I am very often asked for help with OCD. After many years of contact with people afflicted with it, from observing them and analyzing the available research, I draw the conclusion (my personal one, I may be wrong, of course) that acutely this form of disorder has its origin primarily in the behavior of the sufferers themselves. It is not caused by poisonings, deficiencies, diseases or whatever else anyone can think of.
A word of further clarification on what I mean by “OCD” It refers to behaviors such as repeatedly washing your hands, touching the doorknob with a handkerchief, equalizing the length of your steps to the curbs, and so on. There will also be intrusive thoughts, but such as, for example, having to add the digits of each car registration, dividing words into syllables and counting the letters in them, and the like. Constant thoughts about, for example, sex are not “intrusive,” nor is the desire to do something. A man once reported on the forum who had constant pedophilic thoughts. This is a completely different situation and does not fall under “obsessive disorder”
I will describe a couple of cases that I met personally.
The first – an adult man, about 50 years old. He is supported by his mom, as far as I know, he can’t even prepare food for himself, his mother has to do it. He hasn’t worked more than a few years in his life (or maybe a few months, I don’t know exactly), he spends his days playing on the computer.
The second – again an adult guy, this time about 25 years old. Like the above, he is unemployed. He spends his time coming up with more and more interesting ways to make a living. Once it was the creation of a commune, then some handicraft trade (with zero knowledge of how to do it), an attempt to become a professional athlete with again zero aptitude, engaging in ideological struggles over some total bullshit that nobody cares about. It was clear to everyone around him that the guy was running away from life’s responsibilities into more and more toys.
Finally, the little kid. Because of his tough character, he was rejected by his peers. However, he told himself that he was the great one and they were the bad ones. He would sit alone, inventing more and more flaws of the bad guys who didn’t want to play with him.
All of the above cases have one thing in common. These individuals are destroying their own lives with their own wrong decisions. In the first two, grown men devote all their time and energy to toys, even though subconsciously they know very well that the prospect of homelessness lurks around the corner when it turns out that they have no earned financial base and their parents are missing. However, it’s easier to tell yourself that it’s okay than to go to work. In the last one, the kid would like to play with others, but he’s too mischievous. It’s too troublesome for him to change himself, it’s easier to attribute negative qualities to others.
In reviewing the research, I noticed that the things that had an effect in other cases, such as anxiety attacks or depression, did not work on OCD. Omega 3s didn’t work, cysteine supplementation didn’t do anything. The study found differences in the levels of some elements (people with intrusiveness had lower levels of zinc, for example), but these were not as high as with other disorders.
In summary, if someone suffers from this affliction, he or she should first of all look at his or her life. I know it’s easier said than done, the three people I wrote about were sanctimoniously convinced that everything was OK with them, but at the same time anyone who looked at them from the side could see as if it wasn’t. It’s a bit like anorexia, a woman weighing 35 kg will insist that she is obese.
Intrusions – in my experience, which, I emphasize, is only my private opinion – mainly come from “suppression” of some need. If we subconsciously know that we should do something, for example, as in the above cases, to go to work, or to change our behavior from extremely annoying to acceptable, but we don’t do it, we will subconsciously redirect this “urge to act”, energy, to other activities.
It is very difficult to list all the possible elements here. It could be living with a toxic person and pretending to yourself that everything is OK in this relationship. Sacrificing your life for computer games. Wanting to change jobs, but lacking the courage to do so. Staying in the “friendzone” of the girl you love. Living in a place where there are virtually no prospects, here the example of a friend who went to the UK, where she has no friends, no prospect of finding a partner, earns only enough to barely survive, and is getting older and older, imposes itself on me.
The common element is the rejection and suppression of the pursuit of something that is very important to us. We want to, desperately want to do it, but fear of change or simple laziness prevails.
On the forum, hundreds of people have already “cured” themselves of anxiety attacks, thanks to supplementation of deficiencies and lifestyle changes. The therapy against anxiety and panic attacks described on this site has a very high effectiveness in their case, on the fingers of one lumberjack’s hand you can count the cases when it did not work at least to some extent. On the other hand, I can’t recall at the moment even one case where supplements cured someone of their obsessions. I suppose if more people tried it, someone would eventually succeed; there are certainly patients in whom it is deficiencies that cause obsessive behavior to occur, but as long as statistics show that there are far fewer of them than in the case of anxiety.
I have encountered theories that this affliction has a purely chemical basis, explained by the fact that increased levels of stress hormones tell you to “fight” with normal activities, for example, washing your hands is then associated with the enemy and the subconscious tells you to “kill” him, which, according to this theory, should disappear as soon as the level of general stress is lowered. In my opinion, even if this theory is true, it is only responsible for the severity of the OC, not for their appearance. But as I wrote, this is my private opinion and I could be wrong.