Topic : 08/05 If People Really Knew ...

It appeared to me (a certified psychotherapist) that Dr. Phil left Ed with the impression that Obsession/Compulsion Personality disorder was NOT his a problem even though Dr. Phil read to Ed the characteristics of OBP. Having had clients like Ed, I'm aware that it is rare that he can change enough to salvage the relationship with his wife who probably will never trust him again--even if he says he'll change and tries to be different for a while. I'm really interested in a follow-up to this piece. With so little information about this couple except what was shared on television, I almost didn't post this message. But the more I thought about the ambiguity of Dr. Phil's message to Ed and Ed's misunderstanding just WHAT Dr. Phil was saying, I had to write. My son-in-law is also a textbook OBP and he is creating both personal and professional havoc for my daughter. The general public has NO idea of what goes on in that home. My concern focuses on how this havoc is impacting on their two children: a boy age 5 and a girl age 3.

I saw this show for the second time and listened more closely to this segment because Ed was like my Mom - nothing was ever neat enough, clean enough or done well enough to suit her. I thought it fit the description Dr. Phil gave of OCD personality disorder. If this woman gets a knot in her stomach when he comes home ,how do you think the kids feel?  I still get a knot in my stomach when my mom calls on the phone although I understand her behavior as something she cannot change and she needed to be tightly in control of everything. But it is very abusive to the kids and the wife. I would have separated from him. The best part now is when ever my Mom comes to visit she cleans the refrigerator!!!!:>) She's done it for years but we live far away. I actually relaxed when I moved to a different state and got fewer headaches. Another town wasn't far enough. Dr. Phil, Please have a show about clean freaks or perfectionists and how this can be abusive. Perhaps an update on this couple. I know you can't tell every couple to split but when you said you thought he didn't have OCD and that they had a lot of good things in their marriage, I looked at the TV and thought Lord, she's probably plotting to kill him slowly with arsenic  or one day he'll pick on her and she'll snap!!!  She's keeping all her anger in. By now she has an ulcer if she hasn't done him in already. I think he snowed you with his long list of her good traits. It made him look good. I think he was more a Jekyll and Hyde type.

 I had issues after a robbery and a few other things. The robbery was just kind of like the straw that broke the camels back, i believe. I remember the next job I took, I actually hit the floor twice when I got spooked by people that came in, and ended up quiting because of an incident where I couldn't llock the door after closing(someone had taken the keys). I still am spooked easily.

I just recently realized that I had convinced myself, somewhat rightly at the time, that the world was a scary, unpredictable place and I wasn't really safe anywhere. Only recently have I realized that that isn't true. It was so ingrained in me for so long to protect myself that getting over it felt like setting myself up for something awful to happen again.  It's terrible the amount of stress that put on me from being so diligent, when the whole reason my mind adopted it was to make me safer. I felt so awful hearing how that's affected her. I can imagine. I did. I remember when the sight of a young man pulling out his wallet literally had me hitting the floor in anticipation of a gun. I  realized I've spent alot of years waiting for and expecting that gun to go off. I hope she doesn't spend so many years before she realizes how self-destructive instead of helpful that kind of hyper-diligent state is.

Good luck Jennifer,
I know what you have gone through, I hope you find the world really is the same world it was before. It's just really hard to see that after having witnessed the worst it had to offer.

Kim