Addicted to Feeling Good: A Love-Hate Story

To kick off Lent, the author reflects on some of his dumber quests to feel good.

Mood music for this post: “Snake Eyes and Sissies” from Marilyn Manson:

Every now and then, it’s useful to look back on who I used to be so I can appreciate who I am today.

Today, as Lent begins, I do it simply to laugh at how in many ways, despite the progress I’ve made, I’ve been as stupid in adulthood as I was 20-plus years ago.

Lent is a time to sacrifice habits you love, gain a true appreciation for the sacrifices Jesus made [which were well beyond anything mortal man can comprehend) and draw closer to God. [More on my Faith in Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, Rat in the Church Pew and Better Angels of My Nature]

I’ve given up cigars for Lent. It’s probably not nearly enough, because I don’t smoke them often enough to really be sacrificing anything. But since I’ve already given up flour, sugar and alcohol, I couldn’t think of anything else.

Still, giving something up always brings back acute memories of some of the dumber things I’ve done in the compulsive-obsessive drive to feel good.

So please indulge me as I take inventory:

Age 18: I’m living off 8 cups of black coffee and a mug of Raisin Bran a day in an attempt to be rock-star thin. I discovered an after dinner drink — Haffenreffer Lager Beer. There were little puzzles on the underside of the bottle caps, and your ability to solve them would steadily decline — or increase — depending on how drunk you were. Being addicted to instant gratification, I’d suck down three bottles in quick succession so I could immediately enjoy feeling like I had just absorbed half a keg of lighter beer.

Age 21: I’m pacing up and down the driveway of the old Revere house in a blue-green polka-dotted bathrobe I used to own. I’m freaking out because I’ve just consumed two beers and an entire stick of marijuana by myself in the concrete storage room beneath the front patio.

The fellow who gave it to me was about 500 pounds and wore a black trenchcoat, even during the summer. He died Valentine’s Day 2009 of a heart attack. I lost touch with him as I became focused on career and learned after his death that he had led an admirable life of aiding the mentally disabled. Anyway, I was freaking out because, in the midst of lying on my bed enjoying the high, I suddenly got the idea that I just might have a heart attack. That’s one of my earlier memories of an anxiety attack.

We partied a lot in that basement. It was the scene of many impressive and entertaining mood swings.

I called my friend Danny Waters and asked him to come over. He did, and found me pacing up and down the driveway in my bathrobe. He took me down the street to Kelly’s Roast Beef and got me an order of chicken fingers to munch away the anxiety. Kelly’s was always a favorite place for me to binge eat away my troubles. It was as good as any drug or liquor store.

That was the year this photo was taken in my basement:

The guy on the left is me. Dan Waters is in the middle. The guy dressed as a vampire on the right is Sean Marley. [Read about him in Lost Brothers and Marley and Me]

It was also around the time the three of us were ambushed by a group of punks while walking home from Kelly’s. I was walking ahead of Sean and Dan and escaped injury.

Age 29: I drop 100 pounds of fat I packed on while binge-eating my way through the middle 1990s. I’m inspired by the quadruple bypass surgery my father has recently had. I lose the weight by pigging out Thursday through Saturday and starving myself Sunday through Wednesday. The binge eating continues through the next few years but I manage to keep the weight down, fooling most people.

Age 33: Around this time, the binge eating gets a new playmate in the form of red wine, which I decide I can’t live without.

Age 39: No more binge eating — not today, anyway. No wine. I work the 12-step program of recovery.

The instant gratification is gone, replaced by something much better — long-term sanity and clarity that allows me to see all the precious moments around me that went unnoticed during the days of mental haze.

Giving up cigars for Lent is the least I could do.

What Kind of Day It Has Been

The author’s day has not gone as planned. He’s OK with that, though he wasn’t always.

Mood music for this post: “Adrift And At Peace” from NIN:

This day has not gone as planned.

I wanted to be in the office today plowing through some work. But another winter storm forced me to work from home.

Some would say it’s great I can do that, and it is. But when there’s a lot on the plate, I prefer to be in the office. Especially when the kids are home from school for February vacation. At least in the summer I can write from the back deck while the kids play in the field behind the house.

This time of year we’re all indoors and the kids are loud.

A few years ago the snow, the change in schedule and the kids in my workspace would have unhinged me.

I’d get a story written. Maybe three. But I’d be a puddle of lava by day’s end, good for nothing except sleep.

Not so today.

I’m enjoying the cozy chair by my living room window, watching the snow fall.

I’ve gotten as much writing and editing done from here as I would have from the office.

The kids were indeed loud and distracting, but I enjoyed that, too. What used to be stress is now comic relief, especially when Sean tells Duncan he looks adorable when he cries and Duncan responds by pouncing on his older brother, yelling, “Who’s crying now?!”

I smoked one last cigar before Lent begins tomorrow, since that’s one of the things I’m abstaining from until Easter. It was a Cuban stick at that. Thanks to my friend Bob Connors for parting with it.

The coffee is French-pressed and bitter. Just the way I like it.

A much different day than what it would have been five years ago, before I gained the upper hand over the OCD.

Days that don’t go as planned are especially difficult for people with OCD. We do, after all, crave control over everything we can control. And we badly want to control things we can’t, like the weather.

Forget about the small stuff, like checking a doorknob seven times or tapping your feet to the count of 60. A carefully crafted schedule in shambles is the big stuff; hell for a sick mind.

That’s when someone like me turns to the food or the booze to comfort the troubled mind.

But the food is well under control today, and bottles of wine that once taunted me from a kitchen counter rack have gone unnoticed in the corner.

I’m not the same man I used to be.

Credit the therapists, the Prozac, the religious conversion or all of the above.

Whatever it is, I’m grateful for it.

Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely

The author goes to Church and comes away with a strange feeling.

Mood music for this post: “Faith.” The Limp Bizkit version:

Yesterday at All Saints Parish Father Michael Harvey delivered one of those Homilies that sent my mind and soul all over the map.

I like Father Harvey. I wasn’t sure about him at first. He had the massive shoes of Father Mark Ballard to fill, so the deck was stacked against him from the start. He’s very conservative, and sometimes I wonder if his collar is stuck to his neck with thumb tacks. He tackles the most taboo of topics — politics — when he delivers a homily.

Truth be told, I like how he goes for the throat in his Homilies without fear of offending someone. One Sunday he gave a Homily about Natural Law, otherwise known as the “contraception is bad” talk. After Mass, we got in the car and Sean, the 8 year old, blurted out, “Gee, I guess Father Mike wasn’t expecting there to be any kids at Mass this morning.”

Being moderate in my political views, I get itchy when he’s up there trashing a politician I like or praising one I despise. Yesterday, without naming him, the Homily turned to the subject of Patrick Kennedy, who I defended in this blog yesterday for showing up for public life despite a withering battle with depression and addiction.

The larger message of the Homily was that the pursuit of power takes a person further and further from God, because when one is spending all his or her time groping for attention they’re too busy thinking about themselves to be thinking about God.

He then brought up “a politician from Rhode Island” who decided not to run for office anymore. “Oh, great, here it comes,” I mumbled to my wife.

He brought up the fact that the Bishop down there had asked Kennedy to stop taking Communion because of his pro-choice stance. The Bishop tried to handle it in private, but Kennedy took it public.

In the end, Father Harvey speculated aloud, Kennedy was probably coming around to the decision that it was time to leave public life because holding onto power had corrupted his soul. I’m not sure Kennedy would share that exact assessment, but I think he would agree that power isn’t worth having when it plunges the rest of your life into a dark, unhappy place.

So I walked away with mixed feelings. I am pro-life but get incensed when someone paints a pro-choice person as evil personified. I don’t think it’s so simple. I know a lot of people who hate abortion, but believe it’s between a woman, her doctor and God. They are pro-choice but NOT pro abortion. They are the types that vote for someone based on a wider range of issues than abortion alone. But they are told they’ve voted against God if they vote the wrong way. [See also: The Better Angels of My Nature]

I have a lot of trouble with that notion.

But in the larger picture, there’s no question that the pursuit of power is a tricky thing, and the longer one wields it the worse off they are.

I see myself in all this. As I’ve admitted before, I have a fairly big ego that comes with being a writer. The ego is frequently driven into overdrive by the OCD [See: The Ego OCD Built]. It’s painfully true that this ego carries a certain level of attention seeking. After all, it’s the writer’s goal to make sure people are reading their work, and that involves a lot of self promotion.

I’m guilty as charged.

It’s a double-edged blade, really. I don’t write with the idea of sticking the papers in a drawer for someone to find after I’m dead. I’m a journalist whose goal is for people to see what he’s writing today, not 30 years from now. Social networking makes it all the more dangerous. I’ll let this illustration drive home the point for me:

At the same time, I have a faith that has deepened with time, and my Religious beliefs often come into direct conflict with my profession. In the end, it doesn’t have to be that way. I just have to find my way on this twisted path.

That’s why I keep coming to Church. It’s ultimately about my relationship with God and how to strengthen it. People can get uptight about church politics and get angry because their beliefs have been challenged by the priest. But to me those things are distractions that are as big as any shiny object that distracts us from our core Faith. I think that’s why Confession is my favorite Sacrament. It forces me to come clean with God on a regular basis. It keeps the emotional trash from piling up and stinking too much.

In this particular case, the priest gave me something to think about. He zeroed in on an unpleasant truth.

And so, he did his job.

It’s up to me to ultimately reconcile it with how I live my life. I think I’ve come a long, long way. But I have a long way to go yet.

In Defense of Patrick Kennedy

The youngest son of Edward M. Kennedy has often been criticized as a lightweight Congressman who gets away with things other people would get arrested for. But the author salutes him anyway. Here’s why.

Patrick Kennedy, the youngest child of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, announced yesterday that he won’t be running for re-election to the Congressional seat he has held since 1995.

Some will tell you it’s just as well. The Congressman, after all, hasn’t done much except for living off his family name and crashing cars into roadside barriers while high on narcotics. That’s often what I hear from my more conservative friends, who hate everything having to do with the Kennedy name.

Stew Milne/AP Photo

But as someone recovering from OCD, depression, a binge-eating disorder and other addictions, I have plenty of reason to defend this man.

In my view, this fellow has gotten some pretty unfair treatment. Let’s start with Laurence Leamer’s book, “Sons of Camelot.”

In this book, Patrick is described as a spoiled kid who has accomplished nothing in Congress other than repeatedly winning re-election. He’s described as someone who blindly follows the Democratic leadership.

Some of that may be true. But Patrick has done some courageous service for those who suffer from mental illness.

Kennedy has been open about his own struggles with bi-polar disorder and the addictions that go with it. He has been in and out of addiction treatment centers and once noted how his addictive behavior could latch onto anything from pain medication to something as simple as cough medicine.

What’s more, he did one of the hardest things people like us can do: He lived in the spotlight as a public servant, where critics can be cruel and a lot of people like to hate the Kennedys just for the hell of it.

Patrick has carried a lot of pressure being a Kennedy. There’s the pressure to match his father’s towering legislative record and live up to the legendary stature of his uncles.

Some would have dropped to the floor long ago, curled in a fetal position, over the pressure. Some would not have survived. One of Patrick’s cousins, David Kennedy, one of RFK’s sons, didn’t survive the battle with the demons. He died of a drug overdose in 1984.

RFK Jr. also struggled with addiction. So did Christopher Kennedy Lawford, who wrote an excellent book of his own on the subject: “Symptoms of Withdrawal: A Memoir of Snapshots and Redemption.”

I loved Lawford’s book for a variety of reasons. He recounted his sordid tale with humor and was brutally honest about something addicts are all to aware of: When you quit the thing you’re addicted to, it doesn’t automatically turn you into a good person.

In fact, recovering addicts often become big jerks before they find their footing. They’re learning how to behave in public without being drunk or high. A deep depression often sets in because years of abuse leaves the brain with deep chemical imbalances that hit you like a brick to the head once the booze, food or narcotics exit the picture.

Patrick has dealt with all of these realities and still carried on in public service.

He continued to show up for life when life was at its most unbearable.

It gave people like me a little inspiration when we needed it most. So as Patrick prepares to exit the public stage and embark on a new life, I thank him for his service and wish him the best.

It’s easy for people to pass judgment on him for his flaws.

But people who do so often forget about their own flaws.

None of us are truly without sin. But we like to cast the first stones anyway.

Sobriety vs. Abstinence

Whenever I share my experiences with OCD and the related binge-eating disorder [See: The Most Uncool Addiction], there’s a word I always refrain from using if I’m outside the safe confines of my OA group: Abstinence.

I don’t hate the word. But I don’t like it much, either.

All anyone ever thinks about when it’s uttered is refraining from sex or studying for the Catholic priesthood. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I am a devout Catholic, after all.)

Nevertheless, it’s a word I can’t get around any longer, so let’s talk about it.

In the world of a recovering food addict, abstinence means to abstain from eating compulsively. It’s the exact same thing as the word sobriety in the world of a recovering alcoholic.

Think of OA and AA as essentially the same thing, only OA folks are addicted to compulsive overeating to the point where they walk around dazed like zombies, unable to manage their lives. Ailments boil over and friends and family suffer with you.

I’m abstinent from binge eating, which means I eat nothing with flour and sugar in it and most meals are portioned out on a small scale. I’m sober, too. I used to drink a lot of alcohol when traveling. This weekend I spent a security conference sober. [See: ShmooCon and Snowmageddon and The Engine in Hyperdrive]

This weekend was challenging to be sure. It wasn’t always easy drinking club soda while everyone else drank wine, beer, etc. And while I kept it together with the food plan, being away from the normal routine makes it challenging  to keep all the portions straight. I probably could have done it better, but I think things worked out pretty well on balance.

It was challenging at Christmas, too. In fact, that was probably the closest I’ve come to a relapse. Not helping matters is my tendency to come down with depression around the holidays, partly due to the lack of daylight. Thankfully, I managed to hit the breaks in time to avoid that.

Of course, other, smaller addictions try to reassert themselves [See: How to Play Your Addictions Like a Piano]. One of them is spending. I have a weakness for collecting political and historical knickknacks, especially when I’m in Washington D.C. That weakness is evident to anyone visiting my work space. [See: Someone to Watch Over Me (A.K.A.: Desk Junk] This time, I held back.

I also like a good cigar when traveling, and probably enjoy it more than I should. I’m going to abstain from the stogies during Lent, which starts next week. We’ll see what happens after that.

The Internet is an addiction, too, but it’s a hazard of my profession. Staying away would be like a miner trying to do his job without stepping into the mine. But I stay away from the porn sites and Facebook applications, which are as dangerous as they are dumb, in my opinion.

I drink a lot of coffee, but I’m not giving that up right now.

All in all, I have a lot to be grateful for.

For someone who lived at the bottom of the Dumpster inhaling the stench for as long as I did, abstinence and sobriety is the gift of all gifts.

But it will always be a work in progress, with good days and not-quite-as-good days; always with room for improvement.

That’s OK, though. It is a journey, after all. A journey that you have to take one day at a time.

Rat in the Church Pew

The author has written much about his Faith as a key to overcoming mental illness. But as this post illustrates, he still has a long way to go in his spiritual development.

The scene is the parking lot of All Saints Parish, just after today’s 9:30 Mass. Father Mike Harvey greets the Brenners and the conversation somehow turns to the kids listening to their mother and father.

Father Harvey: Remember kids, if your mother asks you to do something or tells you something, she is always right.

Me: Does that rule apply to me?

Father Mike: Yes. You always should answer her with “Yes Dear.”

Me: I’m an editor so I always try to make do with fewer words. So instead of “Yes Dear,” I shorten it to “Whatever.”

I have to be honest: While Sunday Mass is always a place for me to find peace and get closer to God, sometimes I ruin it for myself. I’m not a special case, because we all have our good days and bad days, but it’s worth noting here because it shows that while I’ve come far in conquering my demons, sometimes I backslide.

Case in point: I woke up cranky as all hell this morning, and as a result I went to church with a lousy attitude.

I didn’t hear the Homily, or the Gospel, or the Readings. I stood stone-faced during the Prayers of the Faithful. I got annoyed with the school principal sitting in the pew in front of us because her perfume was inflaming my allergies. I looked with disdain at a couple people who were reading the church bulletin during the Homily. It’s not my business, and I was as poorly-focused as they were. I was being judgmental, something I need to work on.

What’s this have to do with managing OCD? Let me explain:

Even though I’ve come a long way in managing my demons, there are still going to be days where I’m not as on top of things as I should be.

This is normal. Sliding back is part of the process.

It’s also easy to get caught up in parish politics and attitudes. Sometimes we get pissed because we feel someone is judging us. Yet we turn around and judge them back.

Today was a reminder that my mental tools are only going to remain effective if I keep working to perfect them. That includes the eating plan at the center of my recovery for binge eating.

The battle against the demons is never completely won. It’s a battle that continues until death.

I like to think of it as something more positive: a journey.

Lessons From Dad

The author has learned some surprising lessons from Dad on how to control one’s mental demons.

My father is on my mind this morning. I’m meeting up with him at a meeting of business owners who hope to learn more about a subject I’ve written about extensively for CSO Magazine: The Massachusetts data protection law.

I find it odd that my father is reaching out to me for understanding on such a complex subject. I’m used to him giving me advice instead of asking for it.

And back when I was deep under the spell of OCD, his advice was the last thing on Earth I wanted.

A little background on Dad:

He was always the easy parent. If we kids asked him for something and he said “we’ll see,” it usually meant yes. He would fall asleep watching TV by early evening, while my mother was out with friends, giving us the run of the house.

I could always count on him to take me to the Osco Drug store in Lynn to buy a new Star Wars action figure every Sunday, followed by a trip to Friendly’s for some black raspberry ice cream. He knew that sometimes, when he was still asleep, I’d go in his wallet and grab myself some cash. But he never called me on it. Well, once he did, when I was in sixth grade. He called school looking for me because $100 was missing from his wallet. That time I wasn’t the culprit.

He runs a business in Saugus, Mass. that sells ladies shoes, gloves and all the other things girls go looking for when they need to dress for their prom or wedding. As a kid, I always felt like the business was his favorite child.

He worked hard and expected me to work hard. He didn’t like to see me resting. If he caught me doing so, he’d give me something to do. Rake the leaves. Take out the trash.

As a teenager with a chip on the shoulder the size of a baseball, I grew to resent this. I especially hated it when he’d make me do deliveries with him on the truck. I sucked at the manual labor thing, and he’d always be on me to lift boxes “with my legs, not my back.” Good advice, it turns out. But I didn’t want to hear it.

My friends and some ex-girlfriends remember him walking around the house in his saggy underwear, hairy belly and other things hanging out for all to see. He didn’t care. It was his house. But he was always nice to the friends, and they all in turn got a kick out of his lack of modesty.

He also keeps his emotions largely to himself. The only time I ever saw him cry was when my brother died.

As my mental health really started to come unhinged, he started to grate on me. If I got a promotion at work, he’d ask how much of a raise I got. I’d tell him. He’d reply with a “That’s it?” I think my habit of indulging in OCD behavior through my work was a result of that. He also has terrible eating habits that have led to a variety of health problems. Much of my binge eating is inherited from him. He’ll down a large tray of stuffed cabbage or a box of frozen Devil Dogs as naturally and as easily as most of us take a breath. I’m pretty sure he’s part shark.

But as I approach my 40th birthday, I’m really starting to appreciate the guy and everything he taught me. I started to feel this way a long time ago, actually, but now that I’m keeping this blog, the memories are more vivid and the appreciation is in better focus.

I used to see his stiff upper lip as a weakness; the result of cold emotions. But I’ve learned the value of keeping a stiff upper lip when times are tough. And I’ve realized that it’s not the result of something cold. I think it’s more a case of him trying to be strong when people around him are falling apart.

He’s also far more giving than he might admit. If one of his employees is in a jam, he usually helps them out of it. I remember when one employee, his wife pregnant, needed a little extra financial help. My father gave it, but was quick to say something to the effect of, “I’m paying for this kid and I didn’t even get to have any fun.” I laughed hard when that employee told me about it. He laughed hard, too. Some of my humor comes from him, no doubt.

I’ve also come to appreciate his work ethic instead of being insulted by it. As I’ve gotten over my fear and anxiety in recent years, I’ve come to see work as one of the most honorable responsibilities one can have. Your providing for family and, if you’re lucky like me, you get to do something you love that just happens to be important as well. He certainly provided for his family. He still does. Without his prodding, I’m not sure I would have had the career success I’ve had.

I also love to watch him with my kids. They are always at ease around him, and Duncan will grab his security blanket and sit with him. The kids have always been good judges of character.

People ask me if he was upset when I converted from the Jewish Faith to Catholicism. He wasn’t upset at all. In fact, he likes to tell people that those of different religious stripes are really going to be surprised when they die and discover that it’s the same God for everyone.

The old man has been through a lot. He watched one of his children die and watched two more go through all kinds of mental and physical hurt. His marriage to my mother collapsed and was probably doomed from the start. He’s suffered a lot of illness himself.

Yet he still stands tall, even with the bad back and the bad knees. He’s taught me a lot about pressing forward despite life’s demons.

I thank him for that.

OCD DIARIES: The 12 Steps of Christmas

The author reviews the 12 Steps of Recovery and takes a personal inventory. There’s really no Christmas theme here, other than that the author found the headline catchy.

I’m reconstituting my OA food plan quite nicely since the Christmas Eve scare. I’m lucky for not having slipped completely. Now I find myself thinking about the 12 steps this program is based on. It’s been a bit since I’ve reviewed them to see where I fit in, so here goes:

Step 1 – We admitted we were powerless over our addiction – that our lives had become unmanageable.

I have this one nailed. Hell, I wouldn’t have started going to OA meetings if I hadn’t realized I was indeed powerless over my addiction. But as I was reminded last week, this step must always be top of mind. Otherwise, you relapse before you know what hit you.

Step 2 – Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

This one was easy for me. I realized a few years ago that I would be nowhere unless I let Jesus into my life. Thing is, when an addict is busy being an addict, they’re too busy giving in to the Devil to listen to God. Thankfully, God’s voice is much louder as time goes on.

Step 3 – Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.

For this, I direct you toward the post about my conversion: The Better Angels of My Nature.

Step 4 – Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

This is a tough one. I’ve definitely done a lot of soul searching about where my fault lines lie and how to be better, but I have a lot of work to do on this one. The biggest sign of progress is that I can look back on the past and see that while I was busy smoldering over people who were being jerks to me, I was busy being an even bigger jerk to someone else. [See: Bridge Rats and Schoolyard Bullies] I’ve also realized that I have a bit of an ego problem that needs work. For more on that, see The Ego OCD Built.

Step 5 – Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

I’ve admitted it to God and myself, and a few other human beings. But when it comes to outlining the EXACT NATURE of my wrongs, I’m not always as honest as I need to be. But I’m working on that.

Step 6 – Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

I’m ready, but old habits die hard.

Step 7 – Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

I ask Him every day. Of course, I think God helps you see your shortcomings but you have to be the one to work on the removal part.

Step 8 – Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

I’m willing to make amends with some people but not others. I know for sure I have harmed others in my life and I’m truly sorry for that. Others harmed themselves. I just happened to be standing too close to the tracks when they put their hands on the third rail. Clearly, I have work to do on this one.

Step 9 – Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

See Step 8.

Step 10 – Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

I’m working hard on this one every day. I thank you all for being patient.

Step 11 – Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood God, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.

Doing this step a lot, and believe me — it helps. A lot.

Step 12 – Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to other addicts, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

You could say that starting this blog was my way of working this step. I’ve also started sponsoring people in OA to help them get a grip on their compulsive eating. I’m not sure I’m all that good at it yet, but I’m definitely grateful to those who come to me looking for help. In asking me for help, they are actually helping me to be a better man. It sounds confusing, but it’s true.

The Better Angels of My Nature

It’s not hard for me to write about OCD, binge eating and pills. These are a part of life for people across political and religious divides. Depression and anxiety will hit you whether you’re Catholic, Baptist or agnostic; Democrat, Republican or Libertarian.

Religion and politics. Those are tough.

Those who know me know I have strong opinions on both. But I walk a delicate path between friends and family who are all over the map on these issues. So I wasn’t going to touch it here.

On the subject of religion, however, I realized I had no choice. To write about my experiences with OCD without mentioning my Faith is impossible. It’s too much a part of who I am and how I got here.

In April 2006 I was Baptized a Catholic after going through the RCIA program. This, after more than a decade in the religious wilderness. I was born into a Jewish family but we observed it in a mostly secular manner. By the time I reached my 20s, there was nothing keeping me there.

My first taste of the Catholic Faith was when I met my wife. She grew up going to church every Sunday and going to the same parochial school our boys go to today.

Erin never forced her faith on me, and our marriage certainly wasn’t built on the condition that I convert. I slowly inched toward my Faith over time, and my battle with OCD marked a turning point.

Among my friends and family are people who don’t believe in God and don’t want to hear others talk about it. Then there are those who believe in a higher power but are too angry over perceived wrongdoings in the Church. A lot of that anger is justified, especially when observed through the prism of the Priest Sex Abuse Scandal and atrocities that have happened in God’s name at the hands of misguided people over the centuries.

To the right are those who follow their Faith with a sometimes blinding passion. Bring up things about the organized church you disagree with and they’ll shut the conversation down with a few terse words. On this side of the court, to disagree with what the Pope or Bishops say is to be a fake Catholic or worse.

My misgivings, mainly the intolerance that often abounds in the church, are summed up pretty nicely by this West Wing clip, when President Bartlet, a devout Catholic, rips apart a TV pundit who claims to be an authority on the Word of God:

I also get a big kick out of movies that lampoon religion when it’s handled well. A special favorite is this one:

But all that aside, I believe in the central teachings of the Catholic Faith — that through the death and resurrection of Jesus, sinful humans can be reconciled to God and be offered salvation and the promise of eternal life.  (Wikipedia’s definition, but it’s essentially what I believe).

A big part of my conversion involved my battle with OCD. Part of the mental disorder involved relentless self criticism and loathing. Self-hatred is not too strong a description. I was so convinced that I was flawed beyond repair that I simply plowed along with my self-destructive behavior. I couldn’t get out of my own way.

Catholic conversion entered the picture because, as I was peeling back layer after layer in the struggle to find myself, I found that I simply couldn’t get there without help from a higher power. In 12-step programs like Overeaters Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous, a central theme is that you need to put all your trust in a higher power. In fact, Step 2 says, “For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority—a loving God as He may express Himself in our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.”

I could have been drawn to one of the Protestant denominations or something like Unitarianism. But for me, the Catholic Faith resonated above all others. As I studied the Faith and applied it to my own history, I started to understand that I was not sinful beyond hope. I learned that it’s never too late for any of us, and so I found the strength to move forward and get better. It’s a journey that will continue to my dying breath.

I cherish Mass each week, along with all the Sacraments. My favorite is the Sacrament of Reconciliation — Confession. By spilling out the junk on a regular basis, I feel lighter, less burdened and able to deal with the lingering byproducts of my condition.

The community aspect has also been a tremendous source of strength. I’ve made some dear friends along the way, some of whom don’t share my skepticism of the Church as a governing entity.But we’re able to put those things aside. After all, we’re in full agreement on the central aspect of the Faith.

Faith isn’t for everyone. It may not even be the key to recovery for a lot of people. But it was essential for me, and that’s all that matters.