Show yourself some love!
When you have OCD, you might not have had a lot of practice in demonstrating self-love. Knowing your love language can give you a starting point for how to best communicate kindness and compassion to yourself.
The Need to Feel Seen
Not feeling seen is not only invalidating, it's threatening, but there are 5 simple ways you can let others around [...]
Shower Scripting
When life throws curveballs (as it’s been doing to all of us lately!), sometimes I need to either proactively or reactively remind my OCD that I can use scary content as a weapon just as easily as it can. This is when I do an exposure and response prevention (ERP) exercise I call shower scripting.
3 questions about impact of media on mental health
The pandemic has reinforced my OCD’s twisted, negative view of the world. As I've been working to identify what could help me strengthen the healthier worldview I gained through ERP, one activity has risen to the top: changing my intake of news and social media.
Lessons from Love…and Loss…of Lee
On July 14, 2020, I lost my soulmate. My 35-year-old Arabian horse, Speciale Lee, died in the ICU of the University of Georgia Veterinary Teaching Hospital, with me by his side. As I’ve worked to process my grief, I’ve been thinking about all Lee taught me and is continuing to teach me even though he’s gone. Knowing I’m not alone in going through grief right now, as we’re all experiencing loss and grief due to the pandemic, I thought I would share lessons from my love and loss of Lee in hopes that they will bring you as much comfort and hope as they have given me.
Don’t Give OCD Credit for Your Strengths
Giving OCD credit for your strengths is making a deal with the devil. Here's why.
We Don’t Need OCD Now … or Ever
In this era of COVID-19, OCD is being misused ever more frequently, such as “I wish I had a little OCD” or “we need OCD now,” as if having a mental illness is an adaptive benefit that can protect people from becoming infected with coronavirus. As a person who has obsessive compulsive disorder, I can tell you that nothing could be further from the truth.
Respond Instead of React: Managing COVID-19 Anxiety
Borrowing from some cognitive-behavioral therapy tools for anxiety, in my new Psychology Today blog post, Respond Instead of React: Managing COVID-19 Anxiety, I share five ways we can learn to turn our anxious reactions into more useful responses, helping us and our loved ones cope well in this time of crisis.
An Open Letter to My OCD re: COVID-19
My OCD has been extra riled up lately due to the COVID-19 pandemic, so much so that I decided I needed to reestablish my authority over it. After writing my OCD a letter and reading it out loud, I felt empowered, and my OCD has been much quieter as a result.
Expectations for OCD Recovery During the COVID-19 Pandemic
If you have OCD and it’s acting up because of the COVID-19 pandemic, you’re not alone. But don’t let your self-critical voice or OCD get you down if you’re struggling right now. Instead, empower yourself by validating your experience, modifying your expectations, and self-compassionately accepting your OCD recovery efforts.
Managing OCD about Coronavirus
Because of the toll the current coronavirus situation could take on people with OCD, Reid Wilson, PhD; Kimberley Quinlan, LMFT; and I have developed the following tips for managing OCD fears about coronavirus. We hope they will help you feel empowered and supported, so that even in this uncertain time, you can keep OCD from running your life.
3 Ways to Power Up Your OCD Therapy
Over the past couple of years, I’ve noticed that the people who tame OCD most effectively are those who make three strategic shifts in their attitude toward not only exposure and response prevention (ERP) therapy, the evidence-based therapy for OCD, but to life itself. Read 3 Ways to Power Up Your OCD Therapy on my Psychology Today blog to learn what they do.
When Fear Stops Making Decisions for You
I’ve let fear make a fair number of decisions in my life. But no more. I put my shoulders back and do the things I want to do, acting like all the noise in my head is irrelevant. And you can, too!
OCD’s not always wrong—but that doesn’t mean it’s right
Just because OCD gets lucky sometimes does NOT mean it's right, plus what we're really trying to prove with ERP therapy for OCD.
An OCD-Taming Attitude: Making OCD Pass Out
Have you ever thought about taking the same arrogant attitude with your OCD that it takes with you when you do ERP therapy? Watch this video to watch how I approached ERP with a new attitude that helped me turn my life around.
OCD is Not What You Think
What's wrong with saying, "I'm so OCD"? The hypothesis is that when people who have untreated OCD hear other people misuse the name of their disorder, it discourages them from seeking treatment.
#FaceYourFear: Transform your triggers to win
With practice, you can learn to transform your OCD triggers into opportunities where you can #faceyourfear and win.
Turn “I have to” into “I want to”
Words have power, and changing "I have to" to "I want to" can be tremendously empowering.
Ruby Campbell’s Gift to the OCD Community
As we celebrate OCD Awareness Week (#OCDweek), October 13 -19, 2019, let’s keep the memory of Ruby Campbell alive by remembering her [...]
Are You Handcuffed to Your Devices, and Is OCD at Fault?
In an effort to stop rushing around the way Emmy Rossum elegantly captures in her song “Slow Me Down," a little over a month ago I took both The Focus Course and The Margin Course. I wanted to learn how to make better progress on important projects with less racing around and more breathing room. Assignments in both courses asked me to identify distractions that interfered with my ability to focus. I came up with a list of 11 types, including email, my phone, my Fitbit, social media and even OCD...
Q&A for Interrupting OCD’s Mental Rituals with “May or May Not”
Here are the questions submitted about my blog Interrupt OCD’s Mental Rituals with “May or May Not” (MOMN) and my answers.
The Unintended Consequences of Saying OCD Can Be Cured
Realistic expectations of recovery are so important for the well-being of people with OCD. Because if people with OCD have unrealistic expectations they cannot achieve, they are incredibly likely to beat themselves up, which hurts them and their recoveries. Read more on my Psychology Today Beyond the Doubt blog.
Interrupt OCD’s Mental Rituals with “May or May Not”
If you have trouble using Shoulders Back/Man in the Park because you keep transacting with your OCD in your mind, otherwise known as “mentally ritualizing” or what some call “pure-O,” read about an ERP technique that’s a bridge tool to help you develop the strength to do Shoulders Back/Man in the Park effectively.
Q&A for Shoulders Back! The Man in the Park
Here are the questions submitted about my blog post Shoulders Back! The Man in the Park and my answers.
Shoulders Back! The Man in the Park
The man in the park metaphor is one I use all the time with clients to explain how to most effectively handle OCD.
The Best Ted Talks for People with OCD
I wrote a 5-part series for my Beyond the Doubt Psychology Today blog called The Best TED Talks for People with OCD, plus an additional post related to Part 4 about how to feel more connected to others.
Taming OCD and Reclaiming Your Life
Make the most of your recovery journey with six steps. Read this post on my Beyond the Doubt Psychology Today blog. [...]
I’m an OCD Therapist With OCD. And I Don’t Do ERP Perfectly
How to turn OCD's little wins into BIG victories for your recovery. Read this post on my Beyond the Doubt Psychology [...]
Why There’s No Cure for OCD
But you can have an amazing, joyful life anyway! Read this post on my Beyond the Doubt Psychology Today [...]
The Hidden Power of Swearing at Your OCD
Three ways to use the art and science of cursing to power up your recovery. Read this post on my [...]
Attitude Matters If You Want to Beat OCD
What manspreading, "c is for center," and a Buddhist equation mean for recovery. Read this post on my Beyond the [...]
The Five Things My OCD and I Learned in the South of France
Why my OCD is very sorry it threw a tantrum in a train station. Read this post on my Beyond [...]
What My OCD and I Are Packing for Our Trip to France
Why I never leave home without four special keys...that don't unlock my house. Read this post on my Beyond [...]
Aha! Moments from a magazine encouraging us to “Be a little OCD.”
I'm not going to say which magazine put "Be a little OCD" in print because this is not about shaming them; that would be doing the very thing that I'm advocating against. Instead, this is about education.
Aha! Moments from Stopping the Noise in Your Head
On Monday, as I was boarding a flight from Baltimore to Atlanta, I asked the flight attendant standing by the cockpit door [...]
Aha! Moments from The Five Things We Cannot Change
When you have OCD and/or anxiety, your life can be dominated by attempts to attain the BIG Cs: CONTROL and [...]
Aha! Moments from an Aha! Moment … and dog toys … and questionable holiday merchandising choices …
Why do I have a dog toy with a tissue taped to it sitting on my desk? And how [...]
Aha! Moments from Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World
I read the following paragraph from Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World by Mark Williams [...]
Aha! Moments from the 2015 IOCDF Conference, Part 2
"You can do this," I said as I held Lily's hand, the scene before me becoming blurry as my [...]
Aha! Moments from the 2015 IOCDF Conference, Part 1
As I sit here thinking about what an amazing time I had at the 2015 IOCDF Conference—the fun I [...]
The 2015 IOCDF Conference
We're less than one week away from one of my favorite events of the year: the International OCD Foundation Annual Conference. [...]
Aha! Moments from Brené Brown on Empathy
One of the most basic human desires is to be understood. To be heard fully and deeply by another [...]
Aha! Moments from Self-Compassion
Let's talk about something seemingly unrelated to OCD: the Stockholm syndrome. Named after a situation in the early 1970s where [...]
Aha! Moments from Frozen
When I was a little girl, I used to daydream that I had fantastic, magical powers. I would imagine myself [...]
Aha! Moments from the 2014 IOCDF Conference
When I attended my first International OCD Foundation conference in 2010, the whole thing was one huge Aha! Moment [...]
Aha! Moments from Amy Cuddy’s TED Talk: Your body language shapes who you are
Watching Amy Cuddy's TED Talk, "Your body language shapes who you are," gave me an aha! moment about a new way [...]
Aha! Moments from Man’s Search for Meaning and Unbroken
It was an auspicious coincidence that I decided to read Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl and Unbroken: A World War [...]
Aha! Moments from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
I love the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling. I have read the books and watched the movies countless times. [...]
Aha! Moments from Freedom from OCD
One of the things I love most about Freedom from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder by Jonathan Grayson, PhD is Dr. Grayson's [...]
Aha! Moments from The Onion
For as long as I can remember, I have personified my OCD and thought of it as an entity [...]