Morning session had just ended and we now had our thirty-minute break. I decided to take mine outside. It was very crisp fall day and I wanted to feel the coldness in solitude. Today’s morning session was taxing and made me weary. I walked out of the unit and off toward a small courtyard near an adjacent building. The leafy trees kept most of the courtyard in shade throughout the day. This made the brick-lain ground and the air in the courtyard even cooler than elsewhere in the surround.         I should have pulled the hood of my hoodie on, but I let the chilly air envelope my head. I felt it burn the tip of my ears and flush my cheeks....continue reading

        There’s a certain honesty to be found in lies (an oxymoronic prose and an admission). Lies reveal the extent of moral compromise one is willing to make and the degree of guilt one’s conscience will allow. In this sense, they can be regarded as a challenge to self. How much lying can one endure before it feels entirely wrong? What is the threshold before self-loathing? How long until lines are blurred and one starts to find it difficult to discern what was a lie from what actually occurred? For me lying became the default norm. I had to do it to cover up my OCD and justify my increasingly odd behavior. I lied to others and to myself. I lied to people I knew....continue reading

        About four weeks had passed since when I first arrived at McLean and I was actually starting to feel good about being there. It was easy to pretend that I was “on holiday” if I felt so inclined. The setting was certainly conducive to imaginative allusion. The New England fall is famously inspiring. After all, the area has bred some of literature and poetry’s more notable and rousing luminaries. Emily Dickenson, Herman Melville, Robert Frost, Henry David Thoreau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne to just name a few, pondered prose among the rich foliage of the Red Maples and in view of majestic White Cedars. And many of New England’s native trees were represented on....continue reading

        It was late on Sunday night. Despite an overwhelming sense of lethargy, I knew I wouldn’t be heading to bed anytime soon. Actually, I was in bed, I had just awoken from a lengthy nap, but I meant I wouldn’t be sleeping for the night anytime soon. As in on a normal day-to-night schedule, like what normal people do…not stay in bed all day and stay up all night. While I was lying in bed, still extremely tired, I wasn’t planning on sleeping anymore. I had to be at work early the next morning, yes, but I also had designated this weekend, which meant this Sunday night since I’m an extreme procrastinator, to do my “garbage heap cleaning.”        ....continue reading

        Apparently I was to meet Behavioral Therapist Jared in my room. I bet he wanted to observe how I had settled in, which could be described as “not well.” I hadn’t unpacked my large duffle bag or placed any clothes into the 1970’s looking, scratched, wooden three-drawer dresser. I tended not to allow my clothes and personal items to be housed in foreign containers. I may have ventured to unpack clothes into the bureaus in the Four Seasons hotel if I felt brave enough and after careful visual inspection, but placing my clean clothes into that dresser that was a dilapidated relic – no. At least my bed had been made and everything looked tidy.      ....continue reading

        As I walked into the room where the Morning Meeting takes place, I found that most of the chairs were already taken by the other patients. The chairs were arranged against the walls and everyone was facing each other. I didn’t know where to sit so I stood in the middle of the room awkwardly for a moment. I quickly try to assess who looks the least odd and “dirty” to me. I identify a nice-looking girl who appears to be in her early thirties and attired in Gap-like clothes. The seat next her is empty but so is the seat next to that one, so there’s a risk that a weirdo will come sit next to me after I take the seat next to her. As I can’t linger much longer....continue reading

        My cell phone alarm woke me up at five-thirty a.m. Being in an unfamiliar environment, I wanted to give myself some extra time to make it to the day’s first group session, which starts promptly at 8am. The staff had repeatedly warned me that they shut the door to group exactly at eight a.m. and they make absolutely no exceptions to let anyone in even if they arrive a second after the door closes. I didn’t want to make a bad first impression by missing my first session in which I’m to officially meet all the other patients. Suddenly I felt a familiar nervousness in my body that I couldn’t quite place.         I knew it wasn’t the same....continue reading

        Since it was my first day here, I had been left much to myself to get acquainted with my new environment. I learned later that this is done intentionally. While a strict regimen of structured time is in effect during one’s stay at McLean, the first day you check in you’re left to discover things on your own. They give you some time and space to take it all in. Not just the new environment that you’re in, but also the idea of where you are.         I spent the evening hours of my first day mostly walking around the hospital grounds and sitting by myself in the cafeteria building. After spending a good amount of time in the cafeteria doing....continue reading

        Monday, September 18. This was my first day at McLean Hospital, a preeminent psychiatric facility. It took about six years for me to get here. About six years back was when my OCD started, or at least when it took a turn toward severity. For six years I “lived” a double life. One life spent functioning as normally as possible, professionally and in society. The other life spent in perpetual anxiety and avoidance as an OCD sufferer. I think one of the reasons it took me so long to seek the kind of professional attention that requires checking into and residing in a psychiatric facility is that mental illness isn’t as tangible as a physical ailment. For....continue reading

        “My car’s ready to be picked up. I need you drive me to the body shop,” Ashley said. It was a small request which under normal circumstances I would have been happy to oblige, but this time I was panic-stricken. I started mentally scrambling and talking at the same time. “Well I can just have one of the trainees drive you,” I said. “I don’t think I should leave my desk. And my car is a mess. I will call the mailroom and get one of the trainees up here.”         ”No. I want you to take me. In your car,” said Ashley.         “Ash, my car is really messy right now. There’s junk everywhere! My passenger side has my workout....continue reading