I know how to beat OCD

We all know someone that describes themselves as "a little OCD", they are meaning that they might like things to be neat, tidy and organised in a specific way. That is not OCD, thats just liking things to be a certain way. The anxiety and sheer fear that I would get from my OCD was debilitating! this was not "a little OCD".

OCD which I like to refer to as the "Monster" can be life limiting causing anxiety, depression, self harm and in some cases suicide. The Monster does not only affect the sufferer and their lives but it will also impact the lives of their loved ones. To overcome OCD you must learn to sit with anxiety that it causes and not feed into it by carrying out a compulsion, this will make the Monster less powerful. Now this is not an easy thing to do but it is possible, believe me I know!

Many moons ago I had therapy for my OCD and my therapist said "anxiety will not kill you". My response to that was "really? it feels like it will!" I used describe the feeling as what i would imagine it would feel like if someone was holding a gun to your head! I had to learn not to give into the anxiety and carry out the compulsion the monster was telling me to do to make it all ok.

When anxiety kicks in you are no longer able to think rationally and make rational decisions. After the anxiety subsides your decision will be different.

Let me give you an example of one of the therapy sessions that I had: To give you a bit of background one of my fears was contamination of many different kinds, for this example I will use salmonella food poisoning. At this stage in my life I could not cook as the fear I was going to make some ill was too great. Raw chicken for me was a big no-no as I believed my entire kitchen would become contaminated with salmonella. I also got severe anxiety if anyone else was cooking chicken.

So there I was in my therapy session at my home in Hertfordshire, standing in my kitchen when my therapist told me I was going to cook a whole chicken. My anxiety has immediately spiked and I am now convinced that if I do this my entire kitchen and my self will be covered in raw salmonella-contaminated chicken! My therapist which at this point I was convinced had gone mad got me to hold the chicken, put it on a tray and put it in the oven. I was then allowed to wash my hands but only once (i would normally of washed them at least 5 times) My anxiety was through the roof i was in tears i wanted to wash more and bleach the entire kitchen, of course I was not allowed to do so. We went out for a walk and gradually the anxiety subsided. When I got home i was able to rationally not obsessively wipe down the kitchen sides.

Now that one task did not cure me instantly this was something that had to be practiced and I had to learn to question myself with things like:

What would happen if i didn't was my hand 5 times?

What evidence have I got, am I that powerful that I can cause things to happen?

am I acting rationally?

I learnt lots of distraction techniques so I was able to sit with the anxiety until it subsided so i could then be rational about the situation.