Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

1064 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Dealing with obsessive-compulsive disorder

People check things twice, but what if you feel the urge to repeat things ten times. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder is an anxiety disorder that is characterized by obsessions and compulsions. People use obsessions and compulsions to relieve their anxiety. Without treatment obsessions and compulsions can eventually take over a person’s life. These obsessions and compulsions can be treated with medication or therapy making a person’s life more bearable. Dr. Dorothy Grice had said in an interview with Katie Charles, “There’s a wide range of severity, but in the most extreme cases, OCD can be extremely disabling especially when the compulsions become time-consuming and elaborate…” There are several things that are included in OCD, including its symptoms, treatments and its involvement with the brain. Obsessive Compulsive Disorder recognize their symptoms to be ego-dystonic which are thoughts one would not usually have and not within one’s control but is still a product of one’s mind. The two common symptoms of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder are obsessions and compulsions. Obsessions take the form of persistent and uncontrollable thoughts, images, impulses, worries, fears or doubts. An anonymous writer wrote about his/her images, “These images included hitting, stabbing, poisoning and shooting people, even the people I loved the most…” However, compulsions are either repetitive physical behaviors or mental thought rituals that are performed over and over again to help relieve a person’s anxiety. Over time compulsions can become more elaborate and time- consuming. Shirley Brinkerhoff mentions in her book Amanda, a high school girl facing OCD, said, “Then I started having to count my steps. Like, 387 steps to the bus stop, and if missed... ... middle of paper ... ...auses not fully understood.” New York Daily News. 21 July 2013. Tortora Pato, Michele and Zohar, Joseph. Current Treatments of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Second Edition. ed.2 Washington DC: American Psychiatric, 2008 “The Monster Within- My Living Life Story with OCD” 7 Aug. 2013. National Alliance on Mental Illness. 5 Apr. 2014 http://notalone.nami.org/post/57628850545/the-monster-within-my-living-story-with-ocd University of Cambridge. “Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Linked To Brain Activity.” 18 July 2008 Science Daily. 5 Apr. 2014 www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080717140456.htm “Obsessive- Compulsive Disorder, OCD” 18 Mar. 2014 National Institute of Mental Health. 18 Mar. 2014 http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/obsessive-compulsive-disorder-ocd Brinkerhoff, Shirley. Drug Therapy and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Philadelphia: Mason Crest, 2003

Show More
Related

  • Case Analysis: Felix Unger, The Odd Couple

    1597 Words  | 4 Pages

    Anxiety and Depression Association of America (2010-2016). Obsessive Compulsive Foundation OCD Support. Retrieved on August 20, 2016, from https://www.adaa.org/search/node?keys=obsessive+compulsive

    Read More

  • Anxiety Disorders : Generalized Anxiety Disorder

    810 Words  | 2 Pages

    Obsessive-Compulsive disorder (OCD) - is characterized by persistent, uncontrollable and unwanted feelings or thoughts (obsessions) and routines or rituals (compulsions) in which individuals engage to try to prevent or rid themselves of these thoughts. In example of common compulsions include washing hands or cleaning repeatedly for fear of germs.

    Read More

  • Compulsive Disorder: An Analysis Of Melvin Udall In As Good As It Gets

    1808 Words  | 4 Pages

    Obsessive-compulsive disorder has been classified as a type of anxiety disorder under DSM-5, in which there is a presence of obsessions, compulsions or both. Obsessions are defined as “intrusive and mostly nonsensical thoughts, images, or urges that the individual tries to resist or eliminate,” while compulsion are the thought or actions that accompany these obsessions to try to suppress and provide relief. (TEXTBOOK) The obsessions are categorized into four major types, and each is linked with a certain pattern of compulsive behaviors.

    Read More

  • The Boy Who Couldn't Stop Washing

    919 Words  | 2 Pages

    Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder is a disease that afflicts up to six million Americans, however all its characteristics are yet to be fully understood. Its causes, triggers, attributes, and variations are still unknown although effective medicines exist to treat the symptoms. OCD is a very peculiar disease as Rapoport discusses it comes in many different forms and have different symptoms yet have many similarities. One sure aspect is that it appears, or at least its symptoms do, out of the blue and is triggered either by stressful experiences or, most of the time, just appears out of nowhere. One example is a boy who's father was hard on him for being affected by the worlds "modern ways", the boy at a high school party tries LSD ( a hallucinatory drug), after that thoughts of whether his mind was dangerously affected by the drug. What seemed like completely appropriate worrying and anxiety turned into attacks of anxiety, he couldn't shake the thoughts that something was wrong with his mind. Essentially he had "his mind on his mind" constantly and that haunted his days his thought were as follows: " did the lsd do anything to my mind? The thought never went away ; instead it got more and more complicated. There must be something wrong with my mind if i am spending so much time worrying about it. Is there something wrong with my mind? Was this from the lsd? Will it ever get better?" (The boy who, J. L. Rapoport 125,126) Dr. Rapoport promptly put him on Anafranil (an anti-depressant, used for OCD, not marketed in the U.

    Read More

  • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder: Nature vs Nurture

    926 Words  | 2 Pages

    N.p., n.d. Web. 13 Mar. 2014. "Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, OCD." NIMH RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 12 Mar. 2014.

    Read More

  • Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD): The Repetitive Controller

    575 Words  | 2 Pages

    All people have to double check things once in a while, like if a door is locked or if the lights are off. But people with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, or OCD, have an urge to check and recheck items and the disorder “controls” what people do, and how people do tasks by causing them to repeatedly see how something looks or if something is organized. OCD can be a challenging disorder to live with as it causes anxiety levels to build up.

    Read More

  • Causes Of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)

    1098 Words  | 3 Pages

    Obsessive-compulsive disorder is characterized by unreasonable thoughts, fears, and obsessions that lead you to do repetitive behaviors or compulsions. Living with OCD is like remembering every little thing you need to do for that week, every second of the day, every hour of the day, every minute of the day and all at once. One to two percent of the population in The United States suffers from OCD which is roughly 1 to 2 million people. ("How Many People Have OCD?)

    Read More

  • Analysis of a Cleaning/Contamination Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Case

    2784 Words  | 6 Pages

    Jakubovski, E., Diniz, J. B., Valerio, C., Fossaluza, V., Belotto-Silva, C., Gorenstein, C., …Shavitt, R. G. (2013). Clinical predictors of long-term outcome in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Depression and Anxiety, 30, 763-772. doi 10.1002/da.22013

    Read More

  • Obsessive Compulsive Eating Disorder

    587 Words  | 2 Pages

    One kind of anxiety disorder is obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This disease can ruin a person's life because it causes them to have repetitive thoughts and behaviors towards certain things. Life can become very difficult because this way of thinking and acting is very difficult to overcome, especially since the obsessions have no point and are stressful for the person. It begins to interfere with the person's school, work, and/or home.

    Read More

  • Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

    1242 Words  | 3 Pages

    Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is an anxiety disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts that produce uneasiness, apprehension, fear, or worry. The acts of those who have OCD may appear paranoid and potentially psychotic. However, OCD sufferers generally recognize their obsessions and compulsions as irrational and may become further distressed by this realization. Obsessive–compulsive disorder affects children and adolescents, as well as adults. Roughly one third to one half of adults with OCD reports a childhood onset of the disorder, suggesting the continuum of anxiety disorders across the life span. OCD may be a result of changes in your body's own natural chemistry or brain functions. OCD also may have a genetic component, but specific genes have yet to be identified. OCD may stem from behavior-related habits that you learned over time. Doctors do not know the exact cause of OCD, factors that may play a role include head injury, infections, and abnormal function in certain areas of the brain and family genes seems to play a strong role. Most people who develop OCD it shows the symptoms by age 30. Often the person carries out the behaviors to get rid of the obsessive thoughts, but this only provides temporary relief. Not doing the obsessive rituals can cause great anxiety.

    Read More

  • Compulsive Hoarding Syndrome

    1788 Words  | 4 Pages

    Imagine how much trash and waste people discard in their lifetimes. Now imagine a person living in that waste they have accumulated in their lifetime stored in their own homes because of their inability to discard the useless items. This is what day-to-day life is like for a compulsive hoarder. Compulsive hoarding is a chronic behavioral syndrome that is defined by a person's extreme retention of useless items and crippling inability to discard such items. Compulsive hoarding has been traditionally recognized amongst psychiatrists and researchers in human behavior as a sub-type of obsessive-compulsive disorder due to similar symptoms hoarders have with those that suffer from OCD. However, there is substantial evidence that proves contrary. Hoarders often have several other behavioral or physical symptoms that are not typical of a person with OCD, hoarders also have genetic and physical anomalies different from OCD, and finally, most compulsive hoarders do not respond to treatments intended for OCD patients. Because of these differences, compulsive hoarding should be seen as a separate syndrome apart from OCD, so that the disorder may be categorized and studied accurately in order to pursue more effective treatments.

    Read More

  • Intrusive Thoughts: Progression into Obsessive Compulsivity

    844 Words  | 2 Pages

    Barrera, T. L., & Norton, P. J. (2011). The appraisal of intrusive thoughts in relation to obsessional-compulsive symptoms. Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, 40(2), 98-110. Retrieved November 10, 2013, from EBSCO Host Database.

    Read More

  • Paranoid Personality Disorders

    889 Words  | 2 Pages

    towards the idea that this newfound loyalty is part of a plot to cause harm.

    Read More

  • Anxiety and Depression

    1470 Words  | 3 Pages

    National Institute of Mental Health. (2010). Treating anxiety disorders. NIH Medline plus, 5(3), 15-18. Retrieved from http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/magazine/issues/fall10/articles/fall10pg15.html

    Read More

  • Cause And Effect Essay On Anxiety

    1033 Words  | 3 Pages

    There are many symptoms that lead to the conclusion that someone is suffering from OCD. A person may have a fear of germs, wanting things to be in perfect order constantly, and unwanted thoughts. The compulsions in OCD are the acts that a person feels obliged to do and this may include repeatedly washing hands, excessively cleaning and washing hands and counting regularly. Life with OCD is generally hard and the sufferer generally does not get any relief or satisfaction until they are able to perform their rituals (National Institute of Mental health,

    Read More

More about Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

Open Document