A Prince, a Monster and the Harrowing of Hell

 

There are plenty of things that hurt people without people ever really knowing why. Anxiety can act as internal gravity, shrinking the soul.  

- Beartown by Fredrik Backman

In case you have not figured it out, I am a huge Backman fan girl.  Once I picked up My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry I was hooked!  There are many reasons why this book took up permanent residence in my heart, but, the biggest two are it was a fairy tale and one of the characters suffered from crippling OCD.  Of course this makes no sense unless I share my backstory, so, here goes...

Once upon a time, five years ago, there was a young man who was enjoying his life and doing all of the right things and then he got really sick.  He came down with strep throat and pneumonia, but, the strep presented first.  For those of you paying close attention, yes, this is one of my princes.  He was treated for the strep, but, when we returned for a follow-up visit to the ped, the arrogant doctor refused to entertain the idea that he could have pneumonia as well.  He refused all tests and treatment of the prince.  The prince did get well in spite of this.  Just for the record, moms always know when their children are ill, so, it is best to take our word on this.  

If he had it would have saved us much grief and sorrow.  Three months later the prince developed PANDAS as a result of the untreated infection crossing the blood brain barrier.  For those who are interested, here is an overview on PANDAS.  Basically, it is the sudden onset of neuropsychiatric symptoms after untreated infections, such as strep or pneumonia. Long story short, my son was quite ill and we could not find a doctor to help him until we found a specialist out of state.  A year after the PANDAS onset, he developed severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, which does happen with kids with PANDAS as well.  

That was an absolute nightmare as my son has the kind of OCD that is fear of contamination.  Things that used to be normal and not a threat now posed a threat of not only harming him if he comes in contact with it, but, actually killing him.  For those of you not familiar with OCD, as I was prior to this, there is no way to reason with your child that their fear is irrational.  When you have OCD, there is no reasoning, especially when you are in that moment of fight or flight.  There just isn't, case closed.  

Of course, as loving parents, we initially did everything wrong—removing the contaminated items and trying to make our child less anxious.  This actually feeds the OCD monster (which is the dragon in my story because as I've mentioned every good story needs a dragon) and makes it SO much more powerful in the long run because now even though you truly are trying your best to help your child, you are now working for the OCD and it has you in a choke hold!  OCD tore through our home shattering relationships in its path.  It was surreal and gut wrenching to watch.  There was nothing I could do.  As much as I tried, nothing helped.

Thankfully I found a mom on a FB group with a child like mine who had taken her son to an adolescent outpatient intensive treatment program specifically for OCD.  My son and I were there for nine weeks away from home and it was the best thing for him.  He worked so damn hard and was slaying that dragon a little at a time.  For the record, the OCD dragon will always be a part of his life as there is no cure.  We both left the treatment program feeling empowered and better than we had in years as they taught our entire family how to deal with OCD and my prince now had the tools to tame the monster.

The week after we came home Covid broke out and that was another death blow to our family.  All of the hard work he had done was lost over the next year and it felt like we were back to square one.

During these trials, reading has been my happy place where I can get away for a while and not think about all of this.  So, imagine my surprise when I pick up Grandmother and one of the characters is just like my son!  I started to laugh and was like "Seriously?  This is where I go to get away from this!"  Backman writes anxiety so well because he intimately knows it.  He is honest and candid about his struggles over the years, and in my opinion this is what makes his books so beautiful.

That is what I am striving for.  To take some of what's inside of me (the good and the bad) and weave it into a fairy tale of sorts as I adore all things fairy tale.  And let's face it, we all have dragons waiting to be slayed and we are all on a hero's journey leading us towards redemption.