Sometimes I wonder if this is true. I want to trust God with all my heart and mind, but I can't...I don't. I believe that He died on the cross for me, and believe that He is the one and only true God. However, my life is not evident that I am a Christian. I have not been changed, other than believing all this, and I don't possess any fruits as a result of the Holy Spirit. I have often wondered if maybe my heart is hardened, because He has tried one too many times with me and I just won't repent. I have even read articles by Christian authors that speak of people like me and refer to them as demon possessed. Eddie says that if I am truely demon possessed, then I wouldn't seek God so often, that I would writh in anger and fear at the mention of His name. But, if I am so sure of my eternity, then why do I react so badly to fear.
2 Timothy 1:7
For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.
I am crying out to Him to give me power, love, and self-discipline, but I don't have any of those. I don't love others. I am more scared of them and what they can do to hurt me, so I would never bother to help them especially in the case of them being physically wounded. My psychiatrist said that God knows that I have OCD. But, I believe that if God created the world and allowed His only son to die, but then arose him from the dead after three days, then He must be able to cure me. Every waking moment is a sin when I struggle with OCD. It over powers every single other thing in my life and the bad thing is, it is beginning to take my relationship with my children. Sometimes, I wonder if I wouldn't be better off in a mental institution so they couldn't see me like this until I am well, but then I hate to leave them with these awful images of me and then not see me at all for months. I remember that...when my mom was in the hospital, I didn't see her and the few times she came home, all she did would cry and cry. It scared me to death. The one person I loved more than anything else in the world wasn't happy, and it terrified me.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Runaway Bride
Whenever I am in a bad situation, I run(fast). Yesterday, I went to Walmart in Manning which is 15 miles away. There is no grocery store that I can go to in town. Two stores are in the vicinity of a local hotel(nice area of town) in which there was a fatal shooting two weeks ago and a guy bleed to death in the parking lot. That hotel is always bustling with activity and I have convinced myself that someone went to Walmart which is right across the street and somehow tracked blood in the store or the parking lot. Even the thought of this makes me want to vomit. The other two stores that are in a nice area and not in the ghetto, are Food-Lion and Bi-Lo. I used to love Bi-Lo, because they have a U-Scan which means I can check myself out. I hate going through a belt line with a cashier because there is usually meat blood on the belt(which makes me do the "what ifs" "What if it is human blood?" ). Shiver. However, at Bi-Lo, in the fridge section, they have long black strings of mold hanging underneath each shelf and it really grosses me out. Most of their condiments and things are always out of date and I have even seen outdated items in the fridge section. At Food Lion, recently, I saw a huge puddle of reddish stuff in the parking lot, but no evidence of glass. I did check the police blotter and the paper, but neither one mentioned any violence. I am still terrified to buy groceries there.
So anyway, at Manning...I spend about an hour in the store because I needed certain things and only had $70.00 with me. I really needed to buy more items than I had the money for, so I was trying to buy generic of some things and cut out some of the things on my list. It took me forever. Especially since, anytime I would see any red or brown spill, I would have to sanitize my hands and put back whatever item was near the spill in violation. I was a nervous wreck at checkout. I went to the U-Scan line just so I wouldn't have to deal with inspecting the cashiers for someone that was absent of cuts or red marks on their skin. Well, I scanned half of my groceries and put them back in my cart before I realize that right there on the bag stand was a reddish brown stain. I ran, left my entire cart and everything and just walked quickly out the store. Looking back, I should have inspected the stain, because it could have been gum, candy, salsa, ketchup, etc.
But the only thing that made sense at that moment was to get the heck out of there.
On the way home, I beat myself up about it. I felt unclean, but I also felt psychotic. I knew Eddie would be irritated as hell at me for coming home empty handed. He was...but I deserved it.
All night, this bothered me. We really were out of major things that we need to survive, so I made plans to take the kids out for lunch and then we were going to go strawberry picking today so that we could have a healthy dinner of strawberries and pasta. I decided that on the way, we would stop by Zaxby's for lunch. I was really nervous about this, but decided that lunch before was the way to go since the kids would probably have dirt all over their hands from the strawberry farm. Horrible idea. I wonder sometimes if I am cursed or if God is trying to teach me a lesson. We went through the drive-thru. Everything seemed fine, I gave her the money, she gave me the drinks, then she turned around to go get our food...and I saw it...a wet red streak on the side of her arm, right near her elbow. Without thinking twice about it, I put the car in drive and took off. I didn't wait for our food and I threw away the drinks. I panicked the entire way home. Once I got home, I threw away my clothes, wiped down my body with bleach(because I handled those items and had the drinks in my lap) and then bleached the tub, installed a new shower curtain and also bleached the floor. We have wood floors. I wanted to call Zaxby's just to see if it were blood or ketchup on her arm. Normally, Zaxby's uses the individual ketchup packets and they have a Zak sauce that they add to everything. I doubt she nor anyone who was working there would tell me if it really were blood anyway, so I didn't call. versus ketchup. They do offer it, but don't add it to their menu items. I still feel like I can't drive my car tomorrow and we are almost out of groceries. I am planning on having Eddie get us take out for lunch and dinner. I really feel like I am losing it, but also wonder why I keep coming in contact with stuff like this. I am really trying to trust God, but on the way there, I prayed that I wouldn't see anything. Is that too much to ask? I believe that He can perform miracles...but I need a miracle but I haven't been given one.
So anyway, at Manning...I spend about an hour in the store because I needed certain things and only had $70.00 with me. I really needed to buy more items than I had the money for, so I was trying to buy generic of some things and cut out some of the things on my list. It took me forever. Especially since, anytime I would see any red or brown spill, I would have to sanitize my hands and put back whatever item was near the spill in violation. I was a nervous wreck at checkout. I went to the U-Scan line just so I wouldn't have to deal with inspecting the cashiers for someone that was absent of cuts or red marks on their skin. Well, I scanned half of my groceries and put them back in my cart before I realize that right there on the bag stand was a reddish brown stain. I ran, left my entire cart and everything and just walked quickly out the store. Looking back, I should have inspected the stain, because it could have been gum, candy, salsa, ketchup, etc.
But the only thing that made sense at that moment was to get the heck out of there.
On the way home, I beat myself up about it. I felt unclean, but I also felt psychotic. I knew Eddie would be irritated as hell at me for coming home empty handed. He was...but I deserved it.
All night, this bothered me. We really were out of major things that we need to survive, so I made plans to take the kids out for lunch and then we were going to go strawberry picking today so that we could have a healthy dinner of strawberries and pasta. I decided that on the way, we would stop by Zaxby's for lunch. I was really nervous about this, but decided that lunch before was the way to go since the kids would probably have dirt all over their hands from the strawberry farm. Horrible idea. I wonder sometimes if I am cursed or if God is trying to teach me a lesson. We went through the drive-thru. Everything seemed fine, I gave her the money, she gave me the drinks, then she turned around to go get our food...and I saw it...a wet red streak on the side of her arm, right near her elbow. Without thinking twice about it, I put the car in drive and took off. I didn't wait for our food and I threw away the drinks. I panicked the entire way home. Once I got home, I threw away my clothes, wiped down my body with bleach(because I handled those items and had the drinks in my lap) and then bleached the tub, installed a new shower curtain and also bleached the floor. We have wood floors. I wanted to call Zaxby's just to see if it were blood or ketchup on her arm. Normally, Zaxby's uses the individual ketchup packets and they have a Zak sauce that they add to everything. I doubt she nor anyone who was working there would tell me if it really were blood anyway, so I didn't call. versus ketchup. They do offer it, but don't add it to their menu items. I still feel like I can't drive my car tomorrow and we are almost out of groceries. I am planning on having Eddie get us take out for lunch and dinner. I really feel like I am losing it, but also wonder why I keep coming in contact with stuff like this. I am really trying to trust God, but on the way there, I prayed that I wouldn't see anything. Is that too much to ask? I believe that He can perform miracles...but I need a miracle but I haven't been given one.
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Cinco De Mayo
I had to work today which always causes stress before and after work, but during the day I always do *okay* managing my OCD. This weekend I got out of my car at Walgreens and noticed a pad of gauze with brown blood in my parking spot next to where I got out. I don't remember stepping on it, but still felt contaminated. I threw away my $8.00 flip flops and vowed to clean my car pedals and mats before I drove it again so as not to contaminate my other shoes. I have not had to drive my car since(actually I have been avoiding that very thing), so this morning I had to get up early to clean my mats and pedals with bleach. Of course, this meant that when I can back inside, I had to take one shower to clean myself so that I could clean the wood floors (in the path from the front door to bathroom) and then get a second shower. I ended up being late for work because of this ordeal. I also felt like the floor was still contaminated when I got out of the shower because it was not dry from when I had cleaned it. Work went fine. I worried about my children coloring on the brown cardboard box that the UPS guy had at my mom's because: What if, that same truck visits the hotel in which a guy was shot and bled to death in the parking lot over two weeks ago? I just tried not to think about it. When a student came into our office and announced that we shouldn't get close to her because she has Mono(well, why the heck did you come in then?), I briefly looked up how the virus is transmitted, then determined I wasn't at risk and brushed it from my mind. (I did use handsanitizer after this though and several more times throughout the day.) After work, I picked up the kids and headed home. Other than closely inspecting spills on the road for evidence of blood from any car accident that may have occured, it was uneventful. I headed to Walgreens to pick up my new prescription for Zoloft(hoping and praying this is my *fix*) and couldn't follow through because a man in a beat up old car was waiting for his prescription and I convinced myself that he MUST have AIDS. I am hoping and praying that I can follow through and pick up my prescription on tomorrow. Once home, we all came in, took baths(we never enter the house and touch anything before taking a shower). I took a shower and ran a bath for all three kids so they could play while I cleaned the floor. I then finished off with another shower and got them out of the tub and now I can finally feel safe and relax.
OCD
I am a 30 year old Christian female living with OCD. This blog will focus on my journey as I cling to God knowing that He is bigger than my OCD.
My obsessions are based on contamination. I am terrified of coming into contact with blood and spend excessive amounts of time creating a plan of action on how to handle contaminated objects and actually cleaning. I am being treated with Zoloft and trying hard to relinquish all my fears to God. It is a daily battle that is there when I wake up in the morning, when I go to sleep at night, and also haunts my dreams.
I am hoping that in keeping this blog, it will serve as a reminder to me of how far I have come(in the future) and how truely great our God is.
My obsessions are based on contamination. I am terrified of coming into contact with blood and spend excessive amounts of time creating a plan of action on how to handle contaminated objects and actually cleaning. I am being treated with Zoloft and trying hard to relinquish all my fears to God. It is a daily battle that is there when I wake up in the morning, when I go to sleep at night, and also haunts my dreams.
I am hoping that in keeping this blog, it will serve as a reminder to me of how far I have come(in the future) and how truely great our God is.
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