Can’t Figure It Out Friday – What’s Raw

Posted on by
Reply

This week Oz made Lala a sweet potato. He looked up how long to boil it. Did that. Cut it up and served it up. Lala wanted nothing to do with it. Thank goodness, because later when Oz told me that Lala didn’t really eat the sweet potato he also explained there maybe probably was something wrong with it because it was really hard. I was confused.

“You mean you served our daughter a food item that you’re pretty sure had something wrong with it?  AND was it hard like it is when it’s raw?”

“I don’t know”, he said. “I cooked it for as long as it said to, so it had to be cooked. I think there was just something wrong with it.”

“Again, I’m not sure what’s worse, the fact that you didn’t even think to maybe cook the sweet potato a little longer or the fact that you are certain there was something wrong with it and gave it to Lala anyway.”

I was so angry. Not with Oz, because I know he always tries to do the right thing and wouldn’t ever try to put Lala in danger. Instead, I was angry with his autism/aspergers that kept him from being able to problem solve and make right a bad situation. The autism just couldn’t let go of the original plan. Press on, it said. Press on.

Can’t Figure It Out Friday – Which Pillow is His

Posted on by
1

Oz and I have very different pillows. Mine is flat and firm. His is fluffy and fluffy. He’s always complaining that he doesn’t like his. I tell him to get a different one from the pile of 40 of them in the closet, but he never does. Then every once in awhile he says, “Hey, thanks babe! You gave me your pillow. That’s so nice.” And I say, “No, I didn’t. That’s your pillow. The same pillow you sleep with and complain about every night. BUT I’m glad you are enjoying it. Goodnight.”

No to Baby #2

Posted on by
Reply

for now. With the vitamins I’m taking, pregnancy is not in the cards so we’ve decided to have a decision making hiatus for at least 3 months while I get better.

And one other update…acupuncture is kicking my butt, or my kidneys. This really deep treatment to get stuff out is doing SOMETHING. After the last treatment, my back and shoulders were so knotted up I could barely breathe so I went to the chiropractor. He asked me if I was doing some kind of detox. I said that was what we were focusing on in acupuncture. He said it must be working because part of the reason my back was sore was that my kidneys were all swollen. He prescribed epsom salt baths.  They are working to relieve the back discomfort, so on with the acupuncture. I’ve got 7 more sessions of this divergent channel stuff to get all of the bad juju out. My acupuncturist said my mantra is supposed to be something about, “I release and I relax.”, but I usually focus on, “Good riddance and get out now”. She also said that if my back gets tense again, Oz should use a chinese spoon to scrape it until the skin gets speckly with blood and that should do the trick. Then in addtion to all of that torture stuff, I’m having to swallow down or rub on Oz’s juiced concoction, acupuncture herbs, essential oil rubs, stone elixirs, and vitamins. I’m like a walking natural pharmacy. I smell like a combination of anise, dirt, and apples. My face is all broken out and my stomach always feels kinda woozy like a caffeine overdose. Overall, it’s been a blast.

OCD Hates Me – The Back Story

Posted on by
Reply

I know this blog is called Vitiligo Loves OCD, and while I love Oz and he loves me, OCD actually hates me…and the feeling is mutual. Back when Oz and I met (13 years ago), we had a love-hate relationship and we fought A LOT. I’m sure some of it had to do with immaturity (and alcohol, and distracting co-ed hotties), but I think a lot of it was OCD.

As I’ve gotten to know Oz over the years, I’ve realized that he is the most loving, kind, and supportive man I could have dreamed up, most of the time. There’s another side to him though. A defensive, edgy, argumentative, and agitated side, I call the pit bull (pardon the breedism). I now know the pit bull is actually OCD.

When we were younger, Oz had no diagnosis and no clue what was tugging at him, distracting his thoughts and disrupting his daily activities. Instead he self-medicated, with alcohol, and lashed out when he was tested. And that was me, the tester. I was always pushing, asking, seeking out the answers. I couldn’t understand how there could be these two personalities existing in the same body. I didn’t know what would set Oz off and turn him into the pit bull. I didn’t know until a winter break from college when I went to visit him at his parents house.

I had seen Oz do some weird things, like turn the air conditioning in the car off and then back on again after I had just turned it on, or walk back and forth between his bedroom and the bathroom to get one item at a time (toothbrush, face wash, mouth wash) when getting ready for bed at night. I thought he was just a little controlling. On that visit during winter break I saw his weirdness swing out of control. He came down the stairs and did a weird spin at the bottom. He had do to this annoying shake with his sock after he took it off. He couldn’t sleep at night. He was nervous and squirrelly. He barely spoke to me and when he did it wasn’t very nice. He was a major pit bull. What a jerk. I hate you.

Once we got back to school, I started reading about OCD in my Psych 101 text book. It clicked. I showed Oz. He agreed. Oz wasn’t one of those wash his hands, or be really neat kind of OCDers, so he never related to that stereotype. Oz’s OCD was really all in his head. Walk this way to class and your dad dies, walk this way to class and your sister dies. What should I do? Zoey catches up to me as I walk out of the building and asks me to walk with her. Great. That way to class my dad’s going to die. Zoey pisses me off so much. I hate her.

And that’s how it went, just by getting close to Oz, I pushed his buttons and felt the wrath of the OCD. But there was more to it. I really did push Oz and the OCD. I asked, prodded, quizzed, forced. Especially once I was on to him. Once I knew about his OCD I unknowingly became ERP incarnate. And OCD hated me for it. OCD hated me figuring out the cause of the two personalities. OCD hated me explaining it to Oz and helping him to separate it from himself. OCD hated me challenging him not to give in and to deal with his anxiety. OCD hated Oz having a new best friend and protector. And sometimes Oz hated it too. Oz was reluctant to give up his old pal, like a boy bonded to his first dog. Oz was convinced the OCD helped him and couldn’t imagine his life without it. So years went by, on again, off again between Oz and me. Me insisting the whole time that there wasn’t room enough for both me and the OCD. That Oz had to take control of his life and get rid of his dysfunctional best friend. Oz not sure he could live or wanted to live without the OCD.

After many years, love won out. And knowledge. The more I learned about OCD, the more I shared with Oz. I encouraged him to get GOOD therapy (often hard to find). He started to realized the OCD wasn’t getting him anywhere and that it was keeping him from living life. And I learned I can’t push or force OCD out. It’s always going to be there, and Oz has to control it. Not me. I can tell him that OCD is bothering me, but that’s Oz’s friend, and he’s gotta be the one to deal with it and tell OCD what’s what.

BUT..sometimes I still have to mess with my old enemy OCD. So…every now and then I’ll be posting about the current reason OCD hates me.

OCD Hates Me Reason #1 - I cough in his face! Yes. I am that annoying. If when I cough politely to myself you turn your head so fast you nearly cause yourself whiplash, puff up your cheeks and do that weird convulsive using every muscle in your body to blow every possible bit of air out of your lungs forcefully through your nose as if to expel any germ that ever entered your body, and then breathe your next 20 breaths through your shirt that you have now lifted up over your nose…I will climb on your lap with a sweet and sexy smile, wait until you are disarmed and trusting, and cough in your face. AND I won’t care if you’re mad about it. I hate OCD that much. Muah (cough, cough).

More Pills

Posted on by
Reply

I guess in keeping with the pill theme of today, I started taking my new vitamins. When they came in the mail yesterday afternoon, I decided to wait until this morning to give them a go. Fresh start. New life.

I unwrapped the seal slowly and intentionally. I poured them out, held them in my hand, closed my eyes, and sent out a little prayer. I asked that these vitamins help nourish my body, putting it back in balance. I asked that I feel good so I am fearless, successful, healthy, and happy. I asked that I have the strength and energy to fulfill all of my dreams starting today and that I live the best life I possibly can. And finally I asked that I see my skin repigmenting more each day. I closed my prayer with a thank you, lifted the pills to my mouth, then attempted to swallow the little nasties.  It took quite a bit of gagging and head jerking, because, unlike Oz, I do NOT like pills. After the barfy feeling went away and the hot feeling drained from my face, I tried to regroup and get back to the happy place I went to during my prayer.

Instead, I was left standing in the place of the swallowing (or semi-swallowing) incident, wondering how I was going to get the pills down tomorrow. Oz looks over at me as he reads the label on the pill bottle, and says, “It says you can take these one to THREE times a day, so you should take these again in a few hours. Let’s hit this thing hard. More’s gotta get you better faster.” I fight back one more urge to barf and I think to myself that my prayer was probably a tad overzealous.

Favorite Things – Pills

Posted on by
Reply

Oz has his “favorite things”.  Most of them bordering on or classifying as obsessions. In my Favorite Things posts I’ll be mentioning these things, in all of their cute quirkiness.

Today’s post is about pills! Oz loves them. Vitamins, prescriptions, liver cleanses, muscle enhancers, any of it. If one is good, more is better. No water necessary. Just choke ‘em down. You can feel it already. Healthier, stronger, cleaner, leaner, smarter.

In fact, I’d love for him to be able to get off of his prescription anit-depressant medication. I think in the back of his mind, he’d love it too. But besides the real effects of the medication, the placebo effect has such a stronghold on his psyche I don’t think it’s ever a possibility. Maybe if we could find a replacement pill, like an all natural anti-anxiety/depressant he would consider it.

That’s the thing with the love of these favorite things. The love is like energy. It can be transferred from one thing to another, but it never really goes away. I think you just hope to trade one favorite thing in for another healthier, more functional favorite thing. I guess in that train of thought, his favorite thing for anxiety and depression used to be alcohol, and now it’s pills. That’s certainly a trade up. Here’s to better obsessions to come! Cheers.

Can’t Figure It Out Friday – How to Be Quiet

Posted on by
Reply

It’s Friday already! This week I’m thinking about peace and quiet and how to get more of it. Oz is no help. No one that knows him would ever believe that Oz is contributing to the noise around our household. He is typically described as quiet and shy. A man of few words. All of our friends would all be shocked to know that Oz is a groin thrusting, fist pumping, butt slapping, singing fool.  At home that is. See, when there is nothing going on he feels a need to fill the silence for fear of being alone with his obsessive thoughts. He typically fills that quiet void with any number of things, like reading or TV. But when those things aren’t available to him, like while in the bathroom getting ready in the morning, or in the kitchen cooking, he reverts to scripting (the repetition of a phrase or song). Since I work with children on the autism spectrum I’ve always known about scripting, and how much it can annoy everyone around the scripter, but it wasn’t until a few years ago I realized my husband was actually a scripter too!

I knew the repetition of “callate la boca” that had morphed over time into “quality la boca” was about to send me over the edge. I knew that no matter how much I asked Oz to stop he seemed unaware that he was even doing anything. He seemed to be in a calming trance of verbal diarrhea.

But now the scripting has gotten out of hand.

Since I’ve brought the scripting to Oz’s attention, he seems to have gotten more aware of when he’s mouthing off. Good, right? No. Because what has not improved is his ability to shut himself up! Instead this is what happens: Oz starts scripting a little song he heard on the radio; realizes he’s doing it; can’t stop himself; chooses to escalate the scripting by getting louder, adding a little hip rolling action, and moving himself closer to me hoping that I’ll finally scream, “Stop it!”; I scream which satisfies his need for something, attention, anything to fill his busy mind and allows him to finally shut up; and in turn leaves me completely annoyed and frazzled.

Glad Lala’s learned the word “hush”. Maybe I can get a little help around here.