I’ve noticed quite frequently that when I am reading aloud I can retain the information on the page because my mind is mostly distracted by the function of speech and sound. When I try to read silently, I can do it for about a few sentences and then the rushing thoughts pour in and before I know it I have no clue what I’ve been reading. It’s pretty clear to me that what needs to be controlled is the rapidity of thoughts, words, and images in my mind, and not my state of conciousness. Taking xanax and other sedatives always made me loopy, tired, and spaced out. I couldn’t comprehend much of anything or have an intelligent complete thought without really having to squeeze my brain muscles. I don’t understand why psychiatrists are so quick to dish out these types of drugs to patients with OCD other than maybe they are not schooled enough on medications and their uses (they only study this for 3 years under supervision of another doctor), or that they simply have no idea what OCD is and override it into a case of severe anxiety. Which it is, but it is so much more. Numbing your mind doesn’t make you more efficient. I think that xanax would be appropriate for someone who is deathly afraid of public places, and needs it to help them overcome their fear, but of course they couldn’t depend on the drug all their life because they’d have to take massive amounts to fulfill the body’s resistance and conditioning to it. It doesn’t seem like psychiatrists or other doctors are using enough precaution when it comes to these sedatives. I’ve gotten addicted to them because they took away the fear, but without the drugs the fear was still there, and that was not my goal to achieve. If scientists could use brain scanning to further delve into the neurons and chemicals inside of our brains, if they could measure our levels of seratonin and dopamine (can they do this yet?), then match those results with the drug that either increases those amounts of chemicals or lowers them…wouldn’t that get rid of the guinea pig method? Maybe it would have saved me all the money in my savings account. Maybe it would have saved my poor liver. Even though OCD is much more on the map now a days than it was ten, twenty years ago, I found that the statistics of people who have it are still quite low. I opened up the NAMI magazine and there was an article right in front about a new disorder stemming from borderline personality disorder, although the added a few new words to make it more cutting edge (?) I read it, and the syptoms were so broad, my dog or hamster could have claimed to have it. I’m starting to get worried about how easily these disorders are surfacing. In no way am I saying that personality disorders don’t exist, but how many are just small extended versions of an all in all normal human being with some traumatic baggage, and how many are acute enough to require a page in the psychiatric bible? Sometimes I wonder if OCD is really a “disorder.” Sometimes I think that maybe it isn’t and I convince myself it is just this ‘thing’ that is the result of a bunch of other ‘things.’ What if I just did exactly what the self-help books told me? Would I be cured? Is anyone “cured” of OCD? I think it is the skeptics that have put these ideas in my mind, and I think I just want to be better. Why should I have to see a special therapist or read a special book to function normally and healthy and happy? But we all do these things, with or without OCD. I’m not saying go out and buy a self-help book, or go out and spend 350 dollars on a shrink. In fact, I’m not sure what I am trying to say. There are times when I feel that I am quite lazy in my feat to battle OCD, and I wish that it would all just go away and so I do nothing. I have a lot of self-help books at home and I loathe every one of them. I’ve seen many therapists and psychiatrists and I never go back. I finally found a decent guy and he died after two visits. I think he had a heart attack. Now I have to start all over again, and there is by no means a guarantee that it will be successfull. If I don’t try I’ll waste the other half of my life. I know it’ll be a waste because this first half I’ve learned too much to do nothing. So lift your glass of champagne, orange juice, or sleepy-time tea, and toast with me to a positive, happy, and healthy new beginning.