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Obtain and read information and books about OCD so that the disorder can put into a proper perspective.
As you learn more, you will be able to make some new choices about your feeling and reactions to the OCD. For example, you will learn that your family member's strange and excessive behaviours are not caused by a lack of willpower, and that pleading, threatening or cajoling them to stop will not help. You will learn to accept that the OCD impulsive urge, anxiety and intrusive thoughts are the compelling force behind the repetitive behaviours, the slowness, the constant questions or requests for reassurance. You will also learn that you didn't cause it. You will recognize the important part you can play in your family member's recovery and discover many ways that you can help. The recovery journey will not e easy and you will still feel frustrated and despairing sometimes. However, now you know why you are feeling this way, and that your feelings are a reaction to the OCD, not the sufferer.
Take Some Time Our for Yourself
Every week - or every day if possible, spend some time doing something that you really enjoy and where you cannot be interrupted. We all need some time to ourselves, and we all need time to relax, have fun, and to pursue those goals that interest us. If you are able to look after you own mental and emotional well-being, you will cope better with the stresses that the OCD brings into you life.
Helping The Sufferer
If you have been living with a family member who has had severe OCD for along period of time, it is likely that the disorder has caused significant disruption and distress to your home life, relationships and social life. Possibly you have been involved in the sufferer's rituals or avoidance behaviours, trying to ease her distress, or just to keep the peace.
Avoidance Behaviours:
People with OCD avoid many situations or objects that trigger their compulsions. Your involvement in avoidance behaviours may take many forms - for example, you may do all the shopping because the sufferer's compulsions are triggered by contamination and decision making fears involved with buying food, or you may always have to cook the meals, clean the house, or answer the home telephone or the front door because of similar triggers of compulsions and the sufferer becomes too distressed if pressed to to these things. There are several things that you can do to help ease the daily stresses as is the sufferer in their recovery.
Share your knowledge and new understanding of the disorder with the sufferer.
The isolation that four family member has been feeling has been an enormous burden, and she has been feeling distressed and guilty about the affect of the disorder on you. Now, hopefully, you will both be able to talk about the disorder, and express your feelings about it, openly and honestly. This will be a great beginning to the healing process for both of you, and any other family members of friends that are involved.
Encourage the sufferer to talk to you about her disorder.
This will help you to understand exactly how her obsessions and compulsions, have been interwoven into the daily fabric of her life, an yours. This may be very difficult for as it is often very embarrassing and to explain, so ask, but don't push and let her tell you in her own time. When your family member does decide to confide in you, listen attentively, encourage her to get it all out , and thank her for trusting you. Return this trust by accepting what she tells you as an hones and accurate account of what she feels and experiences. Ask questions, if you need to, to clarify what the anxiety or compulsion or obsession in and when it occurs, but don't start trying to engage the sufferer in discussion about the logic of her behaviours. The sufferer will immediately catch on to the fact that you do not understand, and it may be a long time before she will confide in you again.
Encourage the sufferer to obtain professional help.
Your role here will be to provide support and encouragement, and if she agrees, to offer some practical help in locating an experienced therapist. If the sufferer decided to try behaviour therapy, and if you have been extensively involved in the rituals or avoidance behaviours, it will be important that you join in the therapy at some stage. The sufferer will need your help as she begins doing the work with exposure and response prevention, and so you will need to know what to do, what not to do, and the best ways to support her. If you and other members of the family are involved in the sufferer's rituals or avoidance behaviours it is important that you begin to reduce your involvement and find ways of normalising the family routines. Firstly, discuss this with the sufferer - don't just abruptly stop your involvement as this may cause her a great deal of agonising distress. Tell her that you want to reduce your part in the rituals or avoidance behaviours to help her get better, and decide with her which ones you and other family members will no longer participate in. Set some realistic goals together, and make sure that the whole family agrees to abide by the plan. Once you begin to work cooperatively together in this way, your situation will gradually change and the sufferer will no longer take your involvement for granted. When the sufferer undertakes behaviour therapy or a self-help programme, the work you have done together will give her a great head start. Once therapy begins - whether pharmacotherapy" [medication] " or behaviour therapy, your involvement in the sufferer's rituals and avoidance behaviours should be reduced to zero - if at all possible. The doctor or therapist will need to be informed if y our involvement continues, so that they can work on this aspect with the sufferer.
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