Cry For Help ?

This section is philosophical in nature, and might not necessarily help you recover. But you may find it interesting

A very simple definition of mental illness is where a person gets irrational thoughts on a regular basis, that cause negative emotions. OCD fits in with this definition perfectly

However, mental illness implies that the part of us that produces those thoughts (i.e. the subconscious mind) is malfunctioning. But I argue that it is not malfunctioning. I explain the reason for this below

With mental illness, you would expect random thoughts and feelings. But, with OCD, everything is deliberate. That is, the subconscious first tries one OCD thought, and if that doesn’t work, it generates more OCD thoughts. If that doesn’t work then it could change the person’s beliefs. If that doesn’t work, then it could produce psychosomatic symptoms or get the person to associate an OCD thought with an object or area.

The subconscious is acting intelligently given the circumstances it finds itself in.

For almost every sufferer, they only get OCD if something is wrong in their body, like trauma or stress

Therefore, OCD could be considered a cry for help from the body (via the subconscious mind)

So, is OCD a mental illness or actually a cry for help?

I would argue overall it’s a cry for help. But, in the short run, it acts like a mental illness, because that is the only way the subconscious mind can get its message across that something else needs fixing. Therefore, in the short run, you need to do what is required to reduce your anxiety symptoms, such as ERP, and possibly mindfulness

The good thing is that, although it acts like a mental illness in the short run, your mind is not broken. The mind is working as it should, even though it doesn't feel like it

The advantage of treating it as a cry for help (in the long run) is that it gets you to look for the root causes of the condition

For those of you who are a bit older, in the 1980s there was a singer called Rick Astley. He released a song called ‘cry for help’ (see below YouTube video). It’s not about mental illness as such, but if you listen to it, it could remind you that OCD is actually a cry for help

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qB3vD_wGW-g

The next section looks at whether OCD is part of a wider trend - please click the below button