“I think I’ve forgotten how to socialise.”
I was at the work Christmas party, walking into a room of people the majority of whom I’ve never met in person. I started this job 7 months ago and I’m mainly remote so I rely on teams windows and voices. I’m better with voices than faces when it comes to recognising people, neither of which help because I am terrible at remembering names. It’s a running joke in our house.
I don’t really like Christmas, because I associate it with times in my life when I was very unwell. For some reason the epoch-defining OCD spikes that shut down my teens and early twenties all happened round the end of the year. Perhaps there’s a Vitamin D component to it, perhaps my association has built up to be far more than it is over the years, I don’t know, but it is always a relief when January 2nd rolls round. I was half-joking about forgetting how to socialise, but my colleague agreed enthusiastically. “Since Covid,” she said “everyone is more awkward.” We were talking specifically talking about work social events as we filed into the function room behind a man wearing an upside-down Santa hat.
The party was fine. It was quite fun actually. My new colleagues are great and there was a collective atmosphere of pride in a job well done this year. Nevertheless I left after the meal as the ‘disco’ was starting and the covers band were playing at a volume loud enough to dislodge fillings and I’d forgotten my earplugs. Plus when you’re sober, unless you have specific anchors to the narrative (which is impossible at a work Christmas do) watching people get banjaxed becomes boring quickly. So I picked my moment when the lights went down to the tune of Mr Brightside and made my exeunt. Nobody batted an eyelid when I left to be honest, they were too busy in the photo booth, and I wasn’t actually the only one leaving either.
Fundamentally I am far more aware of my social batteries now. Not just because I’m rediscovering my equilibrium on medication, but because I feel like the way I interact with the world has changed in the last 18 months. It took me at least that long post giving up drinking in 2019 to accept that a large part of my drinking was self medication, and the following five years to work out a new way of navigating the noise without booze. The reason it took so long I think, was I replaced pub for gym and did little else for a year. Socialising at the gym is different, and you can’t really think about anything else during jiu jitsu, you’re trying to preserve consciousness and limb function. Plus it was a strict, repetitive, endorphin-filled routine, and I felt physically great. Then Covid hit, and I couldn’t socialise if I wanted to.
After we were allowed out to play again I was all about training and the gym, it was my third space. My first and second spaces were both at home, so it made it all the more important to have somewhere different to go. Even during the brief interlude when I broke my leg I was focused on getting back to the mats, the community is incredibly important to both of us. Which is why when I started getting really really anxious about going to and being in the gym recently, it worried me immensely.
Taking a step back from something that makes me happy was a wrench, but I needed to work out what was going on. After I’d got through the first couple of weeks of titrating back on meds I started to understand that things had changed - since starting therapy properly this year I have found it harder to mask. Masking is commonly spoken of in relation to autism, but with OCD it is absolutely a thing. Your brain is literally screaming at you so in order to be in public there has to be a buffer between the outside world and the horrors. I do not let it show. I can’t. Only my therapist knows the full spectrum of all the most distressing intrusive thoughts and that took decades. I hold therapists like Allegra Kastens and Chrissy Hodges in such high regard for their no fear approach to it, they were my introduction to ERP.
I definitely can’t do that, but I am also finding it harder to maintain the veneer. People who know me very well could spot it, but I was very good at hiding extreme anxiety by just being boisterous, or busy. Sometimes I could even convince myself that I was broadly fine, ‘positive vibes only’ does work for a bit, ‘til it doesn’t then the wheels fall off. I really don’t like showing it at the gym though, and I don’t really know why, especially as it is the most inclusive, caring, supportive place and I co-run a men’s’ mental health group. Maybe it was because I felt I couldn’t disappoint people, I don’t know I’m still working it out. It’s probably the unachievably exacting moral scrupulosity that drives my OCD above everything else which I will never ever satisfy.
But the decision was made for me when I basically had a panic attack on the mats and nearly bolted. I spoke to a few close friends at the gym and of course they were amazing, but I still couldn’t shake this weird sense of shame that I’d let people down by being ill. Which is bonkers.
So now that I can think a bit clearer I’m back training properly and I’ve been renegotiating my relationship with the world, that’s the best way to describe it. I realise that my ability to mask the way I used to has changed and I have to accept that with this change comes a certain vulnerability which I’m not used to. As well as being quite frightening there is something oddly liberating about it, and I’m trying to approach it with curiosity because I’ve held this so painfully close for so long and I’m tired.
I’m really tired.
Photo by Adi Goldstein on Unsplash
your honesty inspires me ❤️