My Father's Mental Illness is Affecting Me

[SQAAD]

Those who have had 'normal' parents can't appreciate the fine line between mental health and mental illness. Nor can you ever truly understand a mental illness if you haven't personally lived through it. 

When I tell people that I grew up with a father who suffered from OCD, most people's reactions are like its not big deal. This just shows the depth of ignorance and misunderstanding. 

I could go on details how my father's mental illness eroded my self esteem and caused me to develop OCD also.(Now I have recovered from OCD through years of CBT and I am better at handling uncertainty than the average Joe). Or I could tell stories to show the severity of the illness, such as when he would cut my nails, he wanted to make sure he cut the the nails perfectly.(As a result he would cut them so much that I would be in pain for 2 days afterwards). 

Now I visited my father in another country to make some papers and I currently live with him for a few days. Today he wasted at least 4 hours of my day doing compulsions. He no longer can trust himself and has to check multiple times everything. Imagine being so uncertain that you don't trust anymore that 5 plus 5 equals 10.

Imagine getting an answer and having to make sure again and again that you heard the answer correctly. 

I feel bad for my dad but I can't do much for him. Today I really wanted to sleep so bad but he kept wasting my time on compulsions. The time and energy he expends on these compulsions is just remarkable. I am at awe that after decades of living like that he hasn't committed suicide yet. I lived through ocd for just 6years and I wanted to kill myself at the end because it was constant misery and anxiety. 

Blessed are those who have had healthy parents. My parents are both dysfunctional. And this has affected me enormously. I feel anger for the card I have been dealt but maybe in the next incarnation things will be much different ?

 

 

 

Edited February 16, 2022 by SQAAD

[PepperBlossoms]

Shrooms may help with OCD.  I am sorry your dad feels the need to check everything.  

I can see that there could be times where things that were not checked had drastic consequences but also, if one spends hours a day checking and repeating things, that in itself can be an ongoing drastic consequence as they are missing out on getting to do other stuff and it could be bothersome to others.

We don't get to pick our parents.  Maybe try to work towards acceptance of your parents and letting go of anger about them and also distance yourself so that they can do what they do and you don't have to be bothered by it.

You could try talking to your dad about seeing a therapist or not checking stuff or ask him some more to dig deep about what triggered him to do it in the first place.  It is like a habit it seems and if he can just stop doing the habit for say 3 weeks, he may be able to break it.  (I read in a book that it can take 3 weeks to make a habit but that could be wrong.)

Maybe you are angry right now because you have seen him but once you get to go away again, the anger will subside and you can focus on other stuff.

I can see that that can be a problem if someone's compulsions is keeping the others up, especially if the house is set up to where there is not enough privacy/distance from each other.   I too would be mad if I missed sleep.

I am sorry your peers do not think it is that bad.  That is a very good point in that having parents who do not have any mental illness or traumas and can make it so much easier for the kids.  There are lots of us though with parents with some sort of illness/trauma that they did not resolve.  Also, it could be that the parents were "healthy mentally" but eventually life has its happenings and shit happens.

Agh well good luck and I hope you can heal and move on.  Anger is no fun and can take up a lot of headspace.  Sometimes it can be easier to move on when you find something else to be angry about haha.

Regarding OCD - I am no expert but if you/him could write down every single activity that is considered OCD on a piece of paper and then look at what is okay to be OCD about and keep doing and what is not okay/not beneficial and then decide which ones you will keep and which you will drop and then how you will drop it. 

Also looking at why you feel OCD about something and how you feel when you do not do it.  Like, maybe learning to be okay with stuff not being perfect.  I guess digging deep and trying to find the why for many things.

Edited February 15, 2022 by PepperBlossoms

[SQAAD]

@PepperBlossoms @PepperBlossoms No amount of shrooms can treat OCD. Shrooms can definitely help by bringing awareness to the problem. 

But after that you have to stop doing the compulsions which is one of the hardest things to ever do. Ιt took me at least 2 years to fully recover from OCD and rewire my brain.  It's  very tricky monster to slay. Very very deceptive. 

I was super lucky that I stumbled across Mark Freeman on yt. A guy who has overcome OCD and now helps others. These OCD specialists, most of them are garbage. They don't fully understand the illness. 

My dad is 56 years old and has no understanding about OCD. That's basically the problem. I tried mentioning it to him but he ignored me. 

He will have to go through the depths of hell to recover if he ever chooses to. 

I just feel sad that people's life become so incredibly miserable because of stuff like that. Whole generation of families get affected. The quality of life drops significantly and You are a prisoner of you mind. 

Thank you for the advice. 

[Breakingthewall]

On 14/2/2022 at 9:31 PM, SQAAD said:

Blessed are those who have had healthy parents. My parents are both dysfunctional. And this has affected me enormously. I feel anger for the hand I have been dealt but maybe in the next incarnation things will be much different ?

 

keep in mind one thing: if you leave the mental matrix, all that will be indifferent. what's more, all that dysfunction is an incentive to leave the mental matrix. your path is narrow, you cannot be comfortable in the matrix. you have to get out of it.

I wish you a good trip and that you get it soon