MickeyAnMeisce

I was wondering if anyone has had any experience with obsessive compulsive personality disorder (either having it or knowing someone who has it).

Here is an article that explains the difference between OCD and OCPD.

NYCDoglvr

Mickey .... twice I've been deeply hurt by someone I considered a very close friend. After reading a great deal, I discovered that OCPD describes him perfectly. What I do know is a leopard doesn't change his spots and I won't let this destructive person in my life again.

Thanks for posting.

MickeyAnMeisce

I'm sorry to hear about your experience.

I, however, was thinking more along the lines of how it might apply to me. I am not asking for a diagnosis or trying to self-diagnose. I'm just trying to understand how I interact with others.

Currently, I have been diagnosed with ADD, moderate major depressive disorder (possibly with obsessive-compulsive tendencies), and an alcohol abuse disorder. My experience of my own life though has been primarily through my mental illnesses other than the alcohol abuse (e.g., forcing myself to get out of bed because I could not stand the thought of falling asleep and having unsettling dreams again). My primary obsessions have been with things that are more abstract (I guess) than the archetypical obsessions of OCD (e.g., lock checking, which I also experience), such as being correct or being properly understood.

In fact, these have been the have been the obsessions that have, for lack of a better word, ruled my life for the last six years in such a way that I see my alcohol abuse as being primarily a coping mechanism for the obsessions. That is not to say that I consider the alcohol abuse to be a problem in itself; I am just explaining how I experience my life .

NYCDoglvr

My alcohol intake was self-medicating and I didn't think it was possible to stop drinking. It wouldn't have been on my own, I did it in AA. In early sobriety so many loving recovering addicts carried me along until I could walk alone.

I've suffered from depression most of my life, had what's called a mental breakdown in my 15th year of recovery but five years later I am in good shape. I have two diseases: alcoholism and depression. I treat the first disease with AA, the second with two wonderful doctors. I wouldn't be alive without both.

Keep in mind that alcohol IS a depressant. It picks us up when we start then it takes us down, down, down. I don't think anyone can deal with mental illness well until the addiction (pills & alcohol) are brought under control.