What Is OCD?
If you’re reading this, you might be familiar with OCD but for those who aren’t, OCD is a debilitating mental health disorder characterised by persistent, intrusive thoughts and repetitive behaviours that significantly impact an individual’s ability to lead a quality life.
It’s NOT about people just needing to wash their hands or turn light switches on and off, but we’re not going to be the ones to tell you what it is about, because you are about to hear first-hand from those living with severe OCD:
“When you hear OCD you might think of being tidy, organised, clean, etc. But really this is the reality…I share my story for hope to those who have it and awareness to those who don’t.
The last 7 years of my life were taken up by Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). It threatened me throughout these years, telling me my worst fear would happen if I didn’t perform specific compulsions that it told me to do.
I know it sounds illogical, but it made so much sense in my head and it felt so real, so I was terrified into doing these compulsions. It gained so much control over me that by the time I hit rock bottom, I could barely move and was debilitated. Everything from walking, getting dressed, opening doors and reading to school and gymnastics, became so hard because the OCD voice in my head gave me so many difficult and complex compulsions that I had to do before I could do anything else. It made me feel like I was a prisoner in my own mind. Contamination was such a big thing too, I would wash my hands so much that they would bleed.
I was at my worst at 17, in September 2022. I remember one night my OCD had me standing in the same spot in the kitchen for 2 hours straight. I wasn’t allowed to take a step, or sit down, or move my feet in any way because my OCD said that if I did, something bad in particular would happen. I was so thankful I was wearing my apple watch because I was able to call my sister (I was home alone, and I couldn’t reach my phone) and she helped me through it.
When I was 10 it wasn’t half as bad as it was at 17, and I knew that if I didn’t get help soon, I could be stuck in the same nightmare for the rest of my life. I had tried getting help since I was diagnosed at 14 but I saw many therapists who said they could treat OCD when they actually couldn’t. They were using the complete opposite technique and therapy that only made the OCD worse instead of better. One therapist didn’t even understand what OCD was!”
“OCD consumed me and took over my life. I had obsessions about nearly anything
and everything you could think of and spent all of my time completing compulsions.
My list of compulsions was endless. Some of the compulsions that I engaged in
were, physical checking, excessive reassurance seeking (I would ask the same
questions up to thousand times per day), avoidance, rumination, thought stopping,
googling, shaking my head or jolting my body to stop thoughts, repeating steps over
and over whether that be physically retracing my steps and movement or repeating
processes in my head, counting things to make them feel right, having safe and
unsafe numbers, days and dates, collecting evidence whether it be mental,
photographic or written to make sure I had done things a certain way, and trying to
block thoughts. These are only the ones that come to my mind writing this, there
were many others.
It became so bad that I couldn’t enter my house because I lived by a petrol station
and thought that I was going to be contaminated. My house was an older house and
I was entirely convinced it wasn’t safe and was riddled with asbestos – it definitely
wasn’t and is a safe place to live. I wouldn’t take any of my medication because I
was convinced it would poison me. I couldn’t even engage with my beloved animals
because I had horrible thoughts about harming them.
I went from being the top of my year level at school, and having academic honours in
my subjects to being unable to complete my last year of school because OCD took
over my ability to study and attend school.”
“I struggle with severe OCD — primarily Contamination OCD, along with Symmetry OCD and ‘Just Right’ OCD. It consumes a large part of my day and can feel overwhelming on a daily basis. I haven’t hugged my family in a long time due to an intense (yet knowingly irrational) fear of contamination, I’ve lost friendships due to the challenges my OCD creates in social situations, and at times, I struggle to take care of myself.
I was professionally diagnosed with OCD about seven years ago and have since tried numerous treatments, including nearly 10 different medications and extensive ERP & CBT therapy with specialists, psychologists, and psychiatrists. Despite my efforts, I’ve had little success with any of them.”
“I faced the onset of OCD at the age of 18. I went from being what was considered a normal, fun-loving young adult to being in a state of terror and panic and uncertainty and experiencing the worst kind of intrusive thoughts. The OCD that I experience is called “Pure O”, and mine comes in intrusive harmful thoughts towards myself and others. OCD was not at all recognised or even known about back in 1988, which meant I spent the next 10 years of my life going undiagnosed, or misdiagnosed.
It was an incredibly traumatic and terrifying ten years, and I lost so much of that time and my life to the illness. I truly believed I was going crazy.”
“At 39, I was happily married with two lovely children, then 4 and 2. The ‘trigger event’ for my illness happened in February 2004, and over the next few months I very quickly developed severe contamination and checking OCD, to the point where I was completely unable to function – washing my hands countless times a day until they bled, taking endless showers at all hours. I was restricted to two rooms in my house, couldn’t take care of my children, and my husband was forced to take time off work with increasing frequency.
I became very depressed and distressed (I don’t suffer from depression in any freestanding sense). We had no family support, and the situation was untenable.”
How Many People Have OCD?
After reading these stories, we hope you have more insight into what it is like for those trying to live with OCD and given that the International OCD Foundation estimate 2% of the general population has this condition – with at least 1 in 100 tamariki and rangatahi being affected – you would think that services and treatment for people with OCD in Aotearoa New Zealand would be a priority, right?
Wrong! That’s where we come in.