cheryl
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The red thread of obsession - Aeon
t all began with a few drops of blood. Or, more precisely, a description of blood on the page. I was reading Lois Lowry’s childhood classic A Summer to Die (1977), about a girl who dies of leukaemia. The first sign that something’s wrong with Molly is a bloody nose that can’t be stopped. Whenever I got a bloody nose after that, I felt certain my own death was right around the corner. I’d check my arms and legs compulsively for errant bruises – another potential leukaemia symptom. I meditated on mortality more deeply before my teen years than some people do on their deathbeds. My obsession ran so deep, I had to throw away the offending book.
When, more than a decade later, a therapist told me I had obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), I could see with no trouble the red thread of obsession that ran through each stage of my life. At the time I was diagnosed, I fell at the extreme end of the broad human spectrum of obsessive traits, along with others who meet the criteria for OCD.
t all began with a few drops of blood. Or, more precisely, a description of blood on the page. I was reading Lois Lowry’s childhood classic A Summer to Die (1977), about a girl who dies of leukaemia. The first sign that something’s wrong with Molly is a bloody nose that can’t be stopped. Whenever I got a bloody nose after that, I felt certain my own death was right around the corner. I’d check my arms and legs compulsively for errant bruises – another potential leukaemia symptom. I meditated on mortality more deeply before my teen years than some people do on their deathbeds. My obsession ran so deep, I had to throw away the offending book.
When, more than a decade later, a therapist told me I had obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), I could see with no trouble the red thread of obsession that ran through each stage of my life. At the time I was diagnosed, I fell at the extreme end of the broad human spectrum of obsessive traits, along with others who meet the criteria for OCD.