annonymously

Yes, Elle is a pseudonym, and I hope that you, my (perhaps imaginary) reader, won't mind that I don't disclose my identity here. Why?

I debated about what sort of identity to construct for myself here, because I am committed to doing my part to break through the stigma that our society has about mental illness. At the same time, I want to be candid with what I write here; I worry that I might censor myself if someone I knew personally could simply stumble upon my blog and know I was the one writing it.

Although in my last post, I stated that my target audience is other people who have OCD and are trying to live with it-- and this is true-- I know that some of the people who find this blog may be looking to understand what their loved one with OCD is experiencing. And this, in the end, was the deciding factor in concealing my identity. If you are here because you are trying to understand the OCD experience, I want you to be able to imagine that I am your mother, or your sister, or your daughter, or your lover.

For this reason, also, I may sometimes limit the detail with which I describe my symptoms, or blur or even edit details that seem too closely interwoven with my real self. I have never been ashamed of my symptoms and do not mind talking about them on a person-to-person basis. If you have questions or would like to simply speak to someone who can relate, I welcome your email at elle [dot] ocd [at] gmail [dot] com.

this is a blog about OCD.

This is a blog about living with OCD. I started it because, of all the things that are important to me, OCD is the one subject on which I have only found a handful of blogs addressing it.
Also, as a person living with OCD, I have a terrible time following through with things. Writing for publication (even blog form) is also a huge exposure for me. So this is a challenge I set for myself: to follow through with posting here, even if nobody else reads it.

What I write here is going to be aimed at people like myself, who have already been diagnosed and have lived with the disorder (a funny name for it, given its nature) for many years.  I hope to focus my blogging on being positive and moving forward. I want to chronicle the ways I have succeeded in living a (mostly) functional life when, at one point, I was debilitated enough by my illness that I was almost completely removed from society.

I plan to write about tools and techniques I have used to handle my many symptoms in different situations. Of course, I am not a doctor, and I have no medical training. My somewhat far-fetched hope is that through this blog, I can create a small community where positive encouragement and ideas for living with OCD can be shared... but nothing, least of all a blog, can replace a real-life therapist and psychiatrist. I believe this fully, which is why I am sharing this disclaimer up front.

Welcome, if you are here and actually reading this post. Please feel free to comment and share your thoughts on whatever you read here. I hope to learn from others as I embark on this blogging journey.