mostly studying for my exams back at the university in Greece. One evening...
What is hypochondriasis?
According to Wikipedia:
“Some people suggest that hypochondriasis is a “mild form” of paranoid schizophrenia, as patients tend to show a paranoid framework in which the target is their body]]. Also, the persistent paranoid feeling about illness can be regarded as delusion from reality.”
There is no source for this and in my brief attempts to gather further information I...
Neurologist (Doctor 1)
When I was very ill I saw a string of doctors and psychologists. As I believed that there was something terribly wrong with my brain, I started with a neurologist.
I was living in Greece and my parents took me along to the local private hospital, where you could pay a reasonable sum of money to talk to a neurologist for an hour. The neurologist was kind. She spoke English. She must have been in...
Stubborn/contemplative?
I have been contemplating the quote in the previous post quite a lot. Being stubborn is a complaint I have had levelled against me enough times that I can’t put it down to coincidence (I also have to doubt that many people consider it a virtue). But where does stubbornness come from, and how does it sit with contemplativeness?
I would like to be able to say that I become stubborn about...
“I think the reason it’s hard to put [this blog] into your voice is...”
– my friend
Trip
I have just come back from a 6 day trip to NYC, visiting a college friend whom I have not seen in over a year. They say that people often find trips a let down because they somehow expect to leave themselves and their troubles behind but soon discover that this cannot be done. I’m pleased to say that, although indeed this could not be done, it did not make my trip a let down.
There was lots...
