One day I had the TV on and not really paying attention to what was going on.  I was probably doing something else like cleaning the kitchen.  A hockey game was showing.  I was not a hockey fan.

Then I heard the announcer say a hockey player’s name, sah-tahn.  Then I looked at the TV screen and saw a hockey player’s jersey with the name SATAN on the back.  He played for the Buffalo Sabres.

His name is Miroslav Šatan.  He is Slovakian.  I think his name is pronounced shah-tahn.

I don’t know what I did back then when I saw this.  It probably set my OCD off.

I thought I heard somebody say that he played for the New Jersey Devils.  Actually, he didn’t.  What if he did?  If that was the case, there could have been New Jersey Devils hockey jerseys with SATAN on the back.  That could have been a good OCD exposure just to wear it.

On an odd note, if you go to the SI website, his hockey info is that the URL http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/hockey/nhl/players/666/.

I don’t know why I am laughing at this.  Two years I might have been dreading this due to my OCD.

I don’t know if this is true or not but I guess Šatan early in his hockey career was ordering pizza and the pizza guy asked how to spell his name.  So Šatan said S-A-T-A-N.  This made the pizza guy upset and hung up.

I just thought about sharing this.  Somebody told me about seeing a license plate on the road.  The plate said “VIVIVI”.  “VI” is a Roman numeral for 6.  So it says 666 in Roman numerals.

I thought it was sort of funny and clever.

No, nothing bad happened.  The sky didn’t fall.  The tires didn’t go flat.  It was just an observation.

I wasn’t sure if I was going to write this, because I am not sure how I got over my OCD.  But recently some event got me thinking.  I realized that there were a few things that did happen that might have contributed to my recovery.

Note that I don’t think I am fully recovered.  I still have unwanted thoughts and some compulsions but very few.  For intance, my psychologist wants me to check the front door only once.  I am compelled to check the door twice.  For some checkers (people to check things multiple times), checking things twice is a huge improvement.  Regardless, I am trying to check it once.

Even though I don’t consider myself totally recovered, life has been great.  The bulk of the OCD that I carried for 17 years is gone.  I used to think and do the craziest things.  I put the brakes on that insanity.  Life after OCD is great.

So did I do it?  Here are some pointers and suggestions.

• I thank my parents for not buying into my OCD thinking.  My mom and dad knew about my OCD and I would ask them OCD questions.  Their responses were the same.  One, nothing bad is going to happen.  Two, it is all irrational.  Three, none of it is real.
• There was a day that something clicked.  I remember asking my dad an OCD question.  I don’t remember what the question was but it probably had something to do with questioning an OCD event.  My dad said that it was irrational.  For some reason that clicked.  My dad has been telling me for years that it is all OCD and irrational but for some reason on that one day it clicked.  My new thinking was, “If it is irrational, then what’s there to worry about?”
• I have been taking coconut oil with my oatmeal for the past 3 years now.  I saw on Dr. Oz that coconut oil was good for Alzheimer’s.  So I figured if it affects the brain positively for Alzheimer’s, it might be helpful for OCD.  Alzheimer’s and OCD are both mental disorders.  Who knows.
• I think you have to do it all yourself.  I was fortunate to have a psychiatrist, not a psychologist, who used to run an OCD clinic.  When I learned about this, I was telling him the most craziest thoughts.  He wasn’t fazed.  He heard it all before.  I thought I was unique with my OCD, but I wasn’t.  Whatever OCD problems I had before the doctor’s appointments were gone afterwards.  However, the OCD thoughts would come back later on.  So the point I guess is that you might have the best doctor but it is up to you to get well.
• I used to dwell a lot about OCD problems.  The interesting thing about dwelling is that I wasn’t doing compulsions.  Basically, instead of doing compulsions, I would think about the OCD event or thoughts.  I would dwell for hours, maybe days.  I was wondering if something bad was really going to happen.  Now, some the thinking behind dwelling might have been illogical, but I wasn’t doing compulsions.  In the end, there were a few times that would do compulsions, but there were other times I would stick it out and not do compulsions.  For instance, I bought a new phone but I had a bad thought when I bought the phone, so I thought my phone was spiritually tainted.  My OCD response was to return the phone and buy it again.  But I didn’t do that.  Instead, I would dwell on it.  I was thinking of reasons that it wasn’t spiritually tainted.  I would ponder on this for days.  Well the grace period to return the phone expired (14 days).  I still have the phone for over a year now.  To me, it is just a phone.  Whatever worries I had with the phone is gone.
• More on dwelling, there were a few times that I deduced that for a given OCD event, nothing was going to happen.  The reasoning behind the dwelling might have been  illogical, but at the time it made sense to me and it gave me reason not to do compulsions.  The reasoning helped stop the rituals.
• Hang on to your dreams.  If you have goals in your life, pursue them as much as you can and don’t let OCD stop you.  OCD may slow you down and cast doubt in your thinking, but don’t let it stop you.  I have heard of people who are afraid to leave the house just avoid their fears.  For me, staying home was not an option.  I had things to do and I was going to do it regardless of OCD or not.
• I am going to go against one of my psychologists with what I am going to say.  Make rules to put a lid on OCD.  For instance, I had a rule called the drive rule.  In the drive rule, I can ignore whatever OCD thoughts I have when I am driving because I need to concentrate on the road, not on my OCD.  Whatever OCD thoughts I had when I am driving are ‘nullified’.  I also had the trip rules – ignore OCD thoughts while on trips.   When I think about it, it actually make sense.  Moreover, you should ignore OCD thoughts period, not just when driving or going on trips.
• Detect OCD-ish situations.  I can detect when certain things were OCD or not.  When I have a thought, I can tell if it is an OCD-ish thought or not.  It is more of a feeling.  If it feels like OCD, then very likely it is OCD.  If I detect an OCD-ish thought, I second guess whether I do should anything in response to the thought.  If you can sense OCD, rely on it.  If you can sense OCD, you can also determine what is normal.
• If you’re going to do any kind of compulsions or rituals, consider saying to yourself that it’s irrational.  So instead of checking doors 50 times, going in and out of doorways or bath tubs 10 times, washing hands multiple times throughout the day, turning off and on the computer until your feel right, and so forth, just say yourself that is irrational.  Say it 10 times if you have to.  I started doing this a few months ago.  Whenever I was compelled to do a ritual, I would say to myself that was irrational and try not to do the compulsion.  It got to a point that saying “it’s irrational” was a ritual.  I wouldn’t feel satisfied or assured until I said “it’s irrational”.  I was saying “it’s irrational” multiple times during the day.  It is true in saying that OCD is irrational.  At least if your going to do a ritual, it might as well be true and realistic.  Now, I don’t say “it’s irrational” all that much because I don’t have to.  Either I don’t have the thoughts or it is automatic that OCD is irrational.

That’s it.  No mystery drug.  No nouveau therapy.  It’s mostly cognitive therapy and a little exposure therapy.

Cognitive therapy is easier but requires a lot of reasoning and deduction which is probably not easy when you have OCD.  OCD might cast doubt in your reasoning.  OCD is going to compel you do something.  Think the OCD over but don’t do any compulsions or rituals.  Because if you do rituals, you just obviated cognitive therapy.

Exposure therapy is tough but necessary.  Exposure therapy tests me that I have no fear of the things that trigger my fear.  For instance, I had a fear of 666.  I would see 666 on license plates and on phone numbers.  Just driving to work is a form of exposure therapy.  By driving to work, there was always a chance that a license plate or a phone number might appear.  If I saw it, I would have to tough it out.  What am I suppose to do?  Turn around and go home?  Not an option.  Just venturing outside the house is a form of exposure therapy.  I never knew what I am going to see outside the house.   Now, 666 barely bothers me.

Don’t buy into OCD.  Don’t defend it.  Don’t find excuses for it.  OCD has no value.  OCD is 99.999% worthless.  I know that the assurance can be gratifying but it comes with tons of grief.   For me, OCD was perpetual fear.  When you’re in perpetual fear, of course going to seek assurance.  The assurance is no excuse to defend the OCD madness.

That’s it.  I hope all this helps.  I know that there are many facets to OCD and my suggestions may not be helpful.  But I think there might be a few OCD suffers who have similar problems that I had.  If it helps, great.

(If you typed 666 in Google search and you managed to get here, congratulations in having the courage to type 666 at all.)

It took awhile for me to get over 666.  Now I don’t think much about it.  If I see it, so what?

Talk to me 2 years ago, it was a different story.  If I saw it, I was looking for a meaning and wondering if it was a sign.  I would dwell on it for awhile.  Would it jinx the rest of the day?

So how did I get over it?  I am not sure, but I think it was a combination of the exposure and cognitive therapy.

So here is a list of things that might be helpful:

• Just like my previous post, let it happen.  Don’t respond to it.  Don’t do rituals.  Don’t undo anything.  Don’t do compulsions.  Tough it out.  If you keep doing this, you’ll probably realize that nothing is going to happen out of the ordinary.
• Don’t believe in jinxing or spiritual contamination.  666 does not affect anything.  If 666 was written on a piece of paper and taped to the wall, the wall is not jinxed, spiritually contaminated, or just plain evil.  Nothing is jinxed or evil.  Not even the paper.
• If something did happen, it has nothing to do with 666.  It is called coincidence.  Coincidences do happen.  Coincidences are not unusual.  Luck is coincidence and it happens all the time.  So is bad luck; it happens all the time too.
• If you are dwelling on it, there is really nothing you can do except let the thoughts play itself out and just try to convince yourself that it means nothing.  The quicker you believe nothing is going to happen, the quicker you’ll assure yourself that everything is going to be OK.  It is one thing to seek assurance from others, but it is quite another to assure yourself all by yourself.
• Don’t think what if something bad is going to happen.  Don’t wonder if something bad is going to happen.  In retrospect, all that thinking was worthless.   Nothing bad did happen.  OCD casts a lot of doubt in the head.  Don’t buy into the doubt.

I know that it is a lot easier said than done.  You just have to keep confronting the fear.  I know that OCD feels so real.  The OCD feelings are so strong that it throws logic out the window.  You just have to go against the OCD feelings or just try to ignore them.  You have to get throw the OCD feelings out the window.

In the past, looking at 666 would strike fear.  Now, I don’t think much of it.  I have gotten desensitized of it.  It is like opposite ends of the spectrum.

I used to fear 666. I have OCD.

I would see 666 in license plates often.  I was issued a new credit card with a 666 security code.  There is a billboard for a local law firm with the last four digits 6666.  There is a taxi company in Vancouver with the phone number 666-666-6666.  I filled up the gas tank and the amount of gas pumped was 6.666 gallons.  Read the drudgereport.com web site and there is going to be news story having to do with 666.  I had somebody call me with a phone number having 666 in the prefix code.  Then there is the usual buy something at a store or restaurant and the total is $6.66.

Other crazy fears:

• Fear of 616. Somebody found some ancients scrolls of the Book of Revelation in Egypt. According to the scrolls, the number wasn’t 666 but 616. I used to have a fear of 616 too.
• Fear of 10:16 am. 10:16 am is the 616 minute of the day.
• Fear of 11:06 am. 11:06 am is the 666 minute of the day.
• Fear of 6:06:06 am/pm. One way of looking at 666.
• Fear of 6:16 am/pm. One way of looking at 616.
• Fear of 7:06 am/pm. 7:06 am/pm is the 66 minute of the 6 hour.
• I used to fear the number 6.

Because of these of these crazy fears, there were things I wouldn’t do. For instance if it was 11:06 am, I would stop doing things fearing that if I do something at the time, whatever I am doing would be jinxed. I wouldn’t start a trip on 11:06 am. I wouldn’t drive in the house driveway at 6:16 pm. I would be reluctant to meet people if I met them at 6:16 pm. I wouldn’t get out of bed at 7:06 am.

To get over the fear of 666:

• Let it happen. If you see 666, just let happen. Don’t ritualize. Don’t do compulsions. Don’t walk away.  Just let it happen. You’ll probably find out that nothing is going to happen.
• Keep reminding yourself that seeing 666 doesn’t mean anything. It is not a sign.  it is just a number.  (There is no such thing as signs.)
• If you see it, it is just coincidence.

If you keep reminding yourself of this, you might get over the fear of 666. It is going to take time. In the end, you’re just going to look at it and that’s about it. You’re not going to do anything out of the ordinary.

By the way, all that 666 stuff with the phone number, license plate, etc.  Nothing bad happened.  And if something did happen, it is just coincidence.

Now, I sort of don’t care what time it is.