Click here for nice stories main menu

main menu   |   youngsters categories   |   authors   |   new stories   |   search   |   links   |   settings   |   author tools


A Season in Hell (standard:non fiction, 1760 words)
Author: kmjogAdded: Apr 22 2002Views/Reads: 3270/2196Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
This is a personal account of a 4 year horrendous depression that finally lifted.
 



		       A SEASON IN HELL 

I have suffered from clinical depression for four years. I have had OCD
an anxiety disorder for 15 long years. Both have waxed and waned over 
the years. This is a personal account of four years that were living 
Hell on earth. 

I remember how the OCD started. I was a waitress at a busy restaurant in
Carmel, California. I loved my job and I was a good waitress. A new 
manager came on the scene. He was either hot or cold. He was an 
alcoholic and when he was on a binge he would yell and scream at the 
waitresses. He particularly picked on me because I never talked back to 
him for fear of losing my job.  I was not depressed until years later. 
I went to work one day and the manager was gone. They said he was 
dismissed for stealing money out of the cash register for drugs. I was 
relieved but they got a woman manager who was rather unfriendly and 
harsh. I finally found a job at another local restaurant. The OCD waxed 
and waned over the years. It was very manageable for 12 years until 
depression set in also from a sales job that I had. I knew what 
clinical depression was because I previously in my life had three short 
bouts with it. 

My husband is a landscape contractor. He wanted me to go to a hardware
store to buy a rake he needed.  I was in the garden department when I 
saw a bunch of insecticides. I immediately felt contaminated and had to 
go to the restroom and wash my hands. I just had to go wash my hands 
like I had some horrible poison on me. That was the beginning of the 
Obsessive Compulsive disorder. They say that tremendous stress can 
cause it. I started thinking that when I passed by a pedestrian in my 
car that I had hit one and I had to check if I had by looking in the 
rear view 

mirror. I had an episode of OCD when I was 13 years old so I knew I had
to get some help. The OCD will not go away on it's own. I started 
therapy with a psychologist and I still continued to work for the 
alcoholic manager. . 

I have been to many psychiatrists and psychologists over the last 15
years. In desperation in March 2002 I made an appointment with my 
family doctor. I had heard that B-12 shots were sometimes given to 
patients with a severe psychosis and they made remarkable recoveries. 
She said that she had heard that but had never heard of a B-12 shot 
being used for depression. She would not give me one and I was upset. I 
went to the drug store and bought a bottle of B-12 vitamins and went 
home and took five1000mg tablets. 

It became extremely severe in March 2002. In that month I began
obsessing more and more at my volunteer waitress job. I could hardly 
concentrate on taking orders because of the horrible, intrusive 
thoughts that were racing in my head. I would take an order and I had 
to double check each ticket to make sure I had charged them the right 
amount. My obsessional thinking was mostly religious in  origin. They 
were senseless thoughts like if I wore certain dangling earrings they 
would offend God and then I would be punished. If I watched a movie 
with a lot of swear words in it; it was hurting God. I could never 
fiqure out why some things that I did would hurt God. 

.Hundreds of thoughts like this tortured me every day.  I knew they were
not really real but a part of me almost believed that they were.  I 
also had developed severe scrupulosity just since January 2002.  It 
previously had never bothered me in my 57 years of life. I had worked 4 
different part time jobs. They were relatively easy jobs like being a 
food demonstrator in a market handing out samples of food or coupons.  
I would not cash any of the checks I had received because my OCD voice 
was telling me I didn't do the jobs completely right and I would be 
punished by God if I cashed the checks. It wasn't until 3 months later 
that I was finally able to cash them. Scrupulosity is a form of OCD. 
People who have it become overly concerned with morals and honesty. 

I will describe what a typical day for me was like. I woke up in sheer
terror. I immediately started praying hundreds of times “Dear Lord 
please help me to function.” I felt like I was waking up to a 
nightmare. However, I was not dreaming for it was as real as the grass 
is green and the sky is blue.  My depression was an agiated type. I had 
been jogging since 1992 and was not about to give it up. It was the one 


Click here to read the rest of this story (84 more lines)



Authors appreciate feedback!
Please write to the authors to tell them what you liked or didn't like about the story!
kmjog has 2 active stories on this site.
Profile for kmjog, incl. all stories
Email: kmjog_2000@yahoo.com

stories in "non fiction"   |   all stories by "kmjog"  






Nice Stories @ nicestories.com, support email: nice at nicestories dot com
Powered by StoryEngine v1.00 © 2000-2020 - Artware Internet Consultancy