OCD Memoir

This past week I concluded reading the memoir Amen, Amen, Amen by Abby Sher which chronicles her bouts with obsessive compulsive disorder from around the age of ten through age thirty.  The compulsion she has begins with shredding napkins underneath the dinner table.  It then becomes picking up sharp objects on the way to school or when out to walk her dog because she believes if she does not then people will have car accidents and die because she left those objects behind.  Her father dies when she is around twelve years of age and she believes whe is responsible in some way because she was having evil thoughts about the cousins she was staying with at the time she learned of his death.  To amend for all the people she believes she has fictionally killed or caused harm she prayers incessantly and she even counts the number of times she prays.  When ambulances go by she begins saying a particular prayer so many times in hopes that the victim will not come to an untimely demise.  Her obsessive-compulsive behavior continues through college; however, it is suspended somewhat when she begins the medication called Anafranil.  She likes to befriend people who are accepting of her condition and tends to fall in love with men who have serious health issues of their own.  For example, Ben has a history of not eating, bulemia, and anorexia.

This main character has a complex relationship with her mother who she continually prays for and who has lost not only her first husband, but her second husband as well.  In my mind, the mother appears to suffer from a hoarding obsession and also has elements of obsessive compulsive illness in that she continually makes lists.  Everything comes crashing down when the main character's mother becomes ill.  At that point, Abby leaves a treatment program for anorexia, comes off medication, and witnesses her mother's demise. Throughout this time, she continues with prayers and inflicting pain upon herself as she seems to believe that she is at fault in many ways for her mother's illness.   In the end, she is married to a man who is accepting of her condition and has a rock solid character.  She becomes pregnant and once agains goes off her medications which now include Paxil and Wellbutrin.  She is able to reduce some of her compulsions and obsessiveness, but not entirely which is what worried me about the ending to the book.

As an individual who once suffered from obsessive-compulsive disorder myself from age 18 until age 25, this book brought back some familiar territory only my obsessions were constantly going over my bank balances, tax forms, and also praying.  I'm beginning to wornder if OCD is found more frequently among religious folks in the population.  My worry was that by age 25 as I exited an abusive relationship, my OCD essentially fell by the wayside and I have had no further problems althought I still take medication regularly.  My curiosity is did the author of this memoir ever truly recover from obsessive-compulsive behavior and will her own child also be prone to developing the disorder as well.  That's probably a whole separate book.  This book was a gread read and I would recommend it highly.