OCD's Link to Sexual Struggles

Speaker 1 0:01

Welcome to the Husband Material podcast , where we help Christian men outgrow porn . Why ? So you can change your brain , heal your heart and save your relationship . My name is Drew Boa and I'm here to show you how let's go . Hey man , thanks for listening to this episode about OCD obsessive compulsive disorder and how it can relate to sexual struggles , including with pornography . Our guest today , andrew Lloyd , is someone who overflows with curiosity and compassion . I am always amazed at his ability to attune and to be fully present . I think you're really going to enjoy his story and his insights on this important piece of healing . Enjoy the episode . Welcome to Husband Material . Today , I'm hanging out with my friend who is a pastor and a certified husband material coach Andrew Lloyd . Welcome to the show .

Speaker 2 0:58

Hey Drew , it's so good to be with you today .

Speaker 1 1:00

It's always good to be with you , man , and today we are talking about OCD obsessive compulsive disorder and how it might relate to having a struggle with porn or other unwanted sexual behavior . Andrew , why are you so passionate about this ?

Speaker 2 1:20

Yeah , I'm really passionate about this because a big part of it is my story and for me there was always this huge disconnect growing up between my spirituality , my mental health , my struggle with unwanted sexual behavior . It all felt like they were in compartments and they were all battling each other all the time and healing for me didn't really start to happen until I realized that those are all parts of me , all those parts of me are actually good , and things just kind of come out sideways sometimes and it was learning how to bring wholeness and health to all of those parts that changed my life for the better , and I just really want all of us to be able to experience that , because it's really changed my life in really positive ways .

Speaker 1 2:09

Andrew , what is your story of how obsessive compulsive disorder developed for you ?

Speaker 2 2:14

Yeah , for me , it hit my life when I was eight years old . I was quite young . In September of 2001 is when the world changed . There was the tragedy with the Twin Towers .

Speaker 2 2:28

As an eight-year-old kid , I didn't know how to process that . I remember watching it on the TV , not knowing how to think about it , how to talk about it , and so I was really my whole world was seeing death for the first time . And then , just a couple weeks later , after that had happened , my grandfather passed away and I wasn't really expecting that . I didn't know it was going to happen very , very close to my grandfather , who was just a wonderful human , really delighted and loved me . And so , in this like two-week time frame , death is at my front door , both from what I'm seeing nationally on the TV and with this person who I am very close to and really love , and I didn't know how to process it and it just felt like my brain broke .

Speaker 2 3:19

And some of the studies though there's a lot being learned still a lot of the studies do see that there's some kind of a trauma component to OCD . Not always , but a lot of the times there is a trauma component . And so , as these traumas hit my life , my brain , whether it was always there and just came out , or that's kind of what brought it up . It just brought it forward in my life and from then on that was my reality , and particularly fear around death was a really , really big part of my OCD journey , especially early on .

Speaker 1 3:54

I can see how that combination of being exposed to death and tragedy and then it hits you really really close to home , taking away your safe place , would be so devastating .

Speaker 2 4:11

Yeah , it was like my safety was just kind of ripped out from under me and in some work that I've done here at Husband Material and the small groups and stuff , really identifying that that's when powerlessness hits me for the first time and ends up being this fear and theme that runs through a lot of my story .

Speaker 1 4:31

On this show we talk a lot about how our sexuality is good and we need to bless those sexual parts of us that might be attached to porn . But what do you mean when you say that OCD is a part of you that can be good ?

Speaker 2 4:49

Yeah , that's something I've really wrestled with , especially in this part of my life , especially since it's , in my experience anyway , been something that's caused a lot of stress and terror in my life and so I wouldn't necessarily say the way it's felt terrorizing inside me has been a good thing . But through the process of learning how to treat myself with more compassion and love and try to see myself the way God sees me , a big part of that has been learning how to bless that , even though there's this thing that I have in my brain , which I've hated for a really long time , that God doesn't look upon me with hate or disgust or like I'm broken , but with compassion , and within it there's actually been this invitation to be more compassionate and gracious and caring for myself , which for a long time I was fighting against it rather than leaning into the compassion God sees with me , with my brain and my mental health and some of the struggles that I've had with that .

Speaker 1 5:55

I love how you have described OCD as a difference in the brain , and each letter O , c and D has a specific meaning . Can you say more about what obsessive compulsive disorder really is ?

Speaker 2 6:11

It's often mess represented a lot in the media . A lot of times you'll think that it means that I have this quirk of being really organized or I need orders , numbers to be in a particular order or things like that . But really what OCD is is it is a brain disorder . It means that your brain is wired differently . A term that's used a lot these days it's not a medical term but it is a helpful term , I think is being neurodivergent . It's diverted from kind of the normal way the brain is wired . And OCD just stands for three things in those letters the O stands for the obsession , and what an obsession is is it's an intrusive thought .

Speaker 2 6:53

And whether we realize it or not , we all have intrusive thoughts . We have them when we're driving down the road and something random pops into our head out of nowhere , like I should just fly to Tennessee , or like something random like that could be unrelated to anything , and you're like that's very strange and you kind of log it in your brain files and continue on with your day . But with someone who has a brain that's wired differently , particularly with OCD , they get intrusive thoughts that are often distressing and against our value systems and those thoughts kind of latch on and , since our brains are wired different , can't just let it go , and there's lots of different ways . You know that happens . You could get intrusive thoughts about cleanliness or contamination , like oh , did I wash my hands ? I didn't wash my hands , I need to do them right now , or something bad could happen . Or it could be something I experienced a lot An intrusive thought like if I don't do this thing , something bad will happen .

Speaker 1 7:54

It could be that vague and , rather than just saying that strange and logging it away , the brain latches on and cannot let go , and one of those types of thoughts might also be spiritual , like will God be disappointed with me or will this affect my eternal salvation Absolutely .

Speaker 2 8:14

And that was my story . I grew up in a Christian home . I loved Jesus from an early age . I did grow up in kind of a Turner burn kind of church and when I developed OCD when I was eight , a lot of it was spiritual for me . I would think these things like did I really ask God for forgiveness ? Did I miss something when I asked Jesus into my heart ? Did I believe hard enough ? If I didn't believe hard enough , did I do it wrong ?

Speaker 2 8:42

And these weren't just like passing thoughts . These are things that would latch onto my brain and cause me significant distress , like keep me up at night , keep me from functioning every day , and these obsessions would just latch on and not let go . And so , since you experienced that level of distress , you try to get rid of it . But you don't know how . And that's where the compulsions come in in OCD . And what's really tricky about these is sometimes they're physical , like if you're worried about your hands being contaminated , you'll wash your hands and wash your hands .

Speaker 2 9:15

If it's something spiritual , like what I experienced , a lot of the compulsions happen in my brain . So if I'm worried , particularly like when I started acting out sexually and having sexually unwanted behavior . I would be so , like I would ask for forgiveness again and again , and again , and again and again , because I'd be like , did I ask for forgiveness right ? Like , did I do these things right ? And so I do these mental compulsions where I just pray the same prayers over and over and over , and it wasn't in a way to meditate on what I was doing , it was out of fear that it wasn't working because of something that I did or didn't do . And so these compulsions are the responses to try to get rid of the distress , of the obsession , which is just wreaks havoc on your brain and , in turn , your body too .

Speaker 1 10:07

And my heart goes out to you . You've also described that as unseen suffering . What does that mean ?

Speaker 2 10:17

For me was this experience where most of this happened in my brain and I didn't have the language to articulate it or talk about it , and so I would just be in my living room and I would maybe be scared that I was contaminated by germs or that I didn't believe hard enough that God would save me , or I didn't believe the right way .

Speaker 2 10:43

Another one that was common for me was I had this obsession with even numbers , so the TV had to be turned up in even numbers , and if it wasn't , I had this fear like something bad would happen , and I'd just be sitting in my living room , freaked out about this , and my body's responding , my heart rate's fast , my breathing is shallow , I'm in fight or flight mode and to everyone else it looks like I'm just sitting in the living room watching a cartoon or something .

Speaker 2 11:10

And there's nights where I have these obsessions going on and I can't sleep and I don't really know how to talk about it . Like I can't quite explain it , but it's my experience , and so I do have memories of my parents lovingly sitting with me when it would get too much and I'd try to explain and they would comfort me . But it was just this vicious cycle I was in , where I was just in this state of terror and nobody really knows and nobody could really see , and I didn't have language , for which so many of those elements are elements that are true of trauma , had not having language and feeling powerless . And so I'm in this traumatized , traumatic state , not knowing what to do , completely unseen to other people .

Speaker 1 11:57

It sounds super lonely and also exhausting .

Speaker 2 12:03

Those are very good words for it . Loneliness is something that I didn't even really name in that until these last couple of years . My therapist mentioned it to me once and I just started weeping uncontrollably because he finally had a name for it . And exhausting is another good one .

Speaker 2 12:20

A word I've always really resonated with is this idea of hypervigilance . When you get into a coffee shop you have to sit in a chair where you can see the doorway , your head's kind of always on a swivel . That has been my experience my whole life , always on alert for something that could go wrong and with OCD in particular , knowing things that triggered it would really affect where I would go or what I would do . Like even in my adulthood there's been seasons where it's been really bad . And it affects like oh , I don't really want to go to that restaurant because it could have a trigger for me , or I don't even really want to go out tonight because it could trigger me and I feel like my whole Friday night would be ruined . You know , Really significant distress . How did that affect your sexuality ? That's a good question . I think it really did affect my sexuality in the way that it was really hard for me to Like , for instance , with sexual brokenness in particular , if there's a time I would act out or something that would really feed into a lot of the spiritual struggles I had about . Am I believing right ? Am I asking for forgiveness right ? Really , this lie that my life in God is all about me or all about my actions , you know , which is just an absolute lie , so it would really reinforce a lot of the spiritual component that was significantly distressing to me .

Speaker 2 13:49

The other way it really affected me , though , is having this level of distress so often in my life . I wanted comfort and soothing so bad . So , like a lot of the things we talk about in husband , material is , you know , porn is a pacifier and that it's about healing and growing the boy . That's like frozen in time , and I was under significant distress , didn't have the tools or the language to know what was going on , and I was just this boy who desperately wanted to be comforted and soothed , which , in and of itself , is a really beautiful thing and a really good thing and something that boy is deserving and worthy of . It affected my sexuality in the way where I found a lot of comfort in that , and unfortunately , it came out in broken ways , which reinforced more distress in my life . But at the heart of it there's some really good things I was looking for and needing and wanting .

Speaker 1 14:52

Amen . So much healing comes when we learn to bless those good God-given desires . Andrew , as you grew up and later became a pastor and started your healing journey , when did things start to change ?

Speaker 2 15:10

Yeah , things really changed for me when I got into a small group with a few guys who were not about being the police , which were not about keeping things really really shallow and not getting into the pain and hurt of our lives , but really were willing to walk through our stories . Together with a couple of the big things we talk about in husband , material curiosity and compassion had lots of ups and downs in my healing journey emotionally , mentally and sexually as well . I was really realizing in my mid-20s that even if there were times where I felt really good about my sexual journey or things were going well there , my mental health was still a disaster or I was overeating . I just really realized in my mid-20s that even if certain areas of my life felt pretty okay at the moment , I didn't know how to deal with life it goes back to . I didn't know how to comfort , to soothe all those

Healing Through Vulnerability and Redemptive Risk

Speaker 2 16:12

things . So I got into a small group with these guys and really we started doing a honest audit of our lives and exploring our stories and really actually coming up with language around the trauma and the things that were at the root of so many of the things that we were dealing with in life , whether that was sexual struggles , not knowing how to cope with life some of the guys struggled with like overeating that there were just these behaviors . We didn't want these ways .

Speaker 2 16:42

Our life was going sideways and the here and now and it was tied to things in our story and it found its roots in shame in our story and I went on this like 10 month journey with these guys in a small group and I got to name things I never named before and specifically talking about my OCD journey , that really finds its root in this fear of powerlessness and this pretty significant traumas that happened to me when I was an eight-year-old kid and so this change was starting to happen where I wasn't just seeing myself as a loser who couldn't get his act together or someone who always needs some kind of coping mechanism , even if that changes , but instead that I'd experienced real hurt in my life and that didn't change until compassion , curiosity and honestly telling my story to others was my reality .

Speaker 2 17:36

Everything started to change when that happened and I was really surprised to find out like how much hurt was a part of my story , but in the process of talking about that with other trusted people around me , it gave permission for parts of that story to heal , and it also gave permission for different parts of myself to heal , and I don't think I can go back after experiencing that . I think it's going to be an ongoing lifelong journey , but I can't really imagine going back , because that's really what changed it all for me Really , really . I started to realize that these changes are only actually happening in relationship with other people , and so I had no option but to really have to trust other people with my story , to take these hurts and distresses in me that were unseen and try to have enough trust to give them to trusted people to love me and care for me , which is really scary because you're putting it into other people's hands to saying can you help me heal ? Can you help me in your presence ? Can you go on this journey as I'm becoming more of who I'm meant to be ?

Speaker 2 18:47

Can I be vulnerable ? Can you suffer with me ? Those are scary questions to ask someone else . Here's my suffering . Can you hold it for a minute with me ?

Speaker 1 18:59

And , frankly , in the time that we have spent together , I have been amazed at your ability to suffer with others and sit with me in my story and offer that same gift .

Speaker 2 19:15

Oftentimes , when I find more wholeness in my life , I feel like part of the invitation of God is you may not have had this for a long time . It's your turn . It's your turn to be what you wish you had at these different avenues of your life , which is really scary . It's really scary to feel that kind of pressure , but it's been really helpful for me to realize that the things that have changed my life the most have not been people coming in with all of the answers , people who can come in as caring guides to sit with me , attune to me well and ask good questions , and when I kind of realized that that's what was being asked , that really changed a lot for me , because being able to tune into someone , ask good questions and just love them well is much less scary .

Speaker 1 20:09

What are some of the nuances and complexities of that healing process for someone with OCD ?

Speaker 2 20:15

Part of the complexity and nuance to it is . It's still so misrepresented that getting the right information is really helpful . A lot of times it takes between 14 and 17 years for someone to get a diagnosis before the onset of symptoms , and so that means that the healing and getting the right tools and resources might not even happen for 17 years , which is a significant amount of distress for a really long time , and so having the right information is really , really helpful , so learning about it is really helpful . One of the things that's been most effective in the world of OCD has been ERP therapy , which is really about exposing yourself to the environment that is going to trigger you , and a lot of times it's best to do this with a trained therapist in it rather than just yourself , so you don't dramatize the living daylights out of yourself . It can be more of a step-by-step journey , but really involves us exposing ourselves to the thing that's going to trigger the fear in us , to train our body and our brain to say I survived , it's okay .

Speaker 2 21:26

So , for instance , for me , one thing that was really triggering to me is going to certain restaurants sometimes that have TVs .

Speaker 2 21:35

There could just be something random on a commercial that triggered my OCD and there was a couple years of my life where I really struggled going out because of it and for me I didn't really experience more healing until I took the scary step to go to restaurants with TVs and then work through those kinds of things . And another thing could be if contamination is something that's really scary for you , a therapist might guide you in somewhat of a safe setting and say what would it be like if you touched some dirt and then ate a chip or something ? And I cannot stress enough that it's usually good to work with someone who's trained in that so they can do it to you in a way that's not scary but really like a lot of what we do at Husband Material . It involves facing that thing we want to run away from , because it's almost in doing that that you can actually name it and tame it and find some freedom and wholeness over it . That's been one of the biggest things .

Speaker 1 22:37

Yes at Husband Material . We call that taking a redemptive risk , and you could take a redemptive risk just listening to this podcast episode . If it is really scary even to just listen to this , that's a redemptive risk . Joining a small group is a redemptive risk . Getting one-on-one coaching coming to one of our retreats is a redemptive risk . Really taking action that may or may not lead to healing , but with a calculated , wise , relatively safe reassurance that this could be really good and that makes a big difference Absolutely , and we can celebrate the risk even if it didn't work out . It is evidence of courage and living in alignment with your values and putting yourself in a position to receive healing .

Speaker 2 23:30

And I love especially what you say living in line with your values , because , particularly with OCD , a lot of the intrusive thoughts are ego-distanic , which means they're against your value system and they don't actually represent what you believe or even what you act out in your life . And so part of the journey of taking redemptive risks or taking these steps to doing scary things that can produce healing , it's really you saying these are my values and this is what I'm actually living out , and you're showing your mind and your body and training your mind and your body that those are your values , what you're living out , that it's not the intrusive thoughts or the things that are contrary to who you really are that define you .

Speaker 1 24:18

Amen , andrew , someone is listening to this and really resonating with some of these symptoms and storylines related to OCD . How would you respond to that person ?

Speaker 2 24:34

I think the first thing I would say is you're not alone . There's nothing inherently wrong with you as a wonderful human created in God's image . Those were things I experienced in my brain for a long time , and I think one of the things God's really shown me these last few years is that it's pretty prevalent thing that people do struggle with , and we're getting more language around . You know there's some studies that say it could be as prevalent as one in 40 people have OCD . Even though there's parts of our brain that might be wired different and it causes a lot of distress , that does not mean that your mind is bad or your body is bad or your emotions are bad or anything like that .

Speaker 2 25:19

I think one of the struggles with OCD is you learn to distrust your mind and your body , and part of the journey to wholeness and getting loving guides around you who can help and finding out who you are in Jesus is learning that your mind , your body , your soul all the parts of you are inherently good and learning how to live with the parts of us that are maybe broken in a broken world and bring them back into wholeness . I think those are things I really wish someone would have told me . You know you're not , you're not strange , you know it's not something that only you struggle with . You are loved and inherently good and there are wonderful , wonderful invitations into more wholeness that are out there . I hope and pray that this is just a chance for you to know that you're not alone and maybe , maybe , together we can find some ways for you to experience more wholeness and compassion in your life .

Speaker 1 26:18

Yeah , and there are so many ways that we can do this together , heal together in the husband and material community . One of those ways is through reaching out to Andrew . He is an amazing coach . Andrew , what's the best way for people to connect with you ?

Speaker 2 26:34

Yeah , the best way to reach out to me is to go to my website . I own a coaching practice called Restored Story Coaching , because I believe that our stories are good . They get a little off track in life a lot of times , living in a broken world , and I would love to just be here to be a guide with you , to attune to you , be compassionate to you and help you identify the roots of where there are lies in your story . I'm trying to tell you something different than what Jesus says about you , so that we can rewrite them and see you living in the restored story that Jesus has for you , because under the behaviors that trip us up often there are lies , lies , of shame , and it changed for me when someone could sit with me and help me rewrite those , and I would love to get to do that with you .

Speaker 1 27:28

Awesome ,

The Power of Freedom From Porn

Speaker 1 27:29

Andrew . What is your favorite thing about freedom from porn ?

Speaker 2 27:32

My favorite thing about being free from sexual brokenness is that it allows me to really hear the wonderful things God has always been speaking to me , that I'm his beloved child and living into the belovedness I have with him . That's always been true , but it's only really been since walking in greater freedom that I've allowed myself to listen . You know , it's been really been a journey where , in these last four or five years where I've been seeing shackles of sexual brokenness coming off and stepping more into the belovedness God has invited me into . So it's just helping me to live with more freedom , much more freedom to see who I really am and be more present in my relationships . That really matter right now .

Speaker 1 28:22

And that is exactly why I always episode I'm saying it , you're good man , you're just speaking this truth of belovedness that is the heart behind everything we do at husband material . Andrew , thanks for being with us , and , gentlemen , always remember you are God's beloved son and you , he is well pleased .