Author's note: CW: for anyone with OCD and gets distressed reading too much about it, might be best to skip onto the next chapter. Take care out there, you good eggs! Have a drink of water and be kind to yourself, now! You're important and deserve good things, and of course, I really appreciate your comments! :D Mighty kind of you to take time out of your day and read this stuff, but comments are the cherry on top, really.
Jane: They have a lot in common it's true, but also enough opposites for this fascinating mixed dynamic where they'll either feed off each other or balance each other out. There's no in-between. Emotional Glorfindel will sob on stoic Rhodri for hours, and she'll have him functioning again with some comforting words and physical affection. And then the tables turn when larger-than-life Glorfindel brings Rhodri, who once again is shipwrecked on some moral/intellectual conundrum and forgets everything else exists, back down to earth. It's all about give and take, right? :D
Guest: With Tulkas and Irmo squabbling over her, Manwë passed Rhodri over to Ilúvatar to sequester away somewhere. The Valar, after all, could go anywhere and do anything, and there was nothing Tulkas couldn't get into, so she couldn't just be hidden somewhere in Arda. Ilúvatar thought London was a good sort of spot to park her. I have no idea why he treated her to the human experience rather than let her keep her Maia body. Can't hurt having an extra perspective, though. It's certainly served her well in her dealings with Gilraen and Aragorn.
Rosenthorne: It was Elrond's idea to requisition Rhodri's cake, would you believe it. All those morals of his are a sham, honestly.
§
"So tell me more about feeling trapped," I said to Bregedúr. "Do you mean in a physical sense? Mental? Something else?"
"Both of those," Bregedúr answered bitterly. "I can't leave my quarters, and I can't get out of my head, either. It's as though something tries to strangle me every time I go to leave."
"Do you physically feel like you're being strangled whenever you try to leave?"
"A little, yes. I feel my heart hammering, though, and my body goes cold." She shook her head. "It's fear, I know it is."
"So where can you be without feeling that fear?"
"Here," Bregedúr said with a small shrug. "Well, and the other few rooms in our chambers here, I think. I haven't tried all of them, because some of them are kept for any children we will have, so they are empty for now."
I nodded. "How would you feel if you were in Imladris in your room? Would you feel calm there?"
She pondered my question for a moment before slowly saying, "I… think I would feel calm there, yes, but it is hard to tell, because I absolutely do not want to travel on horseback presently." She shuddered a little. "The thought of doing that is equally as terrifying as leaving the chambers here."
"Well, most people who fall pregnant are reluctant to ride. What if, say, you travelled in a carriage?"
Bregedúr shook her head hard. "Absolutely not," she repeated.
"Right," I said, making a quick note. "So there is absolutely nowhere outside of your chambers- and, let's say your room in Imladris- that you would be comfortable? There are a lot of rooms that look a lot like this one that I saw on the way here."
"Nowhere at all," she lamented. "I tried to go for a walk with Legolas to the music hall here, hoping that playing the flute a little would calm my nerves, but to absolutely no avail. I was frightened the whole way and only wanted to turn back."
"Having Legolas with you doesn't help, either?"
"Not really," she said sadly as she shook her head again. "I have tried to push through it, and it had me crying all evening. We have tried wine, dancing, music, miruvor, various potions and unguents, and nothing seems to have made a hint of difference."
"What exactly is it that is causing you to feel this fear whenever you leave your chambers, do you know?" I enquired.
"I… I worry that I might injure myself somehow," she murmured.
"You injure yourself all the time, Bregedúr; you are constantly exposing yourself to dangerous situations through your training and other fast-paced activities. That's never bothered you before," I observed.
"I wasn't carrying a baby then, Rhodri," she reminded me, raising her eyebrows.
"Ah, so the concern is really for the health of your unborn child, then?" I observed.
"Mmm."
"Has anything happened to you out there that makes you doubt their safety? A big shock, or watching someone else get hurt?"
"No, no, I haven't had anything like that."
"Surely the halls around here would be reasonably safe as a rule, yes? The spiders don't come into the main areas, do they?"
"There are other hazards," she muttered nervously. "Everything is a hazard now, just about. Stairs, for one. Others running by who might bump into me. What if I went for a walk in the middle of the night and fell, and nobody was there to help? Or even in the middle of the day, when things are at a lull? I could be there for hours."
Bregedúr gave a frustrated groan and slouched in her chair. "What's the matter with me, Rhodri?"
I had a pretty good idea what the matter was at this point. Experiencing fear of leaving a certain area, or going into certain places like the inside of a library or out in the forum, is the hallmark symptom of agoraphobia. Sometimes it arises for fear of not being able to escape from a terrible situation one envisions happening, or that if it happens, that no help will arrive to rescue them. I still didn't have enough information for a proper diagnosis, though. There was a sticky differential diagnosis to be made first that would rule out obsessive-compulsive disorder, which occurs when upsetting thoughts that cause significant distress constantly invade. People with OCD dispel these thoughts, or temporarily offset the anxiety from them, by carrying out rituals like washing their hands or checking locks. Was Bregedúr worrying about her baby all the time? Or was it just an overblown fear of the outdoors?
"I need a little more information before I can tell you what I think might be going on," I said. "Let me say, though, that it's nothing to do with your character or anything like that. I think something totally abstract from you is at play here."
She took a deep breath and nodded. "Go ahead."
"How are you doing when you're in your chambers? Are you able to relax a bit when you're not outside?"
"Oh, yes," Bregedúr replied. "Well, I don't like being indoors all the time, and I don't think it's especially healthy to be confined like this, but I feel safe in here. I pass the time by reading and playing the harp. Not the most… exciting existence, but I am pleased knowing the baby is safe."
"So you don't have any worries about your baby while you're in here? No horrible thoughts or scenarios playing out in your head of you injuring yourself somehow?"
"Not really, no," she said, the syllables drawing out like she was assembling them on the spot.
"Is there something that you're not certain about?"
"Well, I don't like being cooped up inside, and this has had such an impact on my daily life that it is hard not to feel stressed. I can still perform some of my duties in here, such as receiving guests and correspondence with Elrond, but beyond that, life is very limited," she admitted sadly.
"Tell me about how you feel when you talk with people," I requested. "I imagine your social life has taken a bit of a hit, but are you happy enough to have visitors?"
"Yes, when they have the time to visit, I enjoy company greatly. It isn't… especially stimulating in here," she mused, flicking her eyes quickly around the room. "Not for such extended periods, anyway."
"How often does that happen, would you say?" I probed, making a note.
"Oh, not very often. Last time I thought about it was days ago, and before that it was another few days again."
"Do you feel any need to keep checking that your chambers are safe for you?"
Bregedúr frowned. "What do you mean?"
"Well, for example, if you want to avoid stairs, I suppose that is because you worry about falling over, yes?"
"That's right."
"Right. So in your keenness to avoid falling over, do you get any urges to keep checking the floors in here to make sure it's even, or that there isn't anything lying around that trips you up?"
She shook her head. "No, in here is perfectly fine. I will pick up something if it's lying around, because it would be unwise to leave it there. That seems like a reasonable precaution to me, though, but I don't need to check beyond a brief glance as I'm walking."
"So in other words, your mind is your own when you're safe here?"
"Precisely," she confirmed.
"I see. I suppose the last thing I'm wondering is how long this has been going on for."
"Oh, it's been all through pregnancy. I'm six months along now," she said with a smile.
I smiled back. "Well, it sounds to me like what you're suffering from is agoraphobia, pal."
"A-what?"
"It means a fear of going outside."
Bregedúr looked at me like I'd just made the most trite observation in recorded history.
"Well, yes, Rhodri, I've been telling you I've been afraid to go outside all afternoon, now!" she exclaimed in disbelief.
"I know," I said calmly, holding up a hand to placate her. "It's the name of a specific disorder. People can be afraid to go outside for a lot of reasons, and I had to make sure there wasn't something else causing it."
"So now that you know what it is, can you fix it?" she asked.
"It'll take work, but I think we can definitely improve it," I answered with a nod. "Don't expect overnight results, though."
Bregedúr nodded. "Understood."
"I think that the main problem is the way you view the outside. It sounds like you've got some ideas about how unsafe the world beyond your door is and that those ideas don't really match up with how it really is. What I think we should do is start examining what happens in your mind when you think about going out, and then when we change the thoughts, we change how you feel about being outside, too. How does that sound to you?"
"All right," she consented. "Let's give it a try."
"Excellent. We'll start tomorrow," I informed her.
"What will you do to keep yourself amused in the meantime?" Bregedúr asked me.
"I thought I might hang around in here and pester you," I responded with a wicked grin as I started poking her in the face.
Quick as a flash, Bregedúr's hand shot out and grabbed my hand before I could land another prod into her cheek.
"I was hoping you'd say that." She gave me a small smile. "Not that there is much to do in here," she added with a hint of awkwardness as she cast her eyes around her study.
"Oh, I disagree," I said mildly as I joined her in scanning the room. "I think this would be the perfect place for a camping trip."
"Camping?" Bregedúr repeated, eyes widening.
"Indeed," I declared. "In fact, we shall camp tonight, all four of us!"
"Where? In this room?"
"Yep."
Bregedúr regarded me with a mixture of bafflement and suspicion, as though my senses had not merely taken leave of me, but had quit and fled the building entirely.
"There's a campfire to cook our food," I pointed at the unlit fireplace at the other end of the room, "and we have room to set up a tent. It'll be great."
"You're absolutely out of your mind," my friend breathed.
"Quite, yes," I agreed as I stood up, walked over the fireplace, and put some logs in. "Now, are you going to help me with this fire, or are you just going to sit there like a pudding?"
Bregedúr, not being the type to scupper a foolish idea, shrugged and came over to help me arrange the firewood properly.
Naturally, Glorfindel was extremely keen on the idea of indoor camping. Legolas, however, was a little more confused by the prospect.
"So why are we setting up a tent inside, again?" the perplexed Legolas enquired as he passed Glorfindel and me a huge sheet of canvas.
"Would you like to sleep in the great outdoors without shelter?" I asked back.
"But this isn't the great outdoors!" Legolas insisted.
"Not with that attitude, it isn't," I retorted as we draped the canvas over the backs of four armchairs. I put my hands on my hips in satisfaction. "There. Installed!"
After we dragged in a mattress for Bregedúr to sleep on, we were ready for the highly regulated adventure of a lifetime. The majority of the evening was spent roasting various goodies over the fire and pretending absolutely nothing was wrong with the world, but we managed to exercise some discipline and spent the last few hours sleeping.
When we'd woken up, eaten, and packed up the tent, Legolas and Glorfindel made the most of the feeble excuse to take it back to storage so that Bregedúr's next therapy session could start.
"So you think there is something wrong with my thoughts?" Bregedúr said to me as she rubbed her chin pensively.
"Essentially, yes, I think somewhere along the line, you've misread something about the safety of outside your chambers, and it's made it seem a lot more threatening than it actually is. If possible, I'd like to try and get to the bottom of that today."
Bregedúr nodded. "Right. So where do we start?"
"I think it might be well to begin with a scenario, so we can see what kind of thought process is going on when you feel that fear. I want you to pretend I've just asked you to come with me for a short walk downstairs to the kitchens. Now, tell me what's happening in your head."
I unrolled a scroll of fresh parchment and turned it landscape, my pen at the ready.
Her breathing got a little deeper, and a flash of worry came over her face for a moment. "Panic," was all she said.
"Panic," I repeated, writing the word down on the right hand side of the paper in big letters. "Okay, let's backtrack a little with that. What happens before you feel the fear?"
"Ah… well, my heart pounds and my stomach churns, I suppose," she said.
I noted those two things down to the left of the word 'panic,' and drew an arrow to make the start of a flow chart.
"And back a little further, what comes in before that?"
Bregedúr frowned. "I… I see myself tripping down the stairs, or injuring myself some other way and not having anyone around to help."
"Aha, now we're getting to the heart of the matter," I said confidently as I scribbled down those examples and drew another arrow. "Do you envision any other scenarios like that which make you feel afraid?"
"Mmm… no, only about having an accident and injuring myself."
Nodding, I quickly added a couple more notes and arrows.
"All right. Well, have a look at this," I said as I walked over and handed her the flow chart. "What you can see here is the cycle of thinking that you're trapped in right now."
I took my pen and pointed it at the very left of the chart. "You start here, thinking about going outside. Then, these thoughts suddenly hit you, of you injuring yourself and, by extension, your baby, and that's where your trouble starts."
Bregedúr observed in interest, following my pen as I moved it along to the right. "After that, you get alarmed, that heart rate goes up, your stomach churns, and the panic sets in. As a consequence, you stay inside to return to your feeling of safety, and when you want to go out next time," I looped back around to the very left again, "it starts all over again, you see."
"Fascinating," she breathed. "Well, if I'm trapped in the cycle, how am I meant to stop these thoughts from coming in so that I don't get the racing heart and fright?" Bregedúr looked up at me despondently.
"You're trapped in it for now. This is where I come in. I want for us to take a closer look at these scenarios that pop up when you think of going out."
"What is there to examine?" she groaned in frustration. "They're vivid enough- more than sufficient to put any expectant mother off going outside."
"They certainly are if you acknowledge them as true or guaranteed, yes." I raised an eyebrow at her. "I understand the desire to do everything possible to protect your unborn child, but you cannot simply lie in bed for a whole year while you are expecting. Elves are built to be active. Especially you!"
"I know, but I have more control over what happens in here," she said nervously.
"Being in here doesn't necessarily mean you live in a risk-free environment, Bregedúr," I remarked mildly. "You find comfort in being in here because your idea of what is dangerous is built on specious foundations."
"So you're telling me I've got the wrong idea about how to keep my baby safe?" she said, raising an eyebrow. Uh oh. I would have to choose my words carefully here.
"Well, look, it's a terrific idea to not fall over, or trip down the stairs. Babies don't like that." I said, shaking my head.
"But...?" she prodded, keeping her eyes squarely fixed on me as she waited for the follow-up to my apparent platitude.
"But you need to be realistic about how likely that sort of thing is to occur while you're living everyday life, especially if you take a few extra precautions."
She frowned a little, looking at the fingers she had started drumming on the armrest.
"How many times, for example, have you fallen while taking the stairs, excluding, perhaps, the first ten years of your life?"
Her frown deepened as she appeared to turn over my question.
"Once," she mumbled.
"What happened?"
"I was standing in the narrowest part of the spiral staircase and running down."
"So… you mean to tell me the only time you fell down the stairs was when you were doing something fast-paced and highly irresponsible?"
Bregedúr scowled. "You mock me," she said in a wounded tone.
"I do not," I replied calmly. "I'm telling you that the only time you have experienced disaster on a staircase was when you were actively courting it, and even if you had been taking the stairs in a responsible manner, one incident over the course of an almost 4,800 year life span is still miraculous odds."
She looked at me cynically. "Is it?"
"I know Elrond's done it at least three times since I met him," I replied with a shrug. "And I've never managed to go more than a few years without tripping on something, myself. You're really very graceful and strong, you know, Bregedúr."
Bregedúr fell back into her silence for a moment as she appeared to weigh up the cost of being wrong against declining a compliment on a skill she prided greatly.
"Well, maybe you're right about that," she conceded, quickly following up with, "but even if it were unlikely, if anything happened and I were injured, what if nobody found me?"
"What sort of injury do you actually anticipate happening, Bregedúr? You Elves are such hardy, robust sorts that it's almost impossible to incapacitate you. Even when pregnant. Unless you're experiencing a problem with your pregnancy that you haven't mentioned yet?"
"I don't think there's anything wrong with me," she murmured.
"Do you feel weak, dizzy, at risk of losing consciousness, anything like that?"
"Oh, no, nothing like that," she shook her head.
"So what specifically do you envision happening out there that would see you lying on the ground, completely unable to fend for yourself for hours at a time? So far, you've only really mentioned falling down stairs and someone running into you."
Bregedúr looked at me in shock, her mouth opening and shutting it repeatedly with no sound escaping.
"I… I don't really know," she uttered, now a little bewildered herself. "It is mostly the vision of me injured and helpless that I see in my mind's eye. The circumstances behind it are not usually a part of the scenario."
"So realistically, what would you say are your chances of getting so grievously wounded in Thranduil's halls that you cannot even shout for help?"
"Almost nonexistent," she whispered before looking up at me.
"Right," I said with a smile, summarising her odds of injury in a small box below the scenarios she'd mentioned. "Now we come to the hard work part. What we want to do is challenge these scenarios, just as you would any dubious information you came across, with solid, reliable logic." I drew an arrow from the scenarios down to the logic box, and then drew another arrow from that box. "Once you successfully rebut the faulty information enough, we'll be able to move onto phase two of treatment."
"So I have to reason my way out of these thoughts, in other words?" she clarified.
"Spot on," I said with a wink and a thumbs-up. "Let's think of a few more together to add to this list, eh?"
The remainder of the session involved thinking up some choice arguments for the reasonableness of taking the stairs, the risk of injury, and the attentiveness of the Mirkwood Elves (to the point of nosiness, at times). With a list that was almost half a page long, Bregedúr picked a handful she found particularly useful and was tasked with getting into the habit of automatically using them to question those distressing images.
Once we had wrapped up for the day, I excused myself to go for a walk, find a snack, and have a look around the place. Bregedúr asked me to send Legolas to her if I ran into him, which I promised faithfully to do.
After sticking my head into the kitchens and giving the staff there my most winning smile, I triumphantly walked the magnificent halls with a lovely, crisp apple in one hand, and a few slices of bread in the other.
Naturally, it was when I was at my least dignified, having taken such an enormous hunk of apple into my mouth that it poked my tonsils and sent me into a wild coughing fit, that I ran into Legolas.
"Rhodri, my goodness, are you all right?" he asked, dashing out of the library and slapping me hard on the back as I hacked away in front of everyone.
"I'm just fine, thanks," I squeaked once I had extracted the huge piece of food from my craw and hid it behind my back. "Bregedúr asked me to send you to her if I ran into you."
Legolas, to my relief, seemed to understand instinctively that I had been caught at a rather embarrassing moment, and after informing me Glorfindel was to be found in the chambers assigned to us and wishing me a pleasant day, departed promptly.
My day's work done, I made a beeline for my lodgings, hoping to rope my spouse into a spot of branch climbing and sliding before dinner.
Psych Notes
Agoraphobia:
Being afraid of at least two of these things ("agoraphobia situations"): taking public transport, being in open/enclosed spaces (1 point each), being alone while away from home, standing in a queue/being in crowds.
Fearing or avoiding the agoraphobia situations because of a fear that if the person should start feeling afraid, or something embarrassing or incapacitating happens, escape will be impossible, or that no help will come.
The person is almost always afraid of their agoraphobia situations (i.e. always afraid of standing in a queue, being in open spaces, etc.)
The person needs someone with them to get through the agoraphobic situation, or forces themselves to go through it despite their distress, or actively avoids the situation as a whole.
Whatever fear/distress the person feels in the agoraphobia situation is far greater than the true danger of the situation.
The issue is ongoing, usually 6 months or more.
The issue affects the person's ability to function normally in their personal, social, or work life.
The symptoms aren't due to another disorder (see below for the main differential dx)
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD):
Showing signs of obsessions, compulsions, or both:
- Obsessions: repeated and constant thoughts, urges, or images that are distressing, intrusive, and unwanted (e.g. hurting loved ones, dying, being diseased). The person tries to stop the thoughts (and thus the distress) by thinking or doing something else (i.e. a compulsion)
- Compulsions: repetitive behaviours or mental acts that the person feels they must do in order to stop the thoughts. These acts are not realistically connected with preventing the situation, or they're excessive. Example behaviours include hand washing (often repeated to the point the skin is dried and cracked, or scrubbed raw), lock checking. Mental acts might be praying, counting, etc.
The obsessions or compulsions take up a lot of time (e.g. an hour or more per day), cause a lot of distress, or affect the person's work/personal/social life.
The symptoms are not due to another condition (medical or psychological) or use of a drug (medical or recreational).
Differential Diagnosis
This was quite a sticky one. There can be substantial overlap between agoraphobia and OCD, particularly if the person has OCD without any outward compulsions (known as "pure O"). An agoraphobe will often get a distressing scene flash in their mind when they think of having to confront their agoraphobia situation/s, and immediately they'll retreat into the house or shy away from the situation in some way. It's an unwanted thought that stresses them out a lot- very much like an obsession characteristic of OCD.
The difference between the two lies in the situations the thought arises. Though someone with agoraphobia probably isn't pleased to feel the need to avoid crowds to keep their anxiety in check, when they're away from the situation, they cease panicking, and the frightening scenario that provokes the anxiety goes away. As with all phobias, it's situation-based fear.
In an obsession, though, the thought can often stay on loop for hours, days, months- years, even, in the most severe cases, and it doesn't matter where you are or what you are doing. Obsessions can occur at any time, for any reason (even in dreams), and without any relevant context. People with OCD might be feeding the ducks in the park when suddenly, an intrusive thought of saying something unforgivably cruel to a loved one might arise.
Bregedúr's distressing scenarios were situation-dependent. Taking 'public transport' (horse/carriage), leaving the house, and even being in an enclosed space like the library. When she was in her chambers, the thoughts ceased to bother her. To rule out OCD fully, though, Rhodri probed into whether Bregedúr, seemingly afraid of falling over, was obsessively checking the floor for tripping hazards; Bregedúr was not.
Post-traumatic stress disorder had to be ruled out as well, to make sure that the unpleasant thoughts were not flashbacks, hence enquiring whether Bregedúr had experienced a traumatic event.
