I was hanging out at my therapist's office yesterday (as I do every Tuesday), and she gave me some advice that I would like to share. As you all know, I have been in a battle against postpartum OCD for the past 7 months. Though I am far, far better than I once was, I still have intrusive thoughts. Sometimes it just becomes an almost comical game of <insert worst case scenario here>. My mind can come up with the most ridiculous scenarios that would never happen and I then must shut them down. My therapist then recommended a new way for me to deal with them that I believe can be helpful advice to parents everywhere.
She told me that every time I have a thought about Easton or Brayden that is negative or untrue, I replace it (out loud) with a loving, true compliment about them. When I began to think about it more, this is good advice for people who don't have intrusive thoughts like myself. For instance, if Brayden was driving me crazy and not being a good listener (this is completely hypothetical, he is perfect) instead of freaking out in my mind and thinking... "He's driving me nuts!" I could instead calmly speak to him while adding my true feelings about him. I could say "Brayden, mommy loves what a great listener you can be" or "Brayden, I love your enthusiasm, but could you please go to sleep." Maybe these examples are lame, but I hope I am getting my point across.
I guess that I should also say that I have decided to practice this even when my mind is clear. Today I was feeding Easton his lunch and I tried to come up with a compliment for every bite "Easton, mommy loves your smile", "Easton, mommy loves what a chunky monkey you are", "Easton, mommy loves that your bowl movements are regular"...as you can see, I was grasping at straws by the end, but you understand where I'm going with this. I'm sure I'm (hopefully) not the only momma out there who loses her cool sometimes and thinks negatively, but I hope this advice of changing thoughts through changing what is said is helpful to someone else out there!
Thanks for reading!
Chels
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