Jenni locked the door, then tried the knob. It wouldn’t open. Then, she inserted the key to unlock it, opened the door and closed it again, locked it, and tried the knob. It seemed locked, but what if it wasn’t? She inserted the key and unlocked it, opened and closed the door again, and locked it. Again. Better be sure. She again inserted the key, unlocked it, opened the door, and closed it again, and locked it. She tried the knob, and it seemed locked, but she had to be sure. One more time for good measure, she inserted the key, unlocked it, opened the door, then pulled it closed again, and locked it. It was hard to let go, but she just had to get to work. So she forced her hand off the knob and walked to her car. (She didn’t know that ketogenic psychiatry can quiet OCD.)
Once she arrived at work, she lined up the papers on her desk to align them with the edges and angles of her desk. Then, for good measure she lined up everything again. Finally, she picked up the report on the top of the stack and began to analyze it.
Intrusive Thoughts – And Reactions – Interrupt
After about 15 minutes of analysis, she headed to the restroom to wash, rewash, and re-rewash her hands again. The idea that the germs on the paperwork could have contaminated her drove her to wash her hands thoroughly. As the soap and warm water flowed over her hands, she felt such relief. Then, she returned to her desk.
Jenni’s boss considered her an asset to the office, as she was efficient and intelligent, and nothing if not tidy. However, she took so many bathroom breaks. They seemed to be just to wash her hands at length; but on bad days, they interrupted her work flow to the point it was an obstacle to getting her work done. If only she had known that ketogenic psychiatry can quiet OCD.
Fifteen minutes later, she walked back to the restroom.
Her boss noticed, and thought, This is going to be one of those days, and quietly sighed.
When Jenni returned to her desk, she carefully re-aligned all the papers and items on her desk, then opened the center drawer and re-aligned all the pens, pencils, and paper clips in that drawer, three times, before she started back with her analysis.
But touching all those items triggered thoughts about all the germs she likely picked up, so she headed back to the restroom to wash her hands, again three times. On some days, she worried more than on others. Sometimes her fear of infection grew more and more intense inside her.
Washing her hands thoroughly was the only thing that seemed to relieve that tension inside her.
True that her hands were dry and cracked from all the washing and soap, but it was a small price to pay to feel safe from infection.
On her drive home, she often found it difficult to drive through stop signs. Each time she would start across an intersection, she would have the thought of hitting a pedestrian, so she’d stop, back up behind the stop sign, then slowly try again. Cars would stack up behind her, honking.
By the time she could force herself to proceed across an intersection, her hands were sweaty and shaking, and her heart pounded in her chest, frantically anticipating the sound of a thump as she hit or drove over someone.
Unfortunately, she started the entire process over again at the next stop sign.
The commute, which would be a 20 minute drive for someone else, took her an hour to an hour and a half, because of these delays.
Once home, she’d unlock the door, walk inside, and begin the task of locking and unlocking the door. Over and over and over.
Then, she’d proceed to her bedroom and align and re-align all the items on her dresser, then refold all her garments in her chest of drawers, and finally the hanging clothes in her closet. She made sure there was exactly half an inch between hangers on the rod, with each shirt and jacket facing the same direction, and sorted according to color.
Once that task was completed, she would go to the kitchen to clean out the refrigerator, as she did every day. Only then could she begin to prepare supper.
Hand washing had to be done when she returned home, as soon as she walked in, and again after the bedroom tasks were complete so she wouldn’t cross contaminate the germs in the bedroom with those in the kitchen, then after the refrigerator was clean and tidy, before she cooked, after eating, and after the dishes.
There was so much work involved in her day, but taking the time kept everything tidy and clean, and that helped her to feel safe. Some day she would learn that ketogenic psychiatry quiets OCD.
One day, Jenni’s boss Cara, called her into her office.
“Please close the door, Jenni, and have a seat. We need to talk about your productivity. You’re an intelligent woman, and the work you do is exemplary.”
“Thank you, Cara.”
“The problem is that all the interruptions you have during your work day decreases what you actually produce so drastically that you show the lowest results of anyone in the office…”
“Interruptions? No one ever talks to me or visits me at my desk…”
“That’s what I want to talk about, Jenni. Your trips to the restroom are only minutes apart. Your rearranging of your desk and drawers gets redone sometimes 15 or 20 times a day. Can you imagine if you could focus on actually getting your work done how much you could accomplish in a day?”
Tears filled Jenni’s eyes and she stared at her hands.
In a tiny voice, she said, “I know, but need to do those things. They help me. They calm my worrying. And then I can focus and I really get things done. ”
“Jenni, I’m not a doctor, but it’s possible that there is something going on. If that’s true, I believe it can be helped with treatment.”
“Cara, I know my habits are a little strange, but I’m not out of control or anything.”
“Jenni, your intelligence and attention to detail are an asset to this department. But each year I’m required to lay off the lowest producer on my team and hire someone new. I don’t want to have to do that with you, but at this point, you’re the lowest producer. We have some time, and I’m hoping you’ll seek out some treatment that will help you get more done. I don’t want to lose you.
“Here is the website and phone number of a practice that has some innovative ideas for helping people with conditions like this. They call it Metabolic Psychiatry and they offer ketogenic psychiatry. Would you please call them and see if they can help?”
Jenni’s rituals continued without change that day, but she did make the call on her lunch hour.
That evening, she looked up the website on her lap top at home, and learned about the benefits of ketogenic psychiatry. She googled her experiences which the internet called “symptoms.” It had all been so consuming, she hadn’t thought of her behavior as “symptomatic.” It was just how she felt, and what she did when upsetting thoughts came into her head.
But, what came out seemed to indicate she could have symptoms of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder or OCD. And apparently ketogenic psychiatry can quiet OCD symptoms.
It had quieted some of the worst obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors in her psychiatrist’s patients with anorexia — even in women who had suffered for years and whose repetitive thoughts would just not stop. So much so that she published a case report about it and a small clinical trial that demonstrated it.
Recurrent, intrusive, unwanted thoughts…..those are obsessive thoughts. And recurrent, intrusive, unwanted behaviors…. those are compulsive behaviors.
She hadn’t really thought of it that way.
She hadn’t really thought about her thoughts.
A disorder?
As she read, she learned that her drive to wash her hands was a common symptom of this disorder, as well as her need to rearrange her desk, papers, counters, refrigerator, and clothes. Her struggle at stop signs was even included among common symptoms.
Alarms went off in her head. What on earth?
And her fear of germs.
That just seemed ridiculous. Everyone knows that germs are bad. They make you sick. What’s bad about avoiding germs??
Still, she kept reading.
Ketogenic Psychiatry
She learned that the psychiatry practice Cara had told her about had a Metabolic Psychiatry program called Touchpoints 180. They offered a team of experts, and a ton of treatment touchpoints, including a ketogenic dietitian who could help you enter and stay in therapeutic nutritional ketosis. And this state is what can set up therapeutic changes in your brain that could relieve those upsetting intrusive thoughts as well as those behaviors… like repeatedly washing hands or unlocking and re-locking the door.
She could see there was a mountain of information she could — and would — read about all this, but she needed to get to sleep for work tomorrow. She determined that she would read all she could over the coming weekend about how ketogenic psychiatry quiets OCD.
Jenni had made an appointment during her lunch hour the next day at this practice she’d learned about. Her psychiatrist diagnosed OCD, so Cara was right. They set her up in a comprehensive program that included a transition to a ketogenic diet with meal plans and recipes, groups for support, incredible digital apps for all kinds of careful monitoring, and walks and talks four times a week with others for exercise, fresh air, support and community building. They worked with local farms to source organic produce and grass-fed beef; this was a group of clinicians who who knew their farmers! (What?!) They even had short videos to help her prepare her meals. Lots of conversation, flexibility, personalization… and an opportunity to build community and meet other people who were successfully doing this.
She learned that ketogenic metabolic therapy was a bona fide medical treatment that was developed more than 100 years ago — not just a YouTube fad — with specific recommendations that would be worked out for her to reduce her symptoms. It is low in carbohydrates, moderate in protein, and high in good fats.
(Fats were good? This was news.)
It included things like eggs, salmon, chicken, avocados, butter, olive oil, macadamia nuts, and great meats, cheese….and so many other things! It also included cruciferous veggies like brussel sprouts, cauliflower, and broccoli, as well as bell peppers, leafy lettuce, spinach, mushrooms, zucchini, and blueberries. And even garlic scapes (those wonderful wiggles in the basket), napa cabbage, radishes, kohlrabi — stuff she never bought or ate.
But here they were in person and on videos, week after week, teaching her what was fresh on the farm, and what she could buy locally that was easy and delicious. She wasn’t a cook — but their videos were short and sweet, and the recipes so easy that it would be a snap to try them.
The list went on, and she could see that delicious meals could be easy. And that they were her treatment.
Easy was key. This didn’t have to be hard.
She started to realize that her condition could greatly improve with this metabolic approach: she could upgrade her food choices… and doing it right could switch up her metabolism, fire up her brain power, quiet her anxiety, stop the repetitive thoughts.
No meds. No drugs. Just food.
Jenni determined to start this ketogenic metabolic therapy immediately to see what it could do, and to hopefully save her job.
In a private meeting with Cara on Monday, she told her she had been to the doctor on Friday, and was beginning the treatment they recommended. She was hopeful that it was going to help and she’d keep her posted. Her confidence that ketogenic psychiatry can quiet OCD symptoms was getting stronger.
Could food actually change her mind?
Could it change the upsetting thoughts? She could imagine that if it could, that she might feasibly cut back on the rituals she performed… maybe.
Over several weeks, she found the need to wash her hands less compelling and overwhelming. In a month she was able to reduce her hand washing at work to once an hour… in contrast to every 10-15 minutes. That was an improvement.
Could this be working? Jenni hoped so.
After three months, it was easier to get through stop signs, and her commute had decreased from an hour to 30 minutes. She was far less distracted by thoughts of running over someone. It felt better. Freer.
Jenni also found it more comfortable to sit at her desk and work, without constantly rearranging her desk and drawers. Thoughts about germs everywhere she touched subsided…i n fact, sometimes she didn’t even think about germs at all.
Five months after her first visit to the doctor, Jenni was only washing her hands a couple times during her workday. Her productivity had increased so drastically that she was one of the top three producers in the department.
In a meeting, Cara asked her what she attributed to her remarkable improvement. Jenni blushed, and told her that all she could imagine was that the ketogenic metabolic treatment and the program she participated in had changed her brain and relieved what she now understood were symptoms. Ketogenic psychiatry really can quiet OCD.
“I’ve learned so much Cara. I’m so grateful to you for showing me where to get help. I see my life transforming every day, and I expect to continue getting better.”
“Jenni, I’m so glad. I knew you’d excel if you could get those interruptions out of your way. I want you to know that your name has come up with leadership recommending a promotion. I’m not free to reveal it now, but expect an attractive offer in the next few weeks.”
Jenni drove home feeling light and bright. She could hardly believe the changes in her life since the days of repetitions, rituals, and routines. The misery of that time was all but gone. Intrusive, upsetting thoughts and images — if they popped in at all — just flitted by.
Jenni had hope, freedom, and relief.
If you can relate to Jenni’s experience, call us.
Metabolic psychiatry, through a carefully designed and personalized ketogenic metabolic therapy, works in your brain cells and throughout your body, on your mitochondria, your neurotransmitters, your BDNF, your gut microbiome and more. It’s treatment that empowers your mitochondria in many ways so your brain and your whole being can be calm, balanced, and healthy. Ketogenic psychiatry can quiet OCD symptoms. And that can help you to enjoy being symptom-free.
Let us help you achieve health, well-being, and freedom.
To the restoration of your best self,
