Since my OCD diagnosis some 15 years ago, I have spent a lot of time trying to clean up the mess of my mind, trying to determine what is real and true, like some kind of objective reality, and what is my brain's perception of what is real and true.
I spent the better part of 30 years thinking that catastrophizing was normal and logical and made perfect sense. If someone didn't answer the phone and my brain told me they had DIED or were in the process of dying, I accepted this without question. If I thought it, it had to be right.
It is a hard pill to swallow when you realize you've never actually been the captain of your ship but only played one on tv.
The more I think, the more I come to the conclusion that there is no definitive real and true. I am limited by my brain and my sensory perceptions. I'm listening to an audiobook now that talks in part about how our memories can't even be trusted. What we remember may only be a tiny sliver of what actually happened.
Somewhere along the line, my brain told me that adults knew what they were doing, and I accepted this belief as reality.
Pretty soon after becoming a mom, I think I realized that adults are winging it. We don't know what we're doing but we're just better at pretending or not caring or simply being used to the status quo than teens or young adults.
Because I'm diligent about replying to emails and getting things submitted on time or not showing up late for work, I have assumed that the reality is that other people do this. As time marches on, it is evident that I have been wrong.
When people have lauded me with praise about things, I don't know if what I did was actually good work or if it is because I show up and have a pulse (which is beyond the scope of some others).
Sure, there are some folks who have this same "be dependable, follow-up with people" approach as me, but the world is big...bigger than I can usually wrap my head around most days.
It is a borderline miracle that any business or organization functions with anything resembling efficiency at all, ever. That anything gets accomplished is a win.
Over the years, I've definitely chilled out and not expected as much from myself or others. Recognizing that my reality isn't everyone's is both disorienting and freeing. The longer I live and the more I think (which is a lot since we're still lying low due to M's lack of a vaccine), the more I recognize that I will continue to go through these periods where I reconsider things that my brain told me, things that I believed for a long time.
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