The Impact of Overcontrol on Mental Health

At Sparrow Therapy, I use a blend of Radically Open Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (RODBT if you’re into acronyms, and let me tell ya…RO is into acronyms) and Soulwork. My clients are trapped in the intersection of overcontrol, relationship struggles, and spiritual neglect.

A venn diagram of relationship struggles, anxiety coping, and spiritual neglect that Emilea Richardson, LMFT treats in online anxiety counseling for women in South Carolina.

The goal of Radically Open Soulwork is to transform that into an intersection of flexible tools, spiritual harmony, and joining your tribe.

A venn diagram showing the result of online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT for anxious women in South Carolina.

So let’s zoom into this overcontrol circle. What the hell is Overcontrol, and what does it have to do with Radically Open Soulwork?

Well… lemme tell ya! Let’s take Jane.

Photo of a woman holding coffee as an example of an anxious woman living in South Carolina receiving online anxiety counseling from Emilea Richardson in South Carolina

Her perfect Sunday? Kill her long run, and then nest like she’s representing #cottagecore on TikTok. She has Lunchbox Harvest Muffins packed for her Monday Meeting, and she’s even practiced saying “they were so easy to make!” when everyone fawns over them.

But if Monday turns out to be a shitty day at work, she can’t honestly name a person she could call and cry with. Jane is detail oriented, socially conscious, and an organized queen. You wouldn’t know it to look at her, but she’s lonely. And Jane has an over control (or OC) personality.

What is Overcontrol?

Overcontrol is an umbrella term that describes a particular set of temperament and coping. Simply, people who have overcontrol personality (or OC) have high levels of self-control. They're good at delayed gratification, suppressing their emotions, and showing emotional restraint.

The back of a blonde woman's head surrounded by plants representing an anxious woman getting online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT in South Carolina.

Let’s go back to Jane. People in Jane’s life would describe her like…

Perfectionistic. Rigid. Overly agreeable. People pleaser. A+ student. Ultimate team player. Mom friend.

When Jane’s been to therapy before, her mental health professional looks at a basket of different diagnoses:

Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Panic Disorder. Eating Disorders. Major Depressive Disorder.

But when Jane comes to do Radically Open Soulwork with me (I’m Emilea btw!), I don’t label her with any of that. Instead of treating diagnoses, I zero in on the overcontrol and people heal much faster. Cause we're getting to the root of what's causing these issues.

When we talk about overcontrol, I want us to look at this graph of self control and well being.

Graph showing the false self control idea that Emilea Richardson, LMFT treats in online anxiety counseling for women in Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston, SC

For a long time the mental health and the self-help space asked the same question: How do you gain control over your life? How do you increase your discipline, get more organized, and feel confident and certain. That same message gets put into a different package (Marie Kondo, Keto, Greg Goggins, etc.) and we’re sold that if we just get more and more control, we’ll achieve health and well-being.

But it’s not a line. It’s a bell curve. And optimal health and wellbeing exists at the top of that bell curve, not on the overside.

Graph showing the optimal well being between under control and over control that Emilea Richardson, LMFT treats in online anxiety counseling for women in Charleston South Carolina.

You can have too much of a good thing. You can have too much self-control.

Sometimes people I work with will say “oh, I’m such a control freak.” We talk about OC and they totally buy into it.

But I also work with a lot of women who think they don’t have enough self control. Most of them go, “no, no, no, no, no. I snooze through my alarm. Today, and I need to be getting up earlier and pressing into more work activities.” I think I need more discipline because that is the over control person's answer to everything.

The OverControl motto?

There's a problem. We're going to fix it. And how are we going to fix it?

With more control.

Traits of the Overcontrolled Personality

Back to our sweet, hard working, everyone’s-best-friend Jane. She exhibits the typical traits of an OC - perfectionism, emotion suppression, and rigid thinking. It’s what makes her such an achiever at work. Such a good listener with her friend. And an advocate for the causes near to her heart. It also causes a lot of suffering.

A woman with wind blowing her hair over her face with the sunlight in the background representing an anxious woman getting online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT in Charleston, Greenville, and Columbia South Carolina.

Perfectionism

Striving for flawlessness. And not the ‘wake up flawless’ Beyonce anthem. Like…we can't make mistakes. It's not okay to mess up. It's never okay to drop the ball. Having very high standards for themselves and for the world around them. They have a high standard of how people interact with each other, how people conduct themselves as citizens, as employees. And they can be extremely critical of their own performance.

Jane’s constantly seeking improvement. I can be better, I can be better, I can be better. And after the pressure to perform and achieve, sometimes there’s a mistake. Failure. Then the strong gut punch of disappointment and shame comes in. When Janes fall short of that expectation, the shame storm hits, and hits strong -

I'm not enough. I'm so stupid. I'm so weak. This is why I'm never going to be successful.

It knocks the wind out of ya.

Graphic of the over control-shame cycle that Emilea Richardson, LMFT treats in online anxiety counseling for women in Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston, SC

And so, what does Jane do? Shes take stock of her shame story, and decides “I need to be better. But how?” And then the answer appears - More control, baby!

Emotional Supression

It's hard for Jane to express how she actually feels. Hear me out -

She’s very emotional. She cries at Publix commercials or when she argues. But when it comes to more difficult emotions like irritation, resentment,or just full rage? She pushes all that emotion down and suppress, suppress, suppress. She might gossip about it. But she’ rather vomit in public than tell her sister “That made me mad” to her face.

Picture of what emotions over control people show versus what they experience that can be treated in online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT in South Carolina

My clients are very good at keeping their real feelings to themselves. Feelings like…

Maybe I’m a burden to their friends, Maybe my best friend is mad at me, Maybe my boss is going to fire me.

They're good at keeping all those tender, heavy emotions to themselves. They're good at being reserved and guarded in their interactions with others.

Jane is a wonderful friend. She’s excellent at meeting new people and making others feel comfortable. But she’s very bad at being vulnerable. She has this deep craving and dreaming of a genuine close relationship with a friend or with a romantic partner. But she constantly fears jeopardizing the relationship by being herself.

Rigid thinking

Jane experiences a lot of black and white thinking that sounds like…

I'm either succeeding or I am failing.

I am going to achieve this or I'm going to fall short.

This person's my friend or they are my enemy.

A woman lying face down in her bed with hair over her face representing an anxious woman in Charleston, Greenville, and Columbia, SC getting online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT

There's a search for certainty and concreteness. Like, I want to know for sure what's going to happen tomorrow.

Change is very, very hard for the over control person. Even if an OC person doesn't identify as a “control freak,” they’ll admit to really hating change.

Implications for Mental Health

So the average therapist would diagnose Jane with anxiety and/or depression. But she doesn’t just have traditional anxiety and depression. Chronic. Treatment resistant.

Because it comes from her temperament, the culture she grew up in, and the coping that she used to feel accepted growing up. This anxiety and depression certainly has a chemical element to it. And medical treatments can be effective. But the OC person usually needs something more than medicine.

The biggest disease that over control creates is emotional loneliness.

Back of a woman's head as she's driving with a dog next to her representing an anxious woman getting online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT in Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston, SC

Don’t get me wrong - Jane has dozens and dozens of friends. People text her and call her and send her cat memes on Instagram every single day. Even friends who will call her sobbing after having their heart broken. But when the tables are turned? Jane doesn’t really feel like there’s someone she can call. Having an honest to God relationship with someone is hard.

Jane is an expert at people pleasing. And exceptional at performing her roles for people. And so that means two things:

It's hard for Jane to know what she truly wants, versus what she senses others need from her.
It’s hard for Jane to show up as herself and ask for what she truly wants. T

For all of Jane’s accomplishments (and there are many), she doesn’t really experience enjoying those accomplishments. Because she’s thinking about how to top it. She always has to be improving. So this dense fog of dissatisfaction and burnout begins to creep over all of her hobbies, work, and relationships. What if nothing’s ever good enough?

How to Overcome Overcontrol?

Radically Open Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (RO)

So what’s a kick ass girl like Jane to do? Radically Open Soulwork, that’s what.

A blonde woman sitting on a rock reading a book in a meadow representing a woman with anxiety benefiting from online anxiety counseling with Emilea Richardson, LMFT in Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston, SC

Welcome to the Radically Open part of Radically Open Soulwork. RO DBT (often just referred to as RO) is a method of therapy specifically designed to treat the overcontrol. RO is a set of philosophies and tools that treat the root of the anxiety, depression, and emotional loneliness.

Diagram of the three pillars of Radically Open Dialectical Behavioral Therapy practiced by Emilea Richardson, LMFT in online anxiety counseling in Charleston, Greenville, and Columbia, SC

The principles of RO are woven in throughout Radically Open Soulwork. I want to keep Jane’s unique perspective and talents, while taking away the barriers from her enjoying her life and close relationships.

Picture of Emilea Richardson, LMFT a therapist who does online anxiety counseling for women in Greenville, Columbia, and Charleston, South Carolina.

Skills Class is pure RO. Skills Class is the private podcast with 30 RO classes to gain an understanding of how overcontrol manifests, and how to make a life worth living. It gives so many tools to help both overcome and harness overcontrol.

I want Jane to keep the wonderful pieces - striving, hard working, socially conscious, detail oriented, organized. Those are beautiful. We’re not throwing the baby out with the bath water. But we are gonna throw out the bath water.

Are you like Jane? Maybe even a little teensy bit? Maybe Radically Open Soulwork is for you. Join me to grow, heal, and experience a life worth living.