living with guy with obsessive compulsive personality disorder

Anyone have advice for coping with my fiance's weird behaviors? He has to have everything organized a certain way or he gets really angry. We just moved in together, and
I moved a shower caddy he had hung yesterday. He went crazy saying he had measured to get it perfect, so now he was throwing it away because I touched it. He has taken 100 times longer to move me than needed because he has to make an ordeal out of every little thing. We hired a young man to help move heavy things. They could have moved the furniture in one day, but it took many many hours (me paying the kid hourly) as my boyfriend is so controlling. He can't hold a real job, because he takes hours just to set up something and never gets around to the real work. He somewhat sees he has a problem but doesnt really know the extent, and how much it makes him unable to function and it makes him socially isolated. He is nice looking so that has helped him get by with a lot. Much of the time he is affectionate, loving, and fun to be around for me, but then the slightest thing can suddenly send him into a rage. Then after he blows up he apologizes shortly thereafter, and returns to being nice. If I confront him when he is raging it only makes him worse. If I just act like everything is okay my life runs smoother until I accidentally do something to disrupt his order of things. Has anyone else been through this?

OCD can have many different variants...I guess the first question I have...is this something you can accept about him for the rest of your life? I would not expect it to change...cause you can't force help on someone...

If you can't see yourself living like this...probably a good time to move back out...

If you can see yourself living with this and accepting and loving this man...I think you will find a lot of ways you can cope with it...

There are three levels of OCD. The first is obviously OCD, the next is aspergers syndrome and then there is autism.

Each stage is a worse manifestation of the one before, and they all deal with personal security.

Autistics lack emotional capacity, well ask yourself what the brain occupies itself with if there is no emotion. The inanimate objects around him/her.

Aspergers syndrome has the same tendencies only they are more open allowing more stimuli to be taken in and the cyclical tendencies aren’t as bad.

Then you have OCD. Well OCD basically the manifestation of a bad experience where emotion is put out of mind or criticism was taken at a young age restricting feelings.

Now ask yourself how open is your spouse? Does he have anything to hide? Basically what I am saying is get him to open up to you emotionally and the OCD will subside with time as he learns to draw on his emotions. With some people and depending on how old he is, the mind may already be in a decline basically ensuring that there is no change in behavior. However, you also have to remember that the mind is a dynamic machine and with the right changes anything can happen.

Anyways it has to do with him hiding his feelings, or not having much in the first place.

Good luck and I hope I have at least helped.

Chris

OCD is not on the same spectrum as autism or asperger's syndrome. OCD is an anxiety disorder, autism and asperger's are not.

Also, I believe the poster was asking about OCPD, not OCD. The are differences between these two: OCD is an anxiety disorder, OCPD is a personality disorder. While OCD is characterized by obsessions and compulsions, as a manifestation and release of anxiety, OCPD is characterized by obsessions having to do with rules and regulations. The person lacks flexibility and is extremely rigid with routines. Another major differnece is that OCPD is a lifelong way of coping that manifests itself across any situation the person is in-- AND with OCPD the person typically doesn't realize that there is anything wrong with what he/she is doing... not the case for OCD, in which the person realizes that something is wrong.

Excellent explanation, Pink!

My mother has OCPD, and I can attest that it's nothing like OCD (and certainly nothing like Asperger's), as far as I can tell. It's also not much fun to live with, as the person tends to believe they are right about everything, theirs is the only way to do things, and other people can't possibly live up to their standards (which is probably true). They tend to be über organized and dislike anyone tampering with their "system," whatever it is. They also seem to be a bit challenged in the humor and spontenaity departments.

Did I mention they're not fun to live with? This has been my experience, anyway.

I tend to disagree, as the same tendencies all come from the same source. Lack of emotion or suppression of emotion. That’s my opinion though, symptoms yes they are apart. But as people open up, perspective gets bigger and the more severe symptoms begin to disappear leaving only the minor ones such as organization. Perspective is related to intake of information witch is emotion. Emotion relates to people, compromise takes place and symptoms disappear.

There is also another aspect to this that you may not know about, the genius Tesla tested the frequencies in which the mind ran at and found that it adapts based on the stimulus received. Well essentially a rise in emotion is just that. Stimulus, well if the mind is adapting to the emotion, frequency goes up changing the layout of the neurons. Not sure if you know anything about cymatics but it is basically responsible for all the shapes in nature. Anyways onward. The mind basically needs something to do if there is no emotion involved or at least suppression. Well inanimate objects are the focus, Right angle stacking ect. Well at low frequencies this is the exact patterns that low frequencies make. I can’t say for sure that there is a connection but it sure seems that way.

There is also a connection between high frequencies and creativity which lends to the ideas even more. Because at high frequencies more and more complex shapes are created which is fueled by emotion, hence women, artists and gay guys are all very emotional and can be creative. Not all but most. They also have very vivid dreams and directly links to the creative side as well. That is why I think Suppressed emotion is directly linked to OCD OCPD or whatever. It’s all related. This is why it is so important to study other fields instead of just psychology. Philosophy offers truth, evolution offers laws that we all follow; cymatics offers a hidden science that doesn’t even get noticed by most of the scientific community. Everything is connected in way or another and linear thinking just doesn’t recognize this notion and really suppresses creative thought. It’s a damn shame too

Nevermind. I just read your post a second time.

Those rages concern me. What does he do when he is in a rage? The rigidity that you describe sounds like it could be OCPD. Has he been officially diagnosed with that?

Pinksoil is right about the difference between OCD and OCPD. OCPD has to do with rigidity and inflexibility. It probably is hard on him adjusting to someone moving into his space too, although OCPD tends to bother the people who interact with the person who has it, and not really bother the person who has OCPD. They like to have things their own way. Your fiance sounds pretty extreme, though, and I wonder if there could be more to it. Maybe you could tell us more about why you want to be with him. The rages just are ringing a warning bell for me. Do you feel safe with him?

I work as a counselor for a juvenile & domestic court, and have had a lot of training an therapy. I knew my fiance had some sort of psychiatric problem and went on-line to find out what it was. OCPD fit his behaviors to a tee. He was raised by an educated RN mom who was nuturing, but had a jerk of a dad who was verbally and physically abusive. Many years ago (over 10) my fiance did slap his ex-wife around some (no real injuries) and did jail time for it and was required to attend therapy. We have been through some real stressful situations, and he did once punch a door. He is always very repentant after he rages and assures me that he would never hurt me physically. He learned in anger management how to cope with his anger. I do think he is still capable of hurting me when he gets angry; BUT when he is in that state I know how to not provoke him and how to get him to calm down. His ex wife still calls him for advice, so he couldn't have been that bad to her. I know he is not ideal for a mate, but he is caring, considerate, and very attentive to me the majority of the time. He has been made fun by others enough to know that his "neat freak" obsessions are not normal BUT he still persists in making sure the bed is made perfectly, the towels are hung perfectly, all clothes are folded his way, and on and on. I'm not sure whether it is best to just let him have his way or stand up for my rights. I kind of pick and choose my battles with him. I guess what kills me is that it is the unexpected dumb little things that sometimes set him off-like moving the shower caddy to a different spot.
What also irritates me is that it takes him 1000 times longer to do ANYTHING than needed, because he has to organize it a certain way and then do it a certain perfect way. But usually his way (like to paint a room, or hook up a TV, or cook something, etc. ) is just unnecessarily slow and tedious. This keeps him from holding any normal job.
He however thinks his way is not only right, but the best way. He thinks the people who fire him are unfair jerks. He wants me to compliment him on the dumb way he does things. I know he can't handle the truth about his behavior. Any suggestions on how you cope with OCPD would be appreciated. Do any meds help? If so, what are the side effects?

"What also irritates me is that it takes him 1000 times longer to do ANYTHING than needed"

Based on what you have posted...it would seem the least of your concerns...don't you think?

Compare the length of time with pretty much the rest of your post...I guess my only suggestion in dealing with this is to move back out...let things cool off a little bit and take a really good look at your relationship...

What is critical in any relationship is good candid assertive communication...Sounds like he is aggessive and your passive...that really doesn't set things up for success...spend a year or two separte each working on your own on being assertive...If he is not interested in this...I think you have a really important piece of information about how the relationship is viewed from his prespective...all other issues aside.

I thank everyone who has responded so far. I'm NOT moving out away from my guy, unless he physically abuses me or something drastic. I do love him, and really just want to help him with this OCPD problem. Perhaps I just have to tolerate it. By nature I'm not passive at all. I just find that confronting him over every silly thing he obsesses over is not worth it. I'm pretty used to getting my way in a relationship (was in a 30 year marriage that ended a little over a year ago), but realize that I need to change and give in more to a partner's wishes to have a relationship work. I just wondered about OCPD and if folks who have it ever improve and become less compulsive about everything.

A little bit of OCPD can be an asset, if it is applied to getting things done in a productive way. Probably anyone who makes it through graduate school has a bit of OCPD. I think the key is where they focus it, and whether they can recognize when something isn't helping them. Do you think that your guy can do that?

<font color="#000088">I have an OCD of the same type,but not as severe. I have all my things organized and in place,and I can tell if they have been moved even an inch. My clothes in my closet are all hung up according to size and color coordinated. Even my DVD's are set in order to what type of movies they are from horror,to Crime Drama,to Comedy's,and then PS2 games. So I can tell when anything has been disturbed.My books are the same way,subject,alphabetized,and the size of the book. You get the point!
But the difference with me and your fiance, is that if something is moved, I don't fly into a rage about it. I do get irritated,and move it back. But I can't have a roommate because of it,I can't stand having someone come in and mess up my order,and clean apt. or it would drive me nuts.I would'nt throw away a shower thing you were talking about,just because it was moved,and touched, it's gonna get moved and touched when you take your showers anyway! LOGIC! But I can live with myself,but I think it would be hard for someone else to live with me,unless they liked things spotless. And didn't mess things up! But flying into a rage isn't a safe environment for you to be in. My ex-fiance was the same way,and he eventially ended up trying to kill me in one of his rages.Luckily there was a cop right around the corner of our apartment,and kicked the door in and tackled him on the diningroom floor,he had a knife in his hand,and was on his way back in the bedroom to finish what he started.
He didn't know I had already dialed 911 on the cordless after he broke the fan over my head,and face in the bedroom! I was lucky!
Be safe,and be careful!</font>