Dear Midnight:

I saw my therapist when I lived in Southern California. If you do too, let me know. He cannot legally treat a person who lives in another state (as I do for the past three years), via skype or such.

Regarding your concern about terminating your relationship with your therapist as being congruent with ROCD behavior: your therapist is not- or shouldn’t be- your friend or boyfriend-like in any way. He is supposed to be a professional, much like a medical doctor would be. He is paid for a purpose- to promote your healing. He has this professional obligation to you- to help you heal (or manage, as long as the goal is clear to both of you).

It is not your job to understand him, to reach out to him, to be liked by him, to figure his limitations and be understanding. It is his job to help you heal/ manage. This is why he is paid.

So, no- terminating your supposed professional relationship with him because he has not fulfilled his professional obligation to you does not fall within your ROCD.

My therapist’s initial diagnosis of me was not ROCD. I let him know from the beginning that I was already diagnosed with OCD. The diagnosis he started with was Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD)- and I no longer fit the criteria for that diagnosis. Anxiety- yes, still healing, in the process.

Regarding your thoughts: ” maybe I’m just ‘like that’. Maybe this is my character, my physiology even, and there’s nothing to be done.” This is what I thought too, for the longest time. Not completely: I was conflicted regarding Nature vs Nurture. After my therapy and my healing process of more than five years, ongoing, Nurture wins. As I communicate with other people online and in person, again and again, I see Nurture being most influential.

Nature is the case in animals that act strictly by instincts, like bees. Nurture plays more in animals that have emotions, like fear, attachment, anger, etc. And Nurture is most influential in animals that have emotions and a heavy duty ability to think, aka humans. A bee doesn’t need to learn anything, it instinctively knows what to do. A lioness cub has to be shown how to hunt, has to learn via watching a care taker. A person has a much more complicated life than a lioness, a complicated society, so a child learns a whole lot from caretakers, needs to learn to function effectively. Hence Nurture is very powerful.

anita