[tin58]

I was just doing some self examination and I believe I have an idea as to where my ocd (mostly obsessive tho, and my official dx is ptsd) type symptoms come from.

My parents were alcohlics. Alcohlics have this need to appear to the outside world to be 'ok'. This results in exessive energy and attention given to the "where a perfect family" facade. So as a child I would be harshly critizised or judged by my parents if I didn't maintain this perfect facade for them. This unreasonable and unrealistic criticsm leads to my obsessing over minute details trying to get everything right or perfect.

an example might be say I left the house with light jacket. My parents might reason that the jacket is too light and that the neighbors would think they are bad parents for sending me in a light jacket. They would in turn harshly judge and criticize my jacket choice. (Even if there was nothing wrong) this then leads me to today were I might obsessively worry or change jackets before going out.

Idk I'd just thought I'd share my thoughts. Anyone else have some ideas on where their ocd symptoms stem from?

[kaliope]

well i can certainly identify with your story, tho my parents didnt drink and i never considered it ocd. but i certainly remembered the feeling of having to "play a part" to make the family look like something we werent. i find that one of the sad parts of knowing i was doing at the age of 5. but being perfect, i sure know that one. have to be perfect to be loved. i never thought about it as obsessing over everything having to be perfect. but i certainly had the anxiety and panic attacks when things were not working out.

[tin58]

Thanks for your input Kaliope. I don't generally refer to it as ocd myself, rather I would just refer to it as simply anxiety. I'm calling it ocd because I thought it shares some similarities. And my therapist has described some stuff as ocd-like. But for instance I don't really have the physical compulsions that many suffer from. IE the stereotypical hand washing or door lock checking type stuff. Mostly it's just like obsessive worry about being prepared or avoiding all danger or possible things that could go wrong when something stressful comes up. Most recently is was a leisurely trip to the city. And i started freaking out about all sorts off small details... that's what got me thinking about why I do it and where it comes from.

[MusicMike]

I have mostly obsessions too. They are powerful obsessions and affect almost everything I do. I think it's largely genetic. My earliest memories include being anxious and obsessive, and in therapy I've been able to look at my deep personality which was affected by my very early infancy and I see lots of anxiety and obessiveness.

Unlike some with OCD, I haven't been very conscious of my obsessions and they didn't seem to come from "outside me." I always thought of them as part of my personality, so I didn't have a lot of insight into the possibility there was another way of living life until after a lot of therapy. So I think of myself as having an "obsessive personality" as a part of OCD... perhaps part of this was learned from my parents, who are also anxious people and my father has obvious OCD.

Mike