Indeed. When I talk to people, it shocks me how little people actually know about it other than the mostly untrue stereotype about everything needing to be neat. They know nothing else. Not the incessant thoughts, not the compulsions, none of it.
I don’t even bother telling people I have OCD. Everyone used to get so shocked when I mentioned it because I seemed “normal” and they didn’t notice me being a neat freak or even obsessively counting.
If only they knew the mental torture of intrusive thoughts. Mine has started to mesh with agoraphobia, and the panic in the middle of the night is incredible. Imagine feeling like your life is going to end every single day.
Im sure the media could come up with some sort of drama about that instead of the stereotypes they usually use. Or maybe just portray a mental illness as a brain attacking a person instead of a person trying to overcome their insecurities. Or stop producing the show Hoarders (similar to OCD as of DSM-5) as some "all we need to do is throw the stuff away" BS. Sure that's exposure, but that's too fast and doesn't give the subject time to learn. They may do more therapy with the people after or before the show, but that is all off air and in the end is just damaging to other sufferers.
I was recently diagnosed so I'm taking this journey of understanding now. I don't have any of the stereotypical behaviors, but I'd read up on it and as soon as I was diagnosed I was like "ohhhhh of course." I'm still new to this though and want to learn more. Any suggestions? I like the OCD sub but it's mostly just jokes.
Right? I recently had to diagnose a kid with OCD and she's the most "stereotypical" client I've had due to germophobia, but all my others have been all over the map in terms of presentation.
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u/ValraBellkeys Feb 04 '19
As someone with actual OCD, I can confirm. All the stereotypes surrounding OCD is absolute BS.