By Samantha, United Kingdom

Audio recording by Samantha

I lay there asleep in peace on my bed
Avoiding waking to confront the demon in my head
Loosing myself in my beautiful dreams
Feeling free, well, for what it seems
I wake and feel the constraint around me
Face to face with the monster that found me
Reeling out a list of rules I should follow
Each with a meaning that’s hollow
But as I do one, it makes me do more
If I ever missed one, it would yell as it saw
I obeyed every rule, scared of upsetting it
It knew it could own me, and I was letting it
Drained and tired from doing what it desired
I was its own personal slave it had hired
So consumed in the rituals I had to do
I was losing everything else that was true
My freedom was jailed
My love had frailed
Prisoned in a hell I hailed
Watching my love ones fall apart beside me
it was time I set light to the fire inside me
this presence was my enemy not my friend
And was a relationship I needed to end
I burnt my bridges and cut my ties
I ripped it apart and said my goodbyes
I have the freedom now to live my life and be free
But over my shoulder, I know it’s always watching me
Its shadow lingers in a distance
And whispers to me in its persistence
But I stand strong, you will stay a ghost, and I will walk past your existence

I have written poetry from a young age, it has always been an outlet for my very creative imagination. Writing a poem about my challenges with OCD helped me to disassociate myself from it, it also enabled me to look at the illness from an outsiders point of view.

Editor’s note:

Samantha’s poem is featured in a book, “Hope with OCD” that her mother Lynn has written and is available to pre-order here.