Betrayal. It is a word that immediately brings up images. If we have ever been betrayed, we can relate to it. If we haven’t had a major betrayal yet, we know of the ultimate betrayal. Judas betrayed Jesus with a kiss. But, even that was part of the plan. What if all of our betrayals were part of the ultimate plan for our good? I can tell you they are.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that God brings the betrayal. He most definitely does not. The betrayal comes at the hands of Satan himself. We know this because the Bible tells us that Satan entered Judas just before Judas betrayed the Lord. But, look at how it ended. Our savior is risen and He broke the hold of death.
Now, I say all of this because this morning I was wondering why I was still feeling weird around certain objects in my old house. I pondered that this morning, and I felt the word betrayal coming to mind.
It was true. The two chairs reminded me of a betrayal where someone I thought should protect me instead led me into a very uncomfortable situation at work. It is where I fell apart and where I thought I was truly afraid of the contaminated object that was brought into the room. But, it wasn’t ultimately about that. It was about the betrayal. Someone I trusted to protect me did not. Ocd is never really about a contaminant. It always has a deeper root with a deeper fear.
I followed that thought into betrayal and the theme of it had been running for a while. I thought about the betrayal I felt when my husband left during the height of the ocd. And, then I thought about the prescription medication that triggered all of this off to begin with that I took from a doctor who I trusted to help me not harm me. I thought about the deeper betrayals coming from earlier in life where someone I trusted to protect me did not. But, God is trying to resurrect me from the ashes that once was my life. And, He wants to do the same for you.
God asks us to trust Him and when we do great things begin to happen. We are blessed so we can bless others and relationships that looked doomed are redeemed.
So, what I’m telling you when I looked at those objects that I had associated with a memory – those memories for me delved into betrayal leading all the way back to where the fear first began. For you, the fear may be linked to some other fear or hurt that you suffered somewhere in your life. Mine comes from worrying that harm is going to come to me. Certainly I have evidence that there has been harm done, but the greater evidence is that God can redeem it all and turn it around for my good and for your good.
These are just thoughts I had today and I wanted to share them here. I want to tell you that God has blessed my husband and I so much with our new home. It truly is beautiful. He is also restoring and has been restoring broken relationships in my life. I pray that you will continue on in your fight and give God the opportunity to heal you and redeem your life from the ashes.
Getting through ocd.
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Hi
Sorry I don’t know your name as it is not mentioned in your blog. I really must thank you for writing such a fantastic blog about your experiences of OCD. It really helped me somehow especially the article that to feed is to make it grow & to starve will make it die. I am trying to do it now. FYI, it is divine arrangement that I came to know of your site as I was praying to God regarding my situation & I was feeling hopeless…..and my situation is the same as what you had gone through. The OCD I am trying to battle is also in the area of fear of contamination of germs, dirt & bacteria etc etc. Like you, my husband just filed for divorce a few months back because of the OCD & he couldn’t take it any more. The sad thing is my husband & myself
are actually very compatible i.e we don’t quarrel about anything, we can communicate very well & its just this OCD in cleanliness that is getting in the way. So when I read that God restored your marriage, I was feeling so hopeful for my marriage too.
So, I really need to ask you for help & guidance……the fact is I really like to be clean to feel comfortable & I am also a perfectionist…..so when I touch something dirty, I really feel very uncomfortable & I am tormented in my thoughts & I hate these thoughts….so I find its faster if I just go clean it & get these thoughts out of my mind. But my husband cant stand me doing that because I clean after his trail. Also, my husband doesnt bother about being hygienic sometimes…..so sometimes he is quite dirty like after urinating, he doesn’t wash his hands….despite me telling him, he gets angry & this is what drives him crazy that he can’t stand it anymore. So Im really at a loss what I should do & how to heal myself of this OCD – this desire to be clean to feel comfortable & I really like the feeling, that’s my problem. I also have this issue of trail thinking…….i.e I like to clean after trail eg if a plumber comes to my house, I will clean from my house to even outside the house eg the lift buttons he touches etc….so how to set myself free from doing this…I can’t find a solution.
I would really appreciate if you will reply me and we can email each other & I can use your experiences in you being healed of OCD to set myself completely free by God too. Thanks a billion.
Madeline,
Thank you for writing to me and letting me know that God led you to this blog! I want to start by telling you that perfectionism is prominent in a large number of people who suffer with ocd. I have perfectionism tendencies that are extremely heavy in certain areas.
I heard something this morning watching my morning devotional program. Joyce Meyer said she went through a period where she became very fearful that something was going to happen to her husband. She really began struggling and fearing it and saying what would I do without him, and God spoke to her spirit and told her she would do the same thing she is doing now because Dave, her husband, was not upholding her God was. I say that to you because it hit home to me about the time when my husband left and filed for divorce. I thought what am I going to do without him, but God showed me that I was relying on him too much and that God is my true sustainer, not a person.
Now, once God made that clear, he led me to pray over my marriage every day. I prayed the prayers in the book, “The Power of a Praying Wife,” by Stormie Omaritan, I think that’s the correct spelling on her last name, but it may be off a little. God led me to specific prayers in that book and I prayed them every day over my husband even on the days I didn’t feel like it. Someone also sent me a prayer about divorce and I prayed that as well. Then someone at my church told me that satan had stepped into our marriage by what my husband was doing in filing for divorce and I prayed in my authority that God gives me as his wife for satan to step off our marriage and that I was coming and standing in the authority granted to me by God when He put us together.
Madeline, I don’t know what happened, but God got a hold of my husband. He won’t talk about it, but he just says that he knows satan had a hold of his mind and God got a hold of him. My situation turned around in 24 hours from the time he told me for the second time that he was going to go through the divorce.
I tell you this to help you know how to pray, but it is up to God to restore the marriage and that also depends on your husband’s free will. Pray that he will listen to the Lord and that God will open his eyes.
Now, as for you. You use this time to draw as close to God as you can. First, you cannot heal yourself. God can heal you and you have to cooperate by doing what He tells you to do. So, let yourself off the hook that you are not doing everything perfectly. But, each day get up and be determined that you are going to conquer letting something go each day that you would normally clean. It will feel uncomfortable at first. But, that feeling will go away.
I pray for you and your husband and I stand with you in prayer that your husband will realize what he is doing is not what God wants and that he will return home. You pray and use this time to allow God to heal you.
My heart goes out to you because I know what you are going through. And, just because God brings your husband home won’t’ mean that things will go perfectly. Once you have the time to process things, you will feel anger over his leaving. That is normal, but don’t let the anger stay. I am going to try and send you an email from my personal email address so you will have it.
And, the next time the plumber comes take baby steps and try to not clean one thing even though you do others. Then keep doing that until you are no longer cleaning everything. Then keep doing that until you are not cleaning anything except what someone without ocd would clean. Madeline, you can do this! God is with you! I prayed when He led me to start this blog that He would lead those here that He wanted to lead here because I have not marketed this blog in any way so it is no mistake that you are here and that God led you for sure based on what you said in your comment and based on my prayer over this blog. What God does for one person, He will do for others but we do have to cooperate.
God Bless you Madeline! Feel free to write me anytime and I will send you an email with getting through ocd in the subject line.
Stacey