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How to Confront Perfectionism
My OCD continues to improve with ERP therapy. Lately, my perfectionism has been my most difficult challenge. I started to strip away habits and compulsions. Now there’s an underlying anxiety to ensure things are perfect. Even if you don’t have OCD, perfectionism is very common. Our society has trained us that we need to always be at our best. For me, when you factor in chronic illness, that’s just not possible. I have some days where I struggle to function. It’s taken me my entire chronic illness journey to realize that it’s not a weakness to ask for help. In battling perfectionism, I’ve found some tricks in daily life. These…
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How to Stay Present
Life is filled with trials and tribulations. It’s easy to get overwhelmed by work, family, or social situations. Having OCD, I’ve found various ways of staying present. This has become second nature. After a while, you start utilizing these techniques without even realizing it. If you have anxiety or need a little help during the pandemic, here are some tips on how to stay present. Ground Yourself Before you do anything, ground yourself. Bring yourself back to the present moment. Whether you find the rainbow, use your senses, or do 4-5-7 breathing take a moment to come back. Without grounding yourself, your mind will automatically be overwhelmed. Any attempts to…
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Dealing With OCD Spikes
My OCD has been calm lately. I knock on wood when I say that. Really, how well I manage my OCD is completely dependent on me. That’s not to say that I don’t have random spikes of anxiety. Some days I feel more anxious than others. Some days I see a million triggers, other days I see none. Some days, I automatically start compulsions and other days I don’t. The other day, my therapist wanted me to do research on a topic. I started to get anxious about this rather quickly. I didn’t know why she wanted me to research this. I started having a lot of automatic thoughts, “Does…
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Five Reasons Everyone Should Get Therapy
I love therapy. I’ve been going on and off for about eight years. Therapy is an important tool for me to stay on top of my mental health. When I was younger, I struggled with anxiety quite a bit. Therapy allowed me a safe space to divulge my fears and face them. I learned coping skills and anxiety no longer felt like a burden. It was something I had and after time, I didn’t even think about it anymore. Now, for the past year, my OCD has been popping up and bothering me once again. So, I’m back in therapy. Truthfully, if I wasn’t moving around so much I don’t…
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What to do When You Feel Out of Control
There’s been a lot going on lately. The world seems to have flipped upside down, at least in the United States. I’m not going to get into the politics of it. Right now, you might feel out of control. We’re all experiencing a little bit of feel helpless. So how do we deal with that? Here are some ideas to help you regain a sense of control! Turn Off the TV This is important. We all need to stay informed and up to date but it doesn’t have to be our primary focus. You need to take a step back. What is happening is not going to change if you…
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Creating a Vision Board
This week I was discussing with my therapist goals and self-care. Both are important in achieving what you want out of life. Finding self-care has been difficult for me lately. I’ve been in and out of appointments, along with school and other obligations self-care falls away. I always keep up my healthy patterns but during the day, I do very little to let myself take a breath. My therapist brought up a lot of various ideas but one that stuck with me was a vision board. Since I’m creating a new one, I figured I would outline what I’m doing. If you need a boost, I’d suggest you build one…
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Confronting Perfectionism
I have been a perfectionist for as long as I can remember. When I was in grade school, I had a 504 plan to aid me in my battle with anxiety. They tested me on a variety of skills to see exactly where I was struggling. I was given a puzzle and asked to complete it as quickly as I could. I sat there and moved with relative speed but continually went back and checked my work. As I continued to do this, I ran out the clock. What they saw and later explained to me, there were no issues in my ability to solve the puzzle. My inability to…
