Hi
I'm hoping someone can help or is going through a similar thing. My 12 year old daughter has been suffering from ocd since March. Just lately it's becoming debilitating.
The worst times are her morning and evening routines. As well as having set meals and clothes on particular days, frequent hand washing, disinfecting her phone etc. She struggles to walk through doors and it can take a few minutes to get through a door sometimes. She gets very frustrated trying to turn on her phone and iPad as it has to be 'right' and she'll keep doing it until it is. She has to repeat every action and sometimes her bedtime routine will take an hour or more.
Yesterday we had a nice day visiting family but when we came home all hell broke loose. She had a shower and got into such a state the bedtime routine took about three hours. I lay in bed listening to her turn off the light switch probably 50 times. She lies on the floor and sobs saying she wants to die. She's been hitting, scratching and biting herself, at times leaving nasty bruises.
One day last week was particularly bad trying to get ready for school. She was so distressed I nearly called an ambulance. I managed to calm her down after about an hour.
I saw a GP in July and she has referred us to CAMHS. As yet we are still waiting. I was warned it would be a long wait. We've had three sessions with a private counseller which hasn't done much.
My question is what do I do when she's having one of her daily meltdowns? It's heartbreaking to watch. Sometimes I sit and lie quietly with her just so she knows she's not alone. Other times my presence seems to make her worse so I leave her be. We've changed her school to a smaller more nurturing one which she's been at for two weeks.
She finds it difficult to express what she's going through. But from what I can gather she has a lot of bad thoughts and she can only do an action if she has a good thought while doing it, hence the repeating. Something bad will happen if she doesn't do things 'right'.
She gets very aggressive and I just want to help her. Can anyone offer any advice please?
MyNameIsTerry
24-10-16, 07:10
It sounds like she is really suffering at the moment, Redsoles. Her anxiety sounds like it's in the severe category.
She probably gets aggressive because she is so frustrated. Anxiety makes us on edge and we get snappy and these constant never ending frustrating fast paced compulsions just make it worse. Completing a compulsion is supposed to be to reduce anxiety but sadly it doesn't always go like this as the more you are doing them, the more frustrated you feel and it feeds back in. And if she has compulsions between obsessions that are close together (e.g. she has to do things with a door, then it's straight onto a light switch) then you often get little break from it and it starts to feel pretty continuous no matter what you are doing.
These bad thoughts, are they violent intrusive thoughts by any chance? Most likely they will be directed at loved ones and pets.
With intrusive thoughts it's really important to educate yourself. She's very young and she is bound to wonder whether these mean she is changing into someone bad. She may also be exposed to poor examples of mental illness in the media (just think of Sienna in Hollyoaks, someone who represents the lower % of schizophrenics and the medical professionals even say those people only become violent due to drink & drugs) and this will be causing her to misunderstand how things really are.
So, try to encourage her to talk about them to you. But first, do you understand them yourself? If you don't, you really need to do this so that you are prepared for anything she tells you. Intrusive thoughts can be horrific, they can be graphic, and you need to be prepared so that the reaction she gets from you is that of a parent that has the knowledge and is not phased in the slightest as this will be reassuring and she won't feel judged. Intrusive thoughts also include things of a sexual nature as this will be complicated to her right now and it can include things like paedophilia, incest, etc. She may be very wary discussing some of this with anyone, including a professional, and so approaching it from a "I know it all, I'm your mum" point of view might help here so that she can open up.
Is there stress in her life? OCD gets spiked by rising overall levels of anxiety. This is why things like relaxation exercises, healthy activities, distractions, etc are important too.
It's clear from what you are saying that she has a combination of OCD themes going on in here. There is the Magical Thinking theme (with the food, clothes and most likely it will be combined with her intrusive thoughts into why she performs "mitigating" compulsions as she is countered the thoughts), intrusive thoughts (unknown content), some contamination issues (not sure if it's standard contamination or emotional contamination from what you've said so far), maybe there is more she hasn't worked out yet? I know when I started CBT I had no understanding of OCD and I missed documenting some things in a way I can now but I bet my therapist picked up on things from what I said.
It's tough right now BUT she can get much better. At my worst I was doing a lot of what she is and I had hundreds of daily compulsions. So many that when my therapist asked me to spend a week documenting them as I did them it was impossible as it would have taken longer to write one down than before I got onto the next one. And writing or using paper even became part of the cycle so I just ended up with more compulsions. She told me just to document my compulsions and how many times I did them and when instead of doing them at the time. This allowed me to write them all in one go.
Honestly back then I wanted to die too. It's not that I wanted to die, I would then feel guilty because of it affecting my family, but I just wanted the pain to end. She will be feeling like that.
I think you need to know everything you can so you can help her. So, if she is able to document things, it might help with her eventual therapy (disgracefully, kids seem to wait longer than adults for therapy, it should always be the other way around!) but also you then know what's going on with her. Especially with the thoughts because that is something that you can definitely help her with now and it would be better to do this than risk her becoming depressed because she is obsessing over them without telling anyone.
Try to work on decreasing stress on her. You can't do anything about the stress from the OCD, that will take some time to sort out, but if there are ways to make her more relaxed outside of this, that will help reduce the peaks of it.
When she is having a bad cycle of this, if it's the thoughts, I think you stand more chance of helping her to understand they mean nothing and encourage her to use OCD methods to dispel them. Sadly, the more we react with fear, the more this cycle reinforces itself. We have to be positive or neutral in dealing with it and the thoughts will stop coming as much.
I'll paste in a link to another thread which explains a lot about these thoughts and their various little tricks shortly. I will also post you in a link to the OCD UK descriptions. They are not exhaustive but I really think information is so important here because right now she will be tearing into herself for being a "freak". She isn't, she is just struggling with OCD. She has Magical Thinking elements in my opinion and these are very irrational. The more she comes to terms with these just being OCD and nothing scary, the more she can work on bringing her anxiety levels down.
Reducing those compulsions is key too. This means using ERP strategies. It's hard at first, it means more anxiety, but it does work.
The biting, harming stuff may be due to adrenaline. I've had this too and there are other OCD sufferers I know who have. Does this only take place when she is feeling full of tension? I could also be self harm developing but that's something for a professional to determine.
I went through most of what you have said and had more themes and it did take me some time but I've escaped a great deal of it now. Back then I used to think I was cursed for life and that I wouldn't get even a tiny bit better - I did, I was wrong. I can't tell you the amount of times I've heard those suffering saying what I did back then.
---------- Post added at 07:07 ---------- Previous post was at 07:06 ----------
OCD UK's descriptions:
http://ocduk.org/types-ocd
You will likely see some of her OCD on that page, Magical Thinking, for instance:
Magical Thinking Intrusive Thoughts - is the fear is that even thinking about something bad will make it more likely to happen - sometimes also called ‘thought-action fusion’.
Sufferers are beset by intrusive bad thoughts. They try to dispel them by performing rituals - magic rituals, in effect - that are often bizarre and time-consuming and involve linking actions or events that could not possibly be related to each other. *For example having the thought 'I may strangle someone' is regarded as being as reprehensible as actually strangling a person. **Another example is believing that simply imagining a horrific car crash will increase the likelihood of such a crash taking place, or a person may feel that if they don’t count to ten ‘just right’ harm will come to a family member.* Other examples of magical thinking, or thought-action fusion intrusive thoughts include:
A certain colour or number has good or bad luck associated with it.
Certain days have good or bad luck associated with them.
A loved one’s death can be predicted.
One’s thoughts can cause disasters to occur.
Stepping on cracks in the pavement can make bad things happen.
Whatever comes to mind can come true.
Breaking chain letters will actually bring bad luck.
Attending a funeral will bring death.
One can inadvertently cause harm to others with thoughts or carelessness.
Hearing the word ‘death’ will mean repeating the word ‘life’ to prevent death.
In each example listed above, the thoughts and events happening could not possibly ever be linked, but the person with OCD will believe that this possibility does exist, and as a result, this will cause them immense stress and anxiety.* As a result, their silent internal compulsive behaviours will take hours, and often prevent them interacting with anyone else during this time.
---------- Post added at 07:09 ---------- Previous post was at 07:07 ----------
A thread where I've wrote a fair bit about intrusive thoughts:
http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=184847
---------- Post added at 07:10 ---------- Previous post was at 07:09 ----------
In case it's any comfort to you, Post #31 in here is the most I've ever explained about my own GAD & OCD:
http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=169503&page=4
I have an autistic daughter who was also diagnosed with OCD at the Maudsley Hospital when she was 10. I think the most important thing is to try and keep the communication channels open with your daughter. If you can get her to talk about her anxiety and what those "bad thoughts" are centred around you may be able to lessen her anxiety to a point where she can calm herself just a little bit. I expect a lot of her rituals are based around her home/possessions.
Staying calm yourself is essential. My daughter can sniff out my own anxiety very easily and this troubles her and can trigger her own rituals.
I hope you soon hear from CAMHS but if you don't then I would recommend making a nuisance of yourself with repeated phone calls and maybe asking your GP to push for the appointment too. I'm afraid you will have to be very proactive in getting help for your daughter because mental health services are notoriously slow to offer appointments. Make sure you see someone who specialises in OCD though. There used to be a support group called Young Minds which was of help to me.
Thank you both for your comprehensive replies, that's a lot to digest and I appreciate it.
I've found an accredited therapist that does CBT and ERP which is what I read on a forum somewhere is needed. So I hope that will help. There is nothing I can think of that has triggered this. I myself have severe anxiety hence why I'm on here but I've never shown this to her. You wouldn't know it to talk to me. She's an only child in a loving family so I hope I can give her the support she needs.
Being there for her is the best thing you could do and as you say, you are a loving close-knit family so everything is in her favour for stabilisation and recovery. I really hope that she gets on with the new therapist and that things start to improve very soon for her.
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