Tag: obsessive-compulsive behavior

It’s easy to cling to my diagnosis for comfort. In fact, externalizing obsessions the way you would an alien invasion or a metastasized tumor is a foundational part of OCD’s gold standard of treatment.

I never made the direct connection between my gut and how anxiety created physical problems! Why did not one single medical professional tell me this information?

It has taken me close to three years to be able to live with my memories from the hospital, where I felt completely and utterly alone, despairing that I might never live a normal life or see my family again.

Here, Dr. Ben Furman offers a creative approach to helping children who struggle with OCD. Explaining why behaviors like reasoning, reassuring, and superstitious rituals don’t work, he suggests engaging alternatives that teach kids how to manage their “worry monster” and make sense of their distressing experience.

The medication left me emotionally numb, making it impossible to connect with people or sense the aliveness of the world around me. But after two years on antidepressants, I found something that gave me jolt of feeling strong enough to wake me up for a moment. I then spent the next seven years giving myself daily doses of horror to induce an emotional reaction.