Posted by Seamus2 on November 6, 2000, at 20:58:40
In reply to Tourette's, OCD, and rage, posted by cole on November 6, 2000, at 12:14:33
> I have a question about Tourette's and rage. My SO (who has Tourettes, + some obsessions) periodically gets extremely angry with me. 99.9% of the time he is the greatest, most loving guy ever. We are good at compromising, and don't usually have big arguments. Every so often he gets angry and argues and will not de-escalate, he verbally attacks me during this time. We've realized that if this is over the phone I need to hang up, in person I try to "hang up" as best as I can. He says he usually has trouble when he thinks he has hurt my feelings, this confuses him, then he tries to argue to make things "right". I get confused while it's happening, because he is really good at making me feel like everything is my fault. Every time, within about an hour he snaps out of it and feels really bad. He will sit there and mull over the attack all throughout the next day, when I'm beyond worrying about it anymore. He says he feels nothing when he is in the middle of one of these attacks.
> Have any of you dealt with similar feelings? How can we prevent this from happening? Are there any meds that are fairly low key in terms of side effects that might work? He said he's been feeling like the OCD is more noticeable lately as well. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
> ColeCole,
My dearest, best friend is somewhere along the Tourettes's/OCD/Asperger spectrum and I think I know how frustrating this is for you because it's happened to us.
The best thing I ever did to keep this pattern from escalating was to tell him if he did not stop w/ the ad hominem attacks and stick to the problem at hand in a rational manner I was going to walk out on him then and there (hang up the phone). And I had tell him I was going to hang up the phone (and did it) a few times as well.
The pain of doing so was less that the mutual hurt feelings which would have ensued had the thing gotten out of hand, which it had done on numerous previous occasions. Watching his self-reproach over the incident only added to my pain.
One could argue setting limits on the abuse you will take is protecting your dignity, and that's certainly a valid way of looking at the problem.
Another is that setting *external* limits on his behavior which matter more to him than the internal "obsessions" driving him may, and I hate to use the term, teach him a lesson. But it's a good lesson, just one he hasn't picked up yet.
Skip the meds, try a behavioural approach.
Best of luck to you both.
Seamus
poster:Seamus2
thread:48267
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20001102/msgs/48303.html