BDDHELP - Felipe

Felipe

Hi my name is Felipe and I used to suffer from BDD and Depression.

I don't know how it started but I think it was somewhere between my being 13-15 year old. In my case the disorder also created another problem which was with my speech, which became problematic. I couldn't explain why to doctors, because I knew I didn't have a stutter or anything because there were times when I spoke normally, mainly when I was with my family. So this speech problem was really psychologically or emotionally based.

I had it for about 6 years and during this time I had low grades, almost no social life, no will to do anything, didn't attend school very often. In fact the only positive thing I can say about this period is that it made me stay at home and almost all my free time I spent reading which is a habit which I still have and it is good.

My parents saw it as normal and they thought it was just their teenage kid going through an undefined crisis or something but didn't think it was very important, not even when their son remained in the car when they went out, remained in the hotel when they went travelling abroad, had no social life, etc etc.

One thing that helped me was buddhism I think, and meditation. When I started doing meditation it hit me like a rock that life was very short and I had to live it no matter what. So, still under the effects of BDD I started making the effort to go out, use the bus and underground, even though I still thought everyone was looking at me for being so utterly hideous and different from other people. Then I turned to psychiatric help and from there I went to regular therapy. It's helped me a lot, I'm taking this medicine called Paroxetin, which is an antidepressant, and it helps too.

Knowing that there is an illness that has the very symptoms which you have is the first step to recovery I think.

Thank you