Does OCD make you abusive?

[Cansof]

Apologies the thread title sounds horrendous but I genuinely don't know anyone else with OCD / family members so can't discuss.

I'm really struggling with the relationship of my dsis and DM. They both live together and dsis has OCD.

Over the years as the other siblings have moved out, her behaviour has become quite controlling and in my opinion, abusive.

There are behaviours related to the OCD - she will make DM wash her hands / reclean things / rewash clean clothes etc if she feels they are now dirty. She usually will snaes at her and would go into a rage if she didn't get her way. Sometimes DM has been ill and she's made her do these tasks.

DM complies 100% with these requests no matter how unreasonable they are to keep the peace. She is always on edge trying to preempt what might trigger her - hiding things, moving things around, not mentioning things. When I visit, I need to do the same.

Then there's other behaviour which isn't related to the OCD (or at least I don't think it is but happy to be corrected). She is very controlling, doesn't let DM have visitors over, will snap at her after her friends have left as to why she invited them over, she doesn't like DM going out too much, she makes demands to DM about chores like clean this, I want to eat, get me etc. Dsis does very little housework.
She calls DM the most horrid names, calls her thick, stupid and a walkover.

She bosses DM about and DM let's her because she is ill.

It's heartbreaking to watch DM being treated like this and over the years she's socialising less and only has a few friends. My dsis behaviour makes her cry. She is ill herself with health conditions.

If you were to meet dsis, you'd think she was lovely, really chatty and nice and that's what people see her as but behind closed doors she is really hard work and completely different.

Just wondering anyone else living with family members with OCD. Is it like this?

No mental health issue is an excuse for abusive behaviour.

I have OCD. It can dominate your life and affect how you behave. I got help from councelling to manage it. Your DSIS doesn't sound like she is doing this.

I'm NC with parents with MH issues that impact the lives of people around them. Focus on helping your DM protect herself, and ideally help to get her out of the situation.

I had poat natal contamination OCD after the virth of my second child. I certainly was not pleasant to live with my DH put up with so much from me but he was also very good at (gently) standing up to me ans during my recovery this was 100% what was needed.

I didn't try to control who he saw etc. or who came to the house but I did scream at him to wash his hands or to clean something that I thought he had contaminated and lots of other behaviour I'm not proud of but it wasn't my fault I couldn't help it, the need to clean was more important than anything to me because in my head my DC would die if I didn't.

Yy any attempt to control people in this way I think is abusive.
It could be forcing religion on them, making them hop around the house on one leg, making them feel uncomfortable in their own home constantly due to cleaning etc.

Scarlet that's a tough one because it's natural to want to minimise germs around a new born and unfortunately many people have zero self awareness around babies eg kissing them with colds and cold sores, not washing hands before touching them or sticking fingers in their mouths..

Hmm, I don't agree. Maybe controlling and abusive behaviour aren't 'symptoms' as such, I don't know the correct terminology - but when someone is in thrall to ocd it can have a very detrimental effect on those close to them. The rituals take precedence and sometimes everything and everyone else comes second.. Those with ocd can definitely try to be controlling of others...maybe not everyone's like this, but I've seen it first hand. I don't think you can say it doesn't happen, having known just one person with the condition.

@Marynotsocontrary I don't know "just one person with the condition".
I worked for an OCD charity for many years and didn't come across controlling, abusive behaviour as a symptom of OCD. At all.

However you can be abusive and controlling and also have OCD.

Maybe do some charity work around OCD yourself before jumping to conclusions and assuming that most people with OCD are the same?

@Poppchipps
I don't think everyone with OCD is the same. In fact, I said the exact opposite. Some people with OCD can certainly try to be controlling though, it's part of the illness and this is well-known. Possibly this spills over into abuse in some situations, I'm not sure about that, but control, or efforts to be controlling, is certainly something that can be associated with OCD (especially in more severe cases I would think). I'm actually very surprised you haven't come across it if you've worked for an OCD charity.

No, it doesn't.

Some people with OCD may be abusive.

Some people without OCD are abusive.

No condition automatically "makes" anybody with it abusive.

The worst example was when our other sister had a still born. When we were talking about I said that it was one of the worst things to have go to go through and felt so sad for her. Her reaction was well look at me. I don't have my kids.at least she has others. It's really not that bad.

^ Your sister is abusive and vile. She has chosen not to get treatment for her OCD. So this is on her, not on the illness.

So no commitment to fix it then. Too hard for her. Rather be horrible to everyone else. No, that isn't okay and is a decision she's taken.

So sorry for posters who've had this undiagnosed and not known what was happening. That's entirely different to have a diagnosis and continuing as you are, half-heartedly taking medication occasionally and doing a bit of therapy "in bouts" but not really bothering despite the impact on everyone else. And then comparing your situation to somebody losing a baby. That is shocking.

Can people tell me why they think she hasn't been committed to getting better. I thought there was no "better" as OCD is incurable. What is she meant to be doing - surely she can't be in cbt sessions every week indefinitely. I get she can be on meds long term but in my mind I thought she has done all that there is.

Sorry to jump on your post @Cansof but I was wondering what the views are on treatment from those with OCD, is counselling and CBT necessary? My dsis has been prescribed anti depressants but these don't seem to have made much of a diffrence. My dm thinks that pills will solve everything whereas I have had counselling and found it very beneficial, i think it would help my dsis, but just wondered what others thought.

Anti depressants are not going to change the condition, they just reduce the level of anxiety (and other feelings). So hopefully your DSIS will feel less distressed and less compelled to perform the rituals or have the obsessive thoughts if she has pure OCD (where you don't perform rituals you check your thoughts).

For example, if your obsession was about whether your partner was having an affair, you'd check if you still felt that in the morning or constantly try and reassure yourself about it. What happens is you reinforce that thought, which gives it greater importance in your head, and increases the level of anxiety. With people that haven't got OCD, they may have an unpleasant thought, but they're able to let it go much quicker, so they're not holding onto the negative feeling that flows from that thought. As it doesn't haunt them, they don't feel the same level of distress and they don't need to protect themselves from the thought it might be true, by e.g. performing rituals or checking if they are still having that thought.

In simple terms what CBT (ERP) does is help you to practise to sit with those thoughts, not push them away or do rituals to ward off danger or distract yourself from them. This helps you to find thoughts less scary and therefore it becomes easier to let them go. It also has a physical benefit in that it trains the brain to lower the level of alarm it sends out at those thoughts, thus reducing the anxiety.

Depending on the severity of the OCD, people can be helped to manage their condition so that it barely bothers them, or in severe cases cause her less distress. The other thing is that your sister may have to change things in her life that may exacerbate her condition. For example, if she is in a bad relationship or has a stressful job, those things would only make the condition worse.

For some people the anxiety is so great that it's difficult to even get them to face their anxiety, which makes it difficult to treat, but if she can, she can hopefully live with much less distress. It might be worth you reading about OCD or watching some of the people on YouTube I recommended in my earlier post.

Great information.