Too Perfect Tuesdays - Chap 7 - The Thinkaholic: Worry, Rumination & Doubt

from Flickr via Slideshow Bruce

This post continues with The Thinkaholic: Worry, Rumination and Doubt from Chapter Seven.

This series looks at a small snippet of The book on the Perfectionist Personality, aka The Obsessive Compulsive disordered Personality, aka OCPD, each week. Please follow along, leave your comments, engage more on the FaceBook website... whatever your heart calls you to do.

Too Perfect, When Being in Control Gets Out of Control by Allan E. Mallinger, M.D. and Jeanette DeWyze was published by Random House in 1992.  If you believe you are dealing with OCPD or someone who is "Too Perfect," whether that's you or a loved one, please buy a copy of the book and read it for additional insights that will not all be covered in these excerpts.

The Thinkaholic: Worry, Rumination and Doubt

Imagine yourself pedaling down a bike lane that runs beside a country highway. The morning sunlight warms the earth, and colorful flowers scent the air. But even in this rustic locale, traffic streams by. At times farm vehicles lumber beside you, filling your head with their noise. Faster-moving cars whiz by, and you can hear their whining engines far into the distances. Only for a few brief moments do you have the road to yourself, and only then can you savor the breeze, or hear the birds sing, or revel in the power of your hardworking muscles.

For many obsessives, life is a little like that journey down the country road. A steady stream of worries and painful thoughts distracts them from life's joys. In a sense, they think too much: it's nearly impossible for them to turn off the flow of concentrated observation, analysis, and reflection. "My mind is a regular worry machine," one woman said. "Sometimes I'll churn through every conceivable aspect of a problem, then I'll tell myself, 'That's enough,' and will try to shift to something more pleasant. A few minutes later my thoughts have crept right back to my worries. It's as if worrying is as automatic as breathing, something my mind keeps doing, no matter what."

Worry and rumination have few redeeming qualities. Once something bad has happened, Ruminating over it only prolongs your pain. And worrying is at least as pernicious. If the object of your worry doesn't come to pass, you've suffered needlessly. And when misfortunes do occur, they will be just as irritating or devastating as they would have been even if you'd spent more time enjoying yourself and less time worrying. Worries trade chronic misery for the pallid hope of being a little less devastated.

***

I have a friend, who I've suspected of being a little OCPD (and another friend, who I also suspect of having OCPD, who argues that I am now seeing OCPD behind every bush.  She may be right.)

Anyway, Friend A once confided in me that whenever things were going really great, whenever he was in the middle of a terrific love affair or party or even a movie, he would become quite sad, because he would begin thinking about how it couldn't last.  He would start obsessing about how it would end, how things would go wrong... He couldn't let himself be in the moment and enjoy what was happening right then.

I found this terribly sad; still do.  There's a saying, "Don't borrow trouble, the interest rate's too high."  Or the Bible, Matthew 6:34: Do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Let the day's own trouble be sufficient for the day.

We're human, we do worry.  We do sometimes look behind us and play the game of what-if - as if, had we done something different, the outcome would have been better (could've been worse, too, we have no way of knowing).

But it's like being on that country road, after the farm vehicles and the cars have gone by, and instead of noticing and appreciating the flowers and birds and fresh air, we're stuck churning over what it looked and felt like when the cars were crowding us.

Trouble will come - and it will go, and it will come again.  We don't have to live in "trouble-mode" all the time.  That's a choice.

Me, I'd rather smell the roses.

Your thoughts?

Too Perfect Tuesdays - Chap 6 - When the Guards Come Down & Becoming Less Guarded

Source: shannondarrough.com via Jackie on Pinterest

This post continues with When the Guards Come Down and Becoming Less Guarded from Chapter Six.

This series looks at a small snippet of The book on the Perfectionist Personality, aka The Obsessive Compulsive disordered Personality, aka OCPD, each week. Please follow along, leave your comments, engage more on the FaceBook website... whatever your heart calls you to do.

Too Perfect, When Being in Control Gets Out of Control by Allan E. Mallinger, M.D. and Jeanette DeWyze was published by Random House in 1992.  If you believe you are dealing with OCPD or someone who is "Too Perfect," whether that's you or a loved one, please buy a copy of the book and read it for additional insights that will not all be covered in these excerpts.

When the Guards Come Down

Though most obsessives have trouble trusting, depending upon, and revealing themselves to other people, no one ever completely avoids any of those things.  No matter how capable we are, modern life forces us to depend upon one another for such necessities as food, education, medical care, and much more.  Some dependencies are so inescapable and routine (e.g., having to get water from the city water supply or bottled water vendors) that most people, obsessives included, don't think much about them.  However, when circumstances arise that persuade one to acknowledge dependency in a new area - to consult a doctor, for example, or seek help from an accountant - anxieties may arise.  Discomfort also results when some normally suppressed feeling, such as anger, suddenly surfaces.  <snip>

Guarded obsessives commonly view any betrayal of their trust as conclusive "proof" that their original guardedness was justified.  "If I have a friend, and he tells even a small white lie or is even slightly dishonest, I say 'Aha!  He lied!  That proves I can't trust him.'  I subject him to unreasonable standards.  He has to be one-hundred-percent trustworthy of I don't feel I can trust him at all."

Becoming Less Guarded

Becoming less guarded is not something that can be "worked on" all alone, in the privacy of one's study.  For all the pain it can cause, a pattern of interpersonal guardedness is extremely difficult to change, and such change must take place within living, breathing relationships.

• Remind yourself that no one and nothing can be one-hundred-percent dependable.  Other people - less obsessive people - understand this and still manage to trust and depend upon one another.  Do you tell yourself that's because they just aren't as smart as you, that they simply don't see the risks or appreciate the dangers?  Do you think they'll all be sorry someday?  It's not that these people don't don't see the risks of opening themselves to others.  Instead they know that many of the best things in life - such as a send of connection and closeness with other people - are worth the risks.  

• Don't be tripped up by your tendency to think in extremes.  No one is suggesting you should share intimate confidences with every stranger that you meet.  A reasonable amount of discretion will provide you with some protection from hurt, rejection, and exploitation.  But when it comes to guardedness, there is a middle ground, and people who find it are less lonely and isolated than those whose protective shells are too thick and hard.

• Try to be conscious of the fact that your guarded behavior is likely to cause the very rejection, isolation, and unloved feeling that you fear.  Realize that other people are very apt to misinterpret your guardedness, taking it as a hurtful indication that something in them is causing you to hold yourself at a distance.

• It takes determination and patience to become less guarded.  Prepare yourself to see changes occur slowly.  In individual and group therapy, guarded patients will sometimes begin this process unwittingly by revealing emotions in a "weak" moment.  At such times they often feel humiliated and frightened.  Sometimes they weep.  But then they usually realize that nobody has rejected them.  The world goes on.  In fact, the others, sensing how difficult it is for them to open up, often respond with special empathy and warmth.  Over time, the guarded person gradually is able to reveal more and more of the real self beneath the facade - the spontaneously experienced feelings and thoughts.  And often, for the first time, he or she begins to experience what it's like to feel truly understood and still cared for - something that never before seemed possible. <snip>

***

Some of us chatted about this online one night, about how unless you live in a cave or shack, Unabomber style, you're dependent on all kinds of people.  I think I'm safe in saying no one is reading these words on a computer they built by hand of components they personally mined from the earth, with electricity likewise generated by a system they devised themselves.  (And even if they did, who's providing the Internet connection, hmmm?)

Source: 25.media.tumblr.com via Kara on Pinterest

On the rare occasions my ex revealed a fear, a hurt, or weakness, I felt so much closer to him, while his guardedness made him feel distant.  His anger and disappointment at my failure to be perfect, which he used to justify why he couldn't trust me, I found crazy unrealistic.  For example, if he felt a need to rant until one o'clock in the morning, on a night when I had work the next day, and I told him him I had had enough and was going to bed, he felt I had failed him, didn't care enough about the relationship.  See!  Betrayal!  Untrustworthiness!

If you are looking for reasons not to trust someone, and you look long enough and hard enough with a virtual magnifying glass, you will find imperfections.   With OCPD, there's a very appropriate verse from the Bible about removing the beam/log from one's own eye, before trying to locate the speck/mote in another's.

I've blogged about this before, but because my ex wouldn't open up, because he was afraid I would hurt him, and he'd end up alone, he pushed me away.  And... ended up alone.

If he had been willing to put in the very long, hard, scary work of letting down his guard, would thing have been different?  Maybe not, if he didn't address all the other OCPDnesses that killed our relationship.  Or maybe, if he'd let his guard down, he would have been able to see them.

Your thoughts?

Too Perfect Tuesdays - Chap 6 - Guarded with Money & Guarded Against Spontaneity

Image by epSos.de via FlickrThis post continues with Guarded with Money and Guarded Against Spontaneity  from Chapter Six.

This series looks at a small snippet of The book on the Perfectionist Personality, aka The Obsessive Compulsive disordered Personality, aka OCPD, each week. Please follow along, leave your comments, engage more on the FaceBook website... whatever your heart calls you to do.

Too Perfect, When Being in Control Gets Out of Control by Allan E. Mallinger, M.D. and Jeanette DeWyze was published by Random House in 1992.  If you believe you are dealing with OCPD or someone who is "Too Perfect," whether that's you or a loved one, please buy a copy of the book and read it for additional insights that will not all be covered in these excerpts.

GUARDED WITH MONEY

I find that many obsessives harbor a fear of being exploited financially - one component of an overall tendency to be guarded with money.  Frugality may take many forms, including the following: 

• A reluctance to spend money on anything but true necessities.
• The need to get the very best buy - regardless of how much time and effort are expended in shopping for it.
• A reluctance to disclose how much was spent for something - either because someone might judge that the buyer was "taken," or think that he had a lot of money and an easy life, or that he had been unduly extravagant.
• A refusal to make personal loans - or, if a loan is made, the lender tracks it vigilantly - even if only in his own mind.
• Feelings of utter outrage if some product or service purchased turns out to be flawed.
• Pride in making one's possessions last a long time.

More than just the fear of being taken inspires the obsessive's tendency to be guarded with money.  Many people learn early in childhood that saving is a virtue; they may come to associate it with out "good" characteristics such as self-denial and the postponement of pleasure for long-term rewards.  <snip>

GUARDED AGAINST SPONTANEITY

Another form of interpersonal guardedness is the inability to act spontaneously.  By definition, spontaneity means an absence of planning, anathema to most obsessives.  "I'm not even sure how to take a risk," said fifty-year old Jim.  "Before I do anything, I think about it every which way.  before I buy something, I've gotten prices at five different places.  I get things all figured out so I know which way to go, no matter what happens.  I don't like to get anywhere close to situations where I don't have a lot of control; I can never just be."

<snip> When there aren't any guidelines, they feel uncomfortable.  Many complain that they aren't good at small talk, and they may even avoid parties for that reason.  Instead they choose their words slowly and carefully; even their casual conversations may seem scripted.  One patient declared that unpremeditated talk scared her because of the possibility that "some kind of real feelings - weak feelings - may come out." <snip>

***

Ahh, frugality.  I am still struggling to overcome the training whereby one kept one's paper napkin as clean as possible, so it could be repeatedly reused.

Almost everyone who's lived with an OCPD'r has some horror story of the couch/car/mattress That Could Not Be Bought until we had checked thirteen kajillion places, and then dithered over the decision SO long that the process had to begin again.  Burning up three gallons of gas to drive to BF Nowhere to save twenty-five cents on a gallon of milk or loaf of bread.

And nothing could be thrown out.  "We might need that some day!" It took several years and bitter fighting to get rid of the non-functional TV sitting on the bedroom floor.  After the TV in the living room went out, I said, "Okay, now's the time to take the spare TV and get it fixed."
"I'm not sure it's worth getting fixed."
"Well, take it in and find out."
"I don't want to waste the money."
"Dude.  The reason it is here (along with a second "spare" TV, in storage) is as a spare if we need one.  Now we need one.  It's time to either fix it and use it, as a spare, or if we're not going to do that, it needs to go away.  I am tired of vacuuming around it."
He conceded there was nothing wrong with my logic, but it still took another six months of agonizing before he was able to junk it.  And he bitterly resented my "making" him get rid of the old TV.  (While I resented having to live for 3 years with a broken TV on the floor of the bedroom and another one in storage.)


There's nothing wrong with saving money.  I was raised in a household where gift wrap was carefully peeled off presents and reused repeatedly.  Where we recycled everything - even jar labels were carefully soaked off and included in the stacks of newspapers to go for paper recycling - and of course, the jars themselves were sorted and turned in: clear, brown, and green glass.  I still am big on recycling, but those with OCPD...

And the spontaneity.  My ex told me in the beginning he didn't like surprises.  I assumed (wrongly) he meant stuff like people jumping up and saying "Boo!" (which is actually quite mean, IMO) or birthday surprise parties, stuff like that.  No.  Anything unexpected freaked him out.  Like me coming home from the grocery store with a different kind of meat to try, or a package of Hawaiian sweet rolls  (which he liked) - the horror!  "Where are we going to put those?"

Forget about friends just stopping by (except his single best childhood friend) and hanging out.  Although, oddly enough, we were able to take a road trip that was largely unplanned, the idea being drive up the coast as far as we felt like, then get a hotel wherever we wanted to spend the night.  We had some minor meltdowns along the way, but for the most part, had a good time.  Some others with OCPD'rs report on vacation, it's like they've left the OCPD behind. (Where for others, the obsessive behavior and meltdowns are greatly magnified.)
 
 His fear/loathing of spontaneity carried over into things like loveplay in the kitchen.  There was no "surprise" affection, no kisses just because you happen to be passing the other person in the hall - at least from him to me, and I soon learned that those from mine to him upset him terribly.

Makes me sad because while I could say, okay, we're different people, whatever makes him happy... But it didn't make him happy.  I was lonely, not getting the kind of affection I wanted, being discouraged from giving the kind of affection I wanted to give - and he was lonely, too.  After the "honeymoon" period, I became painfully aware he didn't believe I loved him, didn't trust that my love would last.  For so long I struggled to show him in every way I could how much I did love him, thinking surely some how, some way, I would break through, and he would feel secure in my love, and then things would get better.

If he could have accepted (not simply tolerated, but appreciated, enjoyed) spontaneous loveplay or passing kisses, would he have felt more loved?


Your thoughts?