More News!

After returning home from the amazing International IOCD Foundation Conference in Chicago (more on that later), we were pleased to see that The Philadephia Inquirer had run this piece written by Judy in today’s paper.

Post Camino Blog 1

Today I go out the front door of my Cheyney home once again to walk. How I miss it! Although temperatures are already in the low 90s, the road beckons and the body responds. My feet quickly recognize the pattern of putting one foot in front of the other as a way to move forward. I have walked on other days since the rally in Christopher Columbus Park in Boston on June 7^th, but today’s walk feels different, and I’m not quite sure why. Perhaps my body is saying that if I want greater clarity about what’s next in my life, then I have to hit the road to discover the answer.

Today’s path is an old favorite from my winter-training days. I go out Creek Road, turn right at Locksley, and head to the tiny village of Thornton by a circuitous route. Judy’s at Barefoot Yoga for class and I’ll meet her there 90 minutes from now, just enough time for the route. I don’t rely on the GPS, as my feet already know the way. One hundred steps down the road and it all comes back: the sense of purposefulness, the great outdoors, the fresh air, the hard exercise, and the inner voice that says that all will be right even when much is unknown.

So what about the Finish Line in Boston? Did I notice how the tape resisted my passing through it? I sure did. Interesting! Thankfully Judy and Carrie held it tightly. It took some doing, yet that breakthrough had anything but a sense of finality to it. OK, OK, I get it…it’s the beginning line, not the finish line. The beginning of what exactly? Walking with Nathaniel 2? Like Hollywood film favorites, sequels often lack what make the originals successful: imagination and creativity. They dwell too much on what worked in the past and ignore new possibilities. I’ll keep that in mind.

Thornton looms in the distance, and I still haven’t got the answer to my vocational question—what is calling out to me now? BDD advocacy work? I do know that the answer isn’t going to pop up in the half mile that remains before I reach today’s destination. The annual OCD Conference is in Chicago at the end of July. Judy and I (and maybe Carrie, too) will attend. Perhaps something more concrete will emerge by then. I’m reminded of the glass snowball ornament my Grandma Bilodeau had in her upstairs bathroom. Whenever I visited her, I would run to the bathroom, whether I needed to go or not. Once there, I grabbed the snowball, shook it, then watched the flakes come falling down, furiously at first, then more gently. Even when I thought the flakes had finished falling, there were always several more that came down. And then a few more still. That’s what happening now in my Post-Camino-de-Nathaniel life—the impact of the walk is slowly settling, one flake at a time. Maybe eventually clarity will happen.

I now see Judy in the near distance standing by the car. Before I get to her, let me share some good news. We just learned that the walk has already brought in $25,000. I had hoped to break the $24,000 mark, and voilà! And the best news of all: people are talking about BDD in the various arenas of their lives, as sufferers, as parents, as spouses, friends, caregivers, etc. The butterfly effect is growing. That makes me happiest of all, because we have cracked open the door of this closeted disorder. Check out the more than 100 entries under the “Contact” tab on the website and some new press articles. Word is getting out and new connections are being forged.

The Impact of the Walk Continues

A friend and former colleague of Judy’s, Brennan Barnard, wrote a beautiful reflection on his time walking with me in early June towards the end of the walk. It appeared in the New  Hampshire  Concord Monitor on Father’s Day, appropriately. Thanks, Brennan!

Judy joins me now on my on-going daily walks. It is hard to stop. Once a walker, always a walker!

Resources

Many people have contacted us during and after the walk to ask how they can get help for their own struggles with BDD, or for a family member. Below are the places we have found in our search for support. There are many others. Be sure to ask any treatment center you are considering if their staff has experience specifically with BDD.

We are envisioning a day when a young person first diagnosed with BDD has a support group available for themselves, their parents, and their siblings, just as there exist programs now to support children with cancer and their families. Both diseases have a profound impact on families.  Both can be fatal.

Treatment Centers

BDD Clinic and Research Unit, Boston, MA

BDD and Body Image Clinic, Los Angeles, CA

Bio Behavioral Institute, Long Island, New York

OCD Institute, McLean Hospital, Boston

AATC — The Anxiety and Agoraphobia Treatment Center, Bala Cynwyd PA

Books on BDD and OCD

Body Dysmporphic Disorder: an Essential Guide, by Katherine Phillips. M.D. (2009) — the updated version of her seminal book, The Broken Mirror (1986)

Feeling Good About the Way You Look, by Sabine Wilhelm, PH.D.

The BDD Workbook, by James Claiborn, PH.D. and Cherry Pedrick, R.N.

The Adonis Complex: The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession, (2000) by Harrison Pope, M.D., Katharine Phillips M.D., Roberto Olivardia, PH.D.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: New Help for the Family, (2004) Herbert Gravitz

Books on the brain we found helpful

Mindsight, the New Science of Personal Transformation, by Daniel Siegel, M.D. (segments on OCD)

The Brain that Changes Itself, by Norman Doidge, M.D. (chapter on current treatment of phantom limb pain)

Post Camino Wind Down

After all the excitement, Carrie has settled into her new apartment in Boston, and Denis and Judy are both finally at home. The house feels very big and very quiet.

Having pet the cats and bunny, and picked a few peas and carrots in the slightly overgrown garden, we have time to post some photos, videos, and TV footage of the rally and walk. What a finale it was! Funds raised to date: nearly $20,000 and counting!

Denis will post his “walk after thoughts” over the next few days, so we hope you will check the blog from time to time. We’d also love to have any photos of the rally any of you who were there might have taken, so send them along if you can. (Thanks, brother Dan, for sending the photos we were able to post tonight.)