Dear laelithia:

These are my suggestions:

1. Get on an SSRI (or another drug that targets OCD). I was on Zoloft for OCD but it is a stimulant of sorts, maybe not a good idea for you, an SSRI with a mild sedative affect will probably be better for you. Your obsessive thinking has been going rampant for a long time and you need a relief from it. SSRIs are not as difficult to get off as some other classes of drugs. It may very well work for you.

2. Do not move to Switzerland and attempt a life together with your boyfriend. It is not a good idea, not at all.

3. After you experience some relief from your obsessive thinking (and its ongoing theme, Regret), consider leaving your hometown and moving elsewhere in Canada where it is warmer. This will be your first move away from your hometown. Later, once you are settled there and the move was successful, you can consider moving to Europe or elsewhere.

-Living in your hometown near your family didn’t serve you well so far, you feel confident about your ability to make friends elsewhere, and living elsewhere, you will be less likely to concern yourself with comparing yourself to your sisters and friends your age and younger who are married with children.

4. Sometime after you get on an SSRI/ some other drug for your obsessive thinking, before or after you move elsewhere in Canada, attend quality psychotherapy.

5. After sometime in psychotherapy, attempt a relationship with a man you haven’t met yet, guided by your therapist as you enter the relationship and in its beginning. Until then date if you want, but don’t aim at a long term relationship. Accept the fact that you lost that competition of getting married and having children by a certain age, and that these things may not happen in your life at all.

I will soon be away from the computer and back in about 10 hours.

anita