New normal?

On the positive, i got a new job. On the negative, change is still hard. Oh, and shall we mention the new theater for ocd and anxiety to perform in?

I'm now a teacher's aid at a child care center. This means cleaning. Just me cleaning. When I'm around others, it is easier to prioritise ocd into the background. But just me and the room to be cleaned?

I'd like to say i haven't done badly, but am reminded of when i was a kid and timed how long it took me to wash one plastic mug. Drum roll please! Doing my best to pay attention and work at a good pace (my mom attributed my slowness to me daydreaming), it took me five minutes to wash a plastic mug.

Well, i wash dishes faster nowadays. (At least 5 minutes per mug is an easy record to surpass.) Lately i think indecision has slowed me down more at work. To vacuum first or mop or wash dishes or clean the bathroom or take out the garbage. All this with a breath-taking fear of making the wrong choice.

Why do i care which thing i do first? Well, it might influence which things don't get done. What doesn't get done might be done by someone else, or left undone, and they might resent me for not getting my job all done. So i guess that is my fear, my co-workers unhappy with me. And/or getting fired again. After all, if i can get fired once (even if my being let go had very little or nothing to do with my actions), i can get fired twice.

So now let me continue some cognitive therapy. For one thing, I've got a pretty weak link between the choice of which task to do first and my feared consequence. For another, people being upset with me if i make the "wrong" choice isn't the end of the world. Although it is pretty sad... But there isn't really any way to ensure that NO-ONE will ever get upset with me, so... maybe i will be able to gather enough strength to fight the ocd/anxiety. ERP. Yuck! Oh, well. It just might prove worth while again like it has before.

Comments

  1. UnknownSeptember 29, 2015 at 2:20 PM

    Hi, you have great things to share. I'm trying to reach out to others that suffer with OCD/anxiety and perfectionism. I want to build a community of support on my site: https://facefearsnlive.wordpress.com/. I would love for you to check it out!

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownOctober 7, 2015 at 5:50 PM

    I added another post. Since you helped me out last time, I would like to get your feed-back. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I miss my blog

 Well, 4+ years later, and I still have the OCD/Anxiety/Depression combo. I take more psych meds than ever. I've been hospitalized twice, tried TMS, and been enrolled in two Intensive Outpatient Programs, one of which made me slightly in favor of DBT and the second, which turned me off, even though that was mostly due to one person mishandling a situation. I'm currently attending the online International OCD Foundation conference. I did in 2020, too. I don't know if I'm more agitated now, or more aware of my agitation. I like to color while listening to presentations, or even organize my house - I don't like that so much as I tend to like the results. I am a dedicated fidget-er. My Executive Function is more obviously an issue to me now. I did start a medication a couple months before I noticed it more, but the sleep doctor who prescribed it brushed off my concerns, saying people like to take it to help them study. Maybe sleep doctors aren't as aware as the psyc
Read more

My merry-go-round

I've been keeping a mood log since sometime last May, or maybe June. I've done it on the OpenOffice software similar to Excel. This means I can do cool stuff like make charts and graphs to see how my mood has swooped around over the last year. This last week, I found that you can also put in a trend line over your chart. This was neat, but disturbing. I used it over charts made from week averages for the last 10 or 11 months. I learned that: My depression at its best (each day, then averaged per week) is getting better. My depression at its worst (each day, then averaged per week) is getting worse. My anxiety is getting worse. My sleep time is increasing. My exercise time is decreasing. Or, in short, my worst is getting worse. So then I wonder if I'm using the same standards to judge my mood as I was using in May last year. After all, the mood ratings are subjective, done each day, or occasionally every few days. But what if anxiety that I called a 5 in May would be
Read more

An unseen illness

Well, to continue a train of thought started at 71 and Sunny 's blog, lots of my OCD has been, well, invisible. Every now and then, I'd spout off an imitation of my brain's on-going monologue, and either be regarded as worrying about stupid things or be regarded with a bit more respect. My brain jumped topics pretty well, too. I'm not sure if that is typical with OCD, but it usually was with mine. Like while driving. "I wonder if I offended so-and-so last night in our conversation. Oops, I went over a bump. Was it a bump, or a person? Check mirror. Looks like nothing, but maybe there was a person lying in the depression in the road. Well, probably not too realistic. But wait; I wasn't paying attention for the last moment. Better check the mirror again. Rats, checking the mirror meant I didn't pay perfect attention in front of me. Quick, check it again. No, don't look that long, now you have to look again. This is not going to work. Look further ahead,
Read more