MR. MONK BUMPS HIS HEAD
by Dan Gaeta, Production Assistant
Hello. My name is Dan Gaeta, production assistant to the writers' office over here in New Jersey.
People I meet often ask me what my job is all about and I usually have absolutely no answer for them. It is the lowest position available at an office like this, just above being an intern (of which we have none), so you can well imagine what it may involve: photocopies, trash, lunch, and, apparently, blog writing.
It is a particularly curious coincidence that while my employment here at the office arose from knowing Tom Scharpling and Andy Breckman through other work, I ended up working for a show whose main character has very intense manifestations of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
You see, I too was officially diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder about four or five years ago. Though I would classify myself as a recovering obsessive compulsive, insomuch as I rarely exhibit any symptoms at all but am also dependent on medication, the extremely difficult road to being symptom-free, as well as the 15 or so years I suffered undiagnosed and untreated, I take many of the quirks and issues Monk deals with to a very personal level.
And for this, I was rather intrigued at being able to dissect an episode a little, especially "Mr. Monk Bumps His Head."
What would happen if someone with obsessive-compulsive disorder were to suffer from amnesia? How integrated are memory and the electro-chemical process that are believed to be the cause of obsessive-compulsive behavior?
Speaking from a lay position and only my personal experience with the disorder, I would assume that to a large extent they would not be, as is demonstrated in "Mr. Monk Bumps Head."
For me, obsessive rituals and compulsions haven't habits for the sake of the habit. That is to say, I would not continue to do something simply because I have always done it, but more because of the extreme anxiety and fear in the sensations experienced through thinking of, participating in, and completing its fulfillment.
So if the memory of regularly fulfilling a ritual were lost, it could be presumable that the mental "short circuit" of the ingrained activity would still exist and compel someone to still exhibit obsessive-compulsive symptoms.
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