Need help figuring out something kind of weird.

[Sharon123]

I've had OCD and Depression and a several other anxiety disorders and Tourette's since I was a child. Throughout my entire childhood I was constantly invalidated and told that it was all just in my head. I was made to feel like a burden and I carried a lot of pain with me all throughout my childhood and teens. I learned to hide these things masterfully and would suffer greatly very quietly. To make matters worse, I was bullied a lot in school. Now I am finally in a more supportive environment and finally I have access to all the help that I need. But for some reason I am terrified of getting better. For some reason it feels like getting better equates me invalidating my whole experience and pretending that it didn't happen. It feels like now that I get better, no one will ever know how awful it was. It feels like the same thing as hiding or masking my problems. I feel scared to remember any happy memories or any good things about my life because then it might mean that all the bad stuff was in my head and that means I am just a lazy and awful person. I associate feeling better with so much negative stuff, I don't know what to do. It feels like the worse I get, the more likely it will be that people notice that I need support. But the confusing thing is that I have a lot of support these days. And I don't have to shout to be heard anymore or emphasize how much pain I am in in order to flag down assistance. But my brain doesn't seem to register that. It keeps saying, "you're not sick enough yet and you don't have enough support yet to relax and feel better." It's like there is this emptiness that is there and I don't know if it is OCD related or something else. Anyway, I don't know what to do about it. Can anyone relate? I know it's a little weird.

[ankietyjoe]

I think for a lot of anxiety sufferers, true therapy isn't really necessary. For the most part they need more instructional sessions like CBT. It about getting people to reframe their reactions to their anxiety.

However, in your case I think things may be a little different.

A combination of lack of proper parental care and bullying may well have led to a kind of PTSD reaction, and in many cases this can also lead on to different 'versions' of yourself that deal with different situations. I think there may be a touch of this present with you, and would explain why you have a sense of invalidation if you were well. On top of that, the care you are receiving now could be SO welcome, that part of you feels it would disappear if you were recovered.

Back to my original point, I would possibly consider looking to find a therapy that deals with childhood trauma, PTSD and identity disorders.

Please don't be afraid of these terms, they are all incredibly common, but might need a bit of extra help for you working out why being better is a good thing. And of course I could be completely wrong, just my thoughts though.