‘It’s not to be trivialised’: Downton Abbey’s Tuppence Middleton on living with OCD
It was when Tuppence Middleton was 12 years old that her mother realised something was desperately wrong. Having believed that her daughter had fully recovered from chronic fatigue syndrome – a sustained period of nausea and sickness that saw her miss half a school year – she then caught her undergoing a long-winded nighttime ritual; a lasting manifestation triggered by the prolonged illness.
“Everything needed to be counted, to be organised and contained by the number eight,” Middleton now writes. “If I didn’t count, my protective little scorpions [negative thoughts] would thrash and stir, turning thoughts over and over until they span on one continuous loop. My blood would bubble and a feeling like a wave rising in a tsunami would build inside my chest, only to be stopped by the incessant counting.”
Best known for her roles in drama series including Black Mirror, Sens8 and Downton Abbey, Middleton, 38, is now releasing her first memoir, Scorpions, which reflects on how her obsessive-compulsive disorder has shaped and impacted every facet of her life. Despite OCD being thought to affect as many as 1.2 million people in the UK, it is still a widely misunderstood – and mostly dismissed – mental health disorder, frequently and mistakenly used synonymously with ‘being excessively tidy’.
“I did a book club radio interview a few years ago, and I said the repetitive nature of the novel I chose appealed to my OCD,” she tells me, when I ask why she wanted to write it now. “Since then, I've felt like I’ve had a lot to say that isn’t connected to my work. I wanted to put everything down in one place as a separate entity to me.
“I would have loved to read a book that reflected my experience when I was younger and was first diagnosed with OCD. I wanted to offer someone going through the same thing some comfort.”
For those who still understand the disease to be a sensitivity to cleanliness, Middleton’s bold and eloquent prose really underlines the dreadful reality – her obsessive thinking, her extreme phobia of vomit, how her mentally mandatory rituals interfere to great extremes. She writes the story in the style of a gothic horror, with the scorpion metaphor used to describe her negative thought patterns easily lending itself to nightmarish, shudder-inducing imagery. It’s an apt description of a disease so malignant, but so underestimated.
“I have always been drawn to horror,” she says. “I've always loved the Gothic and Victorian aesthetics. In terms of the imagery and the symbolism, I wanted something that felt quite visual; a tangible symbol for what was going on in my head. The idea of things crawling through my brain really made sense to me.
“I could have had spiders or ants, but there was something about scorpions and poison, and the symbolism that comes with that. Scorpions have so many different kinds of connotations in mythology and religion. I felt like there was a slightly sinister feeling that they’re not a benevolent presence.”
While the writing in Scorpions is beautifully descriptive and compelling, the book errs on the shorter side of a memoir; at 190 pages, it dances through Middleton’s childhood, before focusing on specific moments where OCD has tormented her brain, switching up genres to best reflect her psyche (one chapter is effectively a ‘choose your own adventure’ story). It’s a deliberate, stylistic choice from the actress-turned-author.
“There were certain reasons why these incidents stuck in my head,” she says. “There are significant moments – like when my OCD first impacted my relationships or my work. But I didn't want it to just be about big, dramatic things, because so many people who are also living with this condition are battling very small, everyday obstacles.
“It was really interesting for me to explore how people with OCD can live a fully functioning life, but still have this inner world going on, and how that can be triggered by the smallest of things.
“I wanted my writing to mimic the thought patterns of OCD; one minute this thing is obsessing you, then your focus changes. Some days it's much easier than others. I wanted the experience to feel quite immersive when you're reading it.”
Trying to get into the mindset of how her OCD works could have potentially been risky for Middleton, who says she’s found the condition more manageable after welcoming her daughter in 2022 with her partner, the Swedish film director Måns Mårlind.
“I actually found writing Scorpions quite cathartic,” she says. “There were a lot of things that I was holding on to, and so it felt good to release it out into a public sphere.
“I think the most difficult chapter to write for me was the vomit chapter, because it triggered a lot of my obsessive thinking about that, and it made me much more hyper aware of my surroundings and the people around me, but I purposely chose to write it in quite a remote spot – I went to my partner’s summer house in Sweden and wrote a lot of it there. It was good to work on the book in a safe space.”
Being in control of her own narrative, and shaping how the book should look, was vastly different to Middleton’s day job in acting. Her television work seems almost antithetical to her condition, with her roles often seeing her engage in intimate scenes, or covered in gruesome stage make-up.
“The side of the condition that deals with cleanliness, bacteria and handwashing I find easy to manage,” Middleton explains. “Having to kiss other people, or having to be very close to other people, can lead to me panicking that they will have some kind of contagious illness that will make me sick.
“I build trust with my scene partner, and then I will just ask them to tell me if there’s any risk of illness.
“As an actor you're serving someone else's vision a lot of the time. You are a part of a bigger picture, which you can't always impact. Whereas when I’m writing, I feel very creatively free.”
Scorpions: A Memoir - Tuppence Middleton
Now in a more secure place with her OCD, able to recognise the warning signs if the condition was to rear its head again, Middleton hopes Scorpions will help dismantle the severe lack of understanding around the disease.
“I want people to realise that OCD is not to be trivialised in the way it is,” she says. “I think we all exist on the spectrum of mental health somewhere, and I imagine that there will be lots of things in the book that are relatable to everyone, whether you have OCD or not.
“I hope it offers some sense of togetherness for other people who are suffering, so they know that they are not alone.”
Scorpions is available to buy from all good bookshops from 27 February.
If you have been affected by the themes of this piece, please contact Mind for more information, support and advice.
You Might Also Like
