Posted by pseudoname on January 22, 2006, at 14:22:19
I recently got an effective antidepressant for the first time in 20 years (buprenorphine). As the depression lifted, I got super-stressed about all the piled-up undone stuff of my life and the unlikely odds of making a "truly good" (i.e., idealistically good) life now, even if I'm not really depressed anymore.
My new pdoc said I have OCD symptoms in those idealistic demands on myself. I've always felt I have obsessional thinking, but since I have none of the debilitating steroptypical counting / touching / checking stuff, so I never really figured “compulsive” applied to me.
But my idealizing demands for self-perfection usually lead me to give up trying anything, because I can never meet the standards. Except that it's so different from the classic compulsions, GIVING-UP seems to fit the bill (in my case) for a compulisive response. For example, giving-up follows my obsessional idealistic thinking, and its purpose seems to be to make the stress of that thinking go away. If I don't try anything, I won't be criticised or humiliated for my imperfect attempt!
I'm not sure why I'm raising this question, but maybe I could apply more of the OCD literature to my situation if giving-up is a compulsion...
Any thoughts?
poster:pseudoname
thread:601821
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20060121/msgs/601821.html