Heavy

This episode is all about the contradictions of having both ADHD and OCD and how the two play tug of war.  Listen as I breakdown symptoms with my real life examples.  

Transcript

Episode 36 

https://www.additudemag.com/what-is-ocd-obsessive-compulsive-disorder/

https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/obsessive-compulsive-disorder-ocd/index.shtml 

https://uniquemindcare.com/ocd-help-guide/#:~:text=Doubters%20and%20sinners%20are%20afraid,numbers%2C%20colors%2C%20or%20arrangements.

For those of you that know Linkin Park is an amazing band that suffered the loss of a great singer and songwriter when Chester Bennington lost his battle with depression.  Having depression Linkin Park songs hit in a way that most songs don’t Hybrid Theory, Meteora, and Minutes to Midnight, are albums that both motivate and help me release and deal with what is going on in my head.  Just read the lyrics.  Songs like ‘In the End’, ‘Numb’, ‘Crawling’, ‘What I’ve Done’, ‘Bleed It Out’ just to name a few. For this episode I think Heavy works with lyrics like ‘I don’t like my mind right now, stacking up problems that are so unnecessary, wish that I could slow things down, I wanna let go, but there’s comfort in the panic.’ Of course sitting here typing this out I had to take a break and listen to or at least skim through their songs because …. Distractions and my love of Linkin Park.

Justin Timberlake was famously quoted for saying “I have OCD mixed with ADD, you try living with that.” about his life with both ADHD and OCD. I have been thinking about this a lot especially recently.  Before being told I have both I couldn’t really imagine because my view on OCD much like ADHD was based on media and stereotypes.  I know I have touched on this before but the more I think about it the more I wonder if he isn’t right.  OCD and ADHD couldn’t be more opposite and are in direct contradiction of each other yet they also overlap.  It is almost comical how I can be so messy in some things but others have to be absolutely perfect.  How do I know if I am just hyper focused on something or obsessing over it? could it be both?  Let’s talk about it a little because I need to work through it too. 

In case you didn’t know somewhere around 30-50% of those diagnosed with ADHD have a co-morbidity or another condition that you have with ADHD.  I just like saying co-morbidity so we are going to stick with that. I have several which makes my diagnosis ‘complex’.  This is how ADHD can affect so many of us in such drastically different ways and why are treatments are all so different.  It explains why medication is a miracle to some and just a boost up for others.  It also explains why there are those who can manage differently.  No matter how you manage your symptoms or what your diagnosis is we still share many of the same experiences that bond us.  

Let’s see ok I will start with OCD since we pretty much know what our ADHD symptoms are but have no fear, we will go over it again.  There first two parts to OCD are obsessing and having compulsions there is also a third part that when paired with depression is called rumination.  Nice little trifecta right?

Helpguide.org breaks OCD down a little further into categories more defined by the symptoms.

https://www.helpguide.org/articles/anxiety/obssessive-compulsive-disorder-ocd.htm 

Washers: this is one of the stereotypes I associate with it likely because it is very common and one you can see portrayed in TV and movies a lot.  This is the being afraid of contamination or germs constant handwashing or cleaning compulsions.  This one isn’t really me but look at Howey Mendel for example, it is well known he has germaphobia brought on by his OCD he even talks about it in an interview with Everyday Health. Howie talks about how he wouldn’t even tie his shoes because the laces touched the ground.

https://www.everydayhealth.com/emotional-health/howie-mandel.aspx 

Checkers: No not the game although I do like to play checkers, connect 4 or even chess because my son is learning how to play so now, I am too.  This is yet another stereotype the person who can’t leave the house without checking that everything is off, unplugged, and/or locked.  I will occasionally do this I know I locked a door I can see myself in my head doing it.  I doubt myself and my memory so I check it again start to walk away and check it again. I will turn the alarm on get upstairs and start to freak out that someone is going to break in and walk half way back downstairs look at the light on the alarm to make sure it’s red (locked) and then look at it again. These are associated with a fear of danger even if there is none.

Doubters and sinners: This one is me and I am the first to admit completely un rational.  I will catch myself repeating the childhood rhyme step on a crack and you break your mothers back as I purposefully avoid cracks just in case because what if it were real.  I won’t walk under a ladder either. That is completely ridiculous (well maybe not the ladder one) but, in those moments, I can’t even make myself step on them.  It’s not all of the time because ADHD I get distracted and then forget about it and walk on cracks all the time but when I am not distracted, I avoid them. Wearing a seatbelt, I don’t know if this is more programmed from all of the harsh commercials they showed as a kid when the seatbelt laws first started or what.  Anytime I am in a car, seatbelts have to be on.  Sometimes my husband has his off like if he is just driving 6 houses down to the clubhouse to park the car if we are having a lot of company to make room for guests’ vehicles.  That causes me anxiety about horrible things happening even though I know nothing is going to happen.  Usually when I start obsessing (there’s that word or ruminating I am not always sure which is which) it is of final destination type freak accidents. If you haven’t seen Final Destination and you want to see what I am talking about go ahead and watch it. There is a whole movie franchise there were 5 movies from 2000-2011, I have a theory that the person who came up with these movies has OCD too I don’t know but it’s the types of things that run through my head anyway. 

When things aren’t in their place or when I get into that hyper focus of cleaning everything needs to be just perfect organized just right.  For me this doesn’t last long and I think this is again where some of the ADHD/OCD tug of war comes in.  I was listening to an ADDitude Magazine sponsored webinar with Roberto Olivardia, PhD where he was talking about how when you have ADHD and OCD there is a sort of tug of war going on that when ADHD symptoms are up the OCD symptoms are down and vice versa (https://www.additudemag.com/webinar/ocd-and-adhd-link-podcast-343/). 

There is another ADDitutde article tied to the webinar that talks about OCD in children too which made some of my childhood make more sense.  Things like how I was always obsessed with the fact that I was going to die before I was 30 no real reason but I even told my friends that.  I always thought that there was something that I did that god was punishing me for I didn’t know what it was but I thought it was something always something usually I blamed it on not being able to behave, or to be ‘good’ or ‘good enough’ which as I learned when I was 37 with my ADHD diagnosis was because of my uncontrolled impulsivity.  After I would do the impulsive thing, I knew I was going to be punished by god or my parents but usually god.  https://www.additudemag.com/ocd-and-adhd-are-the-polar-opposites-that-are-not/?src=webinar 

Counters and arrangers: obsessed with order and symmetry.  Possibly people who refuse to sleep on a certain hotel level or room number.  This is where the ADHD comes in and messes with everything and the contradictions are evident. Sometimes there will be things that stand out like a hair on someone’s shirt.  I cannot focus on anything else until that hair is removed it consumes my thoughts and I can’t even listen.  When I was younger, I would color code my clothes with my hangers I had blue, green, mauve, white, and black, I think.  I would try to match my clothes to the hanger and negotiate with myself where would something purple go.  Then they would be arranged from no sleeve to long sleeve of that color.  I would also finger space all of my hangers this I attribute to my time in retail.  It lasted for years and on occasion I will still be tempted to do it.  Now about all I do is I have short/no sleeve stuff on the bottom and long sleeve on the top rack.  I put it in order of least worn to most and work type clothes are in front.  

The next part is that many may have superstitions about numbers, colors, or arrangements.  I get particular with certain things and it comes and goes.  Ask anyone I have worked with.  There are times when my desk and all of my things are a hot mess and only I know where things are.  Other times when if something isn’t done the way I like it I will re-do it.  For example, reports that we would send out every month.  We all agreed on a specific shade of blue to change ‘actuals’ to versus projections and on random ones in only certain places it would be the wrong color.  This drives me insane.  I think I might tell you every episode my thing with excel and using borders.  This was a big one for me too.  You know how when you drag a formula across it also takes the formatting.  Apparently, this doesn’t bother some people it does me.  I have stopped in the middle of a meeting to fix it.  

Counting guilty here again.  I count napkins anytime I am out like the movie theater or a ball game.  I have to have an even number of napkins or something will happen and I won’t have enough.  This is how I have so many “car napkins” the magic number is usually 6 or 10 if I am with my whole family everyone needs 2 minimum but there have to be enough for everyone to have the same amount.  I count stairs as I go up or down, sometimes mile markers or the barrels on the side of the road.  I don’t know why I just catch myself doing it. 

Arrangements this usually only bothers me when I am cleaning or have just cleaned something like one of the kids bedrooms.  Organization is huge.  I get really upset when they put a toy in a bin that it clearly does not go in.  That’s stupid right who cares it’s just a toy and it’s off the floor which is the important part right?  Well not really because I will move it every time.  Even when I am in a rush, I will throw something where it doesn’t go and then go back later and move it.  Sometimes most of the time I forget because you know working memory right.  When I decorate or get a vison for how something should be I need it to be perfect and exactly how I see it.  Then I obsess over how awesome it is when it turns out or get really low when it doesn’t.  It isn’t just the kids stuff though if I have organized something if it gets messed up someone puts something where it doesn’t go I get really annoyed.  Put a plastic spatula in the drawer for the wooden spoons and I am silently cursing under my breath.  

Hoarders- fear that something bad will happen if you throw something away.  This is typically more prevalent in those with other issues like depression, PTSD, and ADHD….wait whhhaaattttt? That is me but I don’t really hoard and what I do keep is sentimental.  Due to PTSD and ADHD I am missing chunks of my childhood that I can’t recall.  Sometimes I can with help like with a song, or sound, a smell even helps trigger a memory here and there.  The biggest triggers are items so I have kept items that are tied to memories or people I don’t want to forget.  I would not say I am a hoarder by any stretch of the imagination but I do have a few crates in the basement.  

In the February 2011 issue of Behaviour Research and Therapy there is an article by David F. Tolin and Anna Villavivencio titled “Inattention, but not OCD, predicts the core features of Hoarding Disorder”.  This kind of breaks through stereotypes that it is a symptom of OCD. In the article they state that 83% of Hoarding patients denied other symptoms of OCD. Further they say that “Recent self-report, neuroimaging, and neuropsychological data converge to suggest that impaired cognitive functions (particularly attention) might be a core feature of hoarding that contributes to decision-making problems. On self-report measures, hoarders describe high levels of attentional impairment” 20% of Hoarders met adult inattention symptom criteria for ADHD. In OCD patients those with Hoarding were 10times more likely to have ADHD than those that didn’t have hoarding symptoms.” There are other connections as well.  People with ADHD tend to also have issues with excessive buying, gambling, skin picking all that have a high correlation with impulsivity.  If this is true then there is a persuasive argument to make Hoarding Disorder separate from OCD and even could be considered a co-morbidity of ADHD.  Currently Hoarding in the DSM-5 just highlights the emotional distress and urges to save and not get rid of things.  This would mean they need to add the neurocognitive functions and how they are affected. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0005796710002494?via%3Dihub

There is one more thing with OCD and ADHD I want to get into and that is Rumination.  Rumination I think deserves it’s own episode so I am going to release it as a follow up or part 2 to this one.