Category: Mental Health

Overcoming OCD: Letting Go of the Rope

Posted in OCD General, OCD Coping Strategies, OCD Awareness Week, Mental Health, OCDTagged , , , , , , , , , 2 Comments

I have had OCD for what is fast coming up to 30 years. As I quickly approach my 41st birthday it can sometimes feel like I’ve been fighting a war inside my brain for what feels like forever.  I’ve read all the books, listened to the podcasts, had a couple of rounds of therapy, trained as a yoga teacher and PT, I look after my nutritional and physical health, and choose to share what I’ve learnt in the hope of helping others through my blog, Instagram posts and workshops. 

So why I ask myself do I still struggle at times?  Why does the world still feel overwhelming & why won’t my nervous system just relax already? 

Maybe my expectations are too high?  I had a therapist once say to me that I might just have to ‘accept the fact that I’m an anxious person’, not really what you want to hear but then expecting to find total inner peace is probably a little unrealistic too I realise.     

I know Steven Phillipson says, ‘I don’t care how you feel, continue with your day aligning to your values’ and I try to do this. It is in fact how I’ve managed to achieve everything I have over the last 10 years but I do sometimes wonder how much noise is normal?

I wrote in a post a while back: ‘When we have OCD, Fight-or-flight can turn into a trait instead of a temporary state!’ and this is how I feel, like I’m stuck in fight or flight most of the time. My ability to relax, be in the moment and not feel overwhelmed is seriously lacking.    

I feel like I’ve been on a mission the last few years for answers – which I now realise may be a sneaky compulsion of mine, eek!   Maybe what I should have been doing is letting go of the rope – another ACT metaphor which I love.

This ACT metaphor illustrates how struggling against your obsessions (the monster) is a never-ending fight, but Letting go of the rope and not engaging with your intrusive thoughts, accepting the presence of them and carrying on with your life while aligning to you values is your way to freedom. 

Breaking it down a bit further:

  • The Monster: Represents your OCD obsessions.
  • The Rope: Represents your attempts to control, avoid, or eliminate these obsessions with compulsions.
  • The Pit: Represents the fear of being consumed by, or drowning in your obsessions.
  • Letting Go: Means dropping the rope (not completing the compulsions) and ceasing the battle, not necessarily defeating the monster (obsession). 

We need to recognise that fighting our obsessions is exhausting and ultimately ineffective, allowing our difficult thoughts and feelings to be present without fighting them is the key, this then frees up energy and attention to focus on what actually matters. 

I wonder then have I secretly been pulling on that rope and keeping my OCD alive with all my research and development?  Argh! Does it all actually come down to my inability to just stop and sit with the feelings?

As I head towards my 30 year anniversary with OCD, I need to acknowledge that some education with OCD is important but then try to recognise where the line is between being informed and it being a compulsion.  

Have you got any sneaky defaults which are keeping your OCD alive and kicking? Do you feel like you’re doing everything right but you’re still struggling too?  

Maybe try and keep a list this week, whenever you notice yourself doing something unnecessary because of your OCD, write it down, awareness is the first step to being able to change these traits, which we have unknowingly accepted into our lives. 

On a more positive note and bringing some hope back into the conversation. I do have the odd occasion when I come out of fight or flight and it feels so wonderful.  It feels like what life should be, I’m present, in the moment and experiencing life as it could be, full of opportunity and joy.  

If I have one target for the next 40 years it’s to spend as much time as possible out of fight or flight and if I can achieve this I will be a very happy soul. I want to be able to enjoy life without rushing through it, listen when people talk, take joy in the small things and the process of getting to them.      

Let me know if any of this resonates with you.  It can be very lonely at times to have OCD, and community can help us feel that less.
A bit of a heartfelt one this week as I approach that 30 year milestone but sometimes that’s what’s needed.

As always, you are not alone,
Stay Strong xxx

Understanding OCD Through Relational Framework Theory

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Does this sound familiar?

You’re out enjoying your day, you feel happy, in fact you feel really good and then all of a sudden out of no where you get hit with an OCD obsession.  ‘Ugh you think, why now when I was having so much fun and feeling so happy?’    

Why indeed?

Well there’s a theory to why this happens and it’s called, ‘relational framework theory’ in fact it’s what ACT – acceptance commitment therapy – is built upon.

I’m sure I’m not going to be as good as the creators at explaining how it works so please go look up Steven C. Hayes if you have a chance but the theory is based upon the concept that humans think relationally. 

This basically means that humans can and do relate objects in their environment to other objects. Virtually in any possible way e.g. same as, better than, opposite of, greater than, faster than, part of, similar to or like, before and after, if/then, family relationships, near and far etc,
There are all sorts of ways in which we sort and link information in our minds and it has been amazing for our evolutionary progress however it also opens us up to the possibility of immense suffering.   

Lets dig a little deeper

As we grow as humans, we create vast networks of relationships in our brains.  We link objects together so we are better able to make sense of them and recall them when needed. 

Ever found that when learning something new if you can relate it to or build upon something you already know it’s far easier to remember?  Or when you try and recall someone’s name it can help to remember where you know them from? 

This is because your brain has linked ‘Julie from the gym’, with the gym in your head, therefore remembering the gym will help you recall Julie’s name. 

Julie from the gym might also have other connections such as she has a daughter who goes to the same school you used to attend or maybe she likes to play netball and so does your friend Jane – Jane and Julie will now be linked in your mental framework too.

Here’s a little game you can play to help demonstrate this further:

Write down one noun – any type of object or animal will do

Noun 1 _________________________

Now write down a second noun

Noun 2________________

Now answer the following 3 questions:

  1. How is the first noun related to the second one?
  2. How is the first noun better than the second one?
  3. How is the first one the parent of the second one? 

The third one can take a bit longer but given a bit of time an answer will come.

This exercise highlights how the brain can relate anything to anything else!!!!!!!  It is an interesting insight as ultimately not everything can be the parent of everything; however, the brain justifies these relations by features it abstracts from the related facts. Your mind can always find a justification for that relation!  Sound similar to OCD?

Bringing us back then to OCD and the start of this post.

We can see how obsessions (unwanted, intrusive, and distressing thoughts, images, urges, or feelings that repeatedly enter a person’s mind and cause significant anxiety.) can become linked to events, people, places, circumstances, actions, words, smells, music/sounds etc.

The obsession, whatever it is, can become attached to an existing relational framework in our brain, triggering our OCD every time we then come into contact with that object or framework in the future!

‘ARGH!!!!!!!!!’

Does this sound familiar? 

Can you think of any frameworks that OCD has latched onto?  Maybe something in your bedtime routine, perhaps when you cook a meal and get the knives out, maybe when left on your own with your kids, perhaps when the news comes on, or it could be when you get into your car, the things OCD can attach itself onto are literally endless.

And unfortunately, once it has attached itself, as far as I’m aware, there’s no easy way to unattach it again.

Having an awareness of this is so important for OCD recovery because we have to accept that we are going to get triggered, and if we fight it, push it away or try and block it out, it just makes it stronger and even more sticky.  You can’t unravel these networks they are too vast and convoluted.    

So what can we do?

We have to let go of the struggle.

There’s a lovely ACT metaphor which illustrates this nicely

Someone is standing in a battlefield fighting a war. The war is not going well.  The person fights harder and harder.  Losing is a devasting option, but unless the war is won the person fighting it thinks that living a worthwhile life will be impossible. So the war goes on. 
Unknown to this person however is that at any time they can quit the battlefield and begin to live life now.  The war may still go on and the battlefield may still be visible. The terrain may look very much as it did while the fighting was happening but the outcome of the war is no longer very important and the seemingly logical sequence, of having to win the war before beginning to really live has been abandoned. – Extract Taken from: Get out of your mind and into your life by Steven C. Hayes. 

Here we see that the way to move forward is to stop fighting, accept the obsession and carry on with our lives aligning to our values.  Eventually the brain sees the link to the framework as unimportant and stops bringing your attention to it so readily, however every now and then it will throw it back up to check if its important and it’s your job at this point to say:

‘thank you brain that’s exactly what I wanted to hear right now’

and then carry on with your day aligning to your values – for more information on values work check out my post here.


If you’re enjoying learning more about ACT therapy then I would highly recommend looking up Steven C. Hayes, which is who a lot of these ideas have come from. 

A small thank you at the end of this one for your ongoing support, this is my 100th blog post and definitely something which should be celebrated.

As always, Stay Strong xxx

ACT Metaphors for OCD Recovery

Posted in Anxiety, Mental Health, Mental Wellbeing, OCD, OCD Coping Strategies, OCD GeneralTagged , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

I’ve written a lot recently about how when we have OCD, if we give into our compulsions we are likely to be plunged into our sympathetic (fight or flight) nervous system.   

This is an issue as when in this state we are unable to think rationally and our intrusive thoughts can feel all overwhelming. 

There are some great ACT metaphors which we can use to illustrate this concept, below are 3 of my favourites, let me know which one’s yours:

1. The fog

When an OCD thought comes in imagine it like fog being blown towards you.  You have the choice, at this stage, to not participate, let the thought be and wait for the fog to dissipate or you can give into the compulsion.  Every time you give into the compulsion, whatever it may be, imagine a new layer of fog being blown towards you, further damping your ability to see clearly.

2.Ripples on a pond

Here the OCD obsession is like a stone being thrown into a pond.  If we do nothing and let it be the ripples will soon disperse and we will be able to see clearly again. If however we give into the compulsion it’s the equivalent of throwing a new stone in every time.

3.The bus stop

Here we see that before we are triggered we are standing at the bus stop watching the traffic go by.  If we then get triggered and give into the compulsion it is the equivalent of walking out into the road and being surrounded by the traffic, therefore not being able to see clearly.

There are plenty more of these metaphors out there, if you’ve found these ones helpful why not have a look around for some others or if you know of another helpful one then add it in the comments below, I’d love to hear it. 

I do think the metaphors can make it all seem very easy to just draw yourself back out of fight or flight. I don’t for a second want to belittle how hard this is to do when you’re in it, believe me I know, but it can help to show what the effect of giving into an OCD compulsion can be and hopefully it gives you another tool and incentive to not give into those compulsions when they come along, they really do only lead to misery. 

I really hope it helps, as always remember you are not alone.
Stay Strong xxx 

Conquering OCD: Recognizing Fight or Flight Responses

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In my last post I talked about the threat bucket metaphor and how it relates to our resilience levels – if you haven’t read that one you might want to go and check it out first – link to pervious post.

In this post we’re going to look closer at why it’s particularly bad for your bucket to overflow when you have OCD and why your self-care is of the upmost importance. 

Why it’s so bad for OCD when your bucket overflows?

When we have OCD we want to do everything we can to keep our resilience as high as possible, why? 
Well, when in fight-or-flight, our brain shifts into ‘survival mode’ this, like OCD, changes how you think, not just how you feel.

Our goals switch to speed and safety over accuracy, nuance and long-term reasoning – not what we want when dealing with OCD intrusive thoughts. 

Here’s a summary of what’s happening in the brain when our resilience drops (bucket overflows).

1. Our brain’s “thinking centre” goes offline – The prefrontal cortex (responsible for reasoning, planning, empathy, and impulse control) becomes less active.

This means:

  • We have a reduced ability to think logically
  • Difficulty seeing multiple perspectives
  • Poor working memory (“I can’t think straight”)
  • And more impulsive reactions

You’re not choosing this—blood flow and neural activity are redirected away from this area.

2. Our threat-detection system takes over – our amygdala and related limbic structures start to dominate.

This means our thinking becomes:

  • Threat-focused (“What’s wrong?”)
  • Binary (safe vs dangerous, right vs wrong, black vs white)
  • Fast and reactive
  • Emotion-driven

Our brains are asking one question only: “How do I survive this?”

3. Cognitive narrowing occurs, Fight-or-flight (an overflowing bucket) causes tunnel thinking.

You may experience:

  • Fixation on one detail or outcome
  • Loss of creativity and flexibility
  • Difficulty accessing learned skills – this is why prepping in advance for triggering situations is so important
  • Overgeneralization (“This always happens”)

This is efficient for survival—but limiting for problem-solving and not where you want to be when experiencing intrusive thoughts.

4. Biases increase – in survival mode, the brain relies on shortcuts, common thinking patterns include:

  • Catastrophizing
  • Mind reading (“They’re against me”)
  • Personalization
  • Black-and-white thinking

These are not “bad habits”—they’re stress (OCD)-induced neural shortcuts.

Understanding all this helps you realise that you can’t reason or ruminate your way out of fight-or-flight (OCD)—you regulate your nervous system first. Thinking comes back after ‘safety’ is restored.

BUT…
…how do we know if we’re in fight or flight in the first place?
and
…how do we get out of it and stay out of it when our amygdala keeps letting off faulty signals all the time?
I hear you ask.

Honestly it can feel impossible at times, I get it! 

First things first, the best way I’ve found to work out if I’m in fight or flight is from Martha Beck:

Ask yourself:
‘Am I suffering/struggling?’

If the answer is, ‘yes’ then you can almost guarantee you’re in fight or flight.   
There’ll be no logic involved, you won’t be thinking rationally – you need to stop.    

Our bodies are designed to move between rest and digest and fight or flight naturally and if you can recognise you’re dysregulated and sit with the uncomfortable feeling then great, do that.

I have however found some nice ways to speed up the process, so you can start to see things more rationally more quickly!   

Here are some of the best tools I’ve found to come out of fight or flight when in it:

  1. Creativity – this will mean different things for different people but creativity is amazing at switching on a different part of the brain, drawing your attention away from the catastrophizing part. Quite often if you can focus on creating something, whether it be a piece of art, a yoga sequence, something in the kitchen, garden, workshop, on the computer, anything that gets you thinking outside the box, you will start to draw your attention back to a more balance place.
    What’s your creative outlet?
  2. Curiosity – This can be curiosity about anything, quite often when we become curious and interested in something it grounds us and pulls us away from that extreme black and white thinking. Try asking why? Maybe investigate how something works or why it’s the way it is.
    Have you ever wondered about anything?
  3. Humour – is fabulous for getting the brain to switch modes. It works because its unexpected, remember the brain is a prediction machine and it’s pretty good at it. When a joke comes along and it doesn’t end where the brain think it will, BAM! You’re out of default mode and the brain is switched on and listening.
    Do you like any particular comedians? Go and look up one of their new sets online.
  4. Awe – part of the joy of being human is our ability to find awe. It can really give you some perspective when you look at the stars, birds, clouds, landscape etc. Going out into the world and finding things that make you think, wow! Is very important to our wellbeing and it helps us reset.
    What brings you that feeling of awe?
  5. A Challenge – this can be tricky when you’re in fight or flight but something which I found fun – from Martha Becks book – was to try and write your signature backwards. It takes a huge amount of focus and is very grounding. Go on, give it a try!
  6. Foundations Work – movement, nutrition, sleep, relaxation & social connection.  This takes an element of doing what you know is good for you, even when you don’t feel like it. We have to take action first, do the things we know make us feel better in the long run, your body and brain will thank you.

I really hope some of these methods are useful for you, give them a go and see what works.  It can be very individual which is tricky but once you’ve found the thing that works it can be seriously life changing.  Once back in rest and digest quite often we can let the thought go and see it as completely irrational, but if not, at this stage we can work through Byron Katies, questions.

Ask yourself:
Is it true?
Is it 100% true?  If the answer is no – which it always is in the case of OCD as it is based in doubt and uncertainty – then:

YOU HAVE TO LET IT GO!!!!!!

As I said in one of my previous posts, why would you torture yourself over anything less than 100% certainty?

I really hope this post has helped you to understand the role the nervous system plays in OCD and why it’s so important to recognise when you’re in fight or flight and find useful ways to bring yourself back. Only when out of fight or flight can we rationalise, think clearly and see OCD thoughts for what they are, just thoughts.

And if you ever wanted a reason not to complete a compulsion in the first place then remember, every time you give into one of those unwanted, intrusive, and distressing thoughts, images, urges, or feelings you’re filling up your bucket a little bit more and getting closer and closer to fight or flight, where it all starts to fall apart! 

Leave that thought be and carry on with your life aligning to your values. 

I really hope this post helps, education and knowledge are so vital for OCD recovery,
As Always, you are not alone,

Stay Strong xxx  

Understanding Thought-Action Fusion in OCD

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Thought-action-fusion is a common cognitive distortion associated with OCD.  It’s where a person believes that having a thought is equivalent to performing an action, or that thinking something makes it more likely to happen.

It is a very important distortion to be aware of if you’re suffering from OCD as when you’re in fight or flight mode – talked about in my previous post – anything can feel possible.     

Remember when we are suffering from OCD we are highly likely to be in the fight or flight (sympathetic) part of our nervous system. When in fight or flight our ability to think rationally goes out of the window and so things that we know to be impossible, when in our rational minds, can feel possible! 

When struggling and ruminating on an OCD obsession the brain and body are suffering with high stress (fight or flight), when in this state our memory becomes selective and fragmented.  Our attention narrows (tunnel vision) and our hippocampus (memory organiser) works less efficiently.

The result of this is that we can get gaps in our memory, Out-of-order recall and confusion about timelines. In addition to this the brain searches for danger-related memories, and the Safe or neutral memories are harder to access. 

It’s important to note that a Strong memory ≠ accurate memory.  Stress increases confidence in memory and emotional intensity but decreases, detail accuracy, context and perspective! 

All this results in intrusive memories feeling more real because they’re emotionally tagged

  • “What if” thoughts feel urgent due to amygdala activation
  • Memory distrust develops (“What if I forgot something important?”)

This fuels checking, reassurance, and rumination.

For me this was one of the most enlightening distortions to learn about.  Following my nervous breakdown, I was constantly in my sympathetic nervous system and so I had a few events when an intrusive thought occurred, and I couldn’t remember clearly/rationalise it/work it out, this caused me unbelievable distress. 

Thought-action-fusion can make you feel like a thought is real and because of your mental state your inability to rationalise that distortion feeds the uncertainty.  We need to recognise this pattern when it happens for what it is and reduce the impact by:

  • Not trying to ‘figure it out’ while anxious – this includes during the night, no analysis between 11pm and 5am remember! 
  • Remembering that you’re in fight-or-flight, you’ll be thinking in extremes and this is not evidence.
  • Find ways to reset and come back into the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest). 

I really love Byron Katies method for this where we say:
Is it true?
Is it 100% true? 

If the answer to the second question is no – which it will be because the stress is based on doubt and uncertainty, then ‘you have to let it go’.   

Why would you torture yourself over anything less than 100% certainty? 

Fear lives in the vague after all and it’s my guess, it’s just a thought (obsession), attached to a feeling of uncertainty, that you’re basing your rumination on, not facts. 

Your brain is probably desperately trying to work out whether there is something genuine to be concerned about, you should take this as your sign that there isn’t!   

I really hope this helps, OCD recovery isn’t easy and sometimes thought-action-fusion can get worse when we are in recovery and start to let our guard down, but know and trust who you are and as always,

Stay Strong xxx

Breaking the Cycle: Overcoming OCD Compulsions

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I wrote last week about how when we get triggered by OCD obsessions (unwanted, intrusive, and distressing thoughts, images, urges, or feelings), it’s a faulty signal from our amygdala (part of the brain responsible for detecting potential threats), if we then give into the compulsion (a repetitive behaviour or mental act) it confirms the threat and fully triggers the fight or flight response in our body. 

Why is this an issue? 

Well, when in fight or flight we don’t tend to think rationally, we’re in survival mode and though this system can be useful at times, when it comes to OCD it’s not the place we want to be. 

It allows the irrational use of compulsions to ‘neutralise’ thoughts seem rational.  We see ourselves doing things we know are senseless, like retracing our steps, washing our hands multiple times, repeating safety phrases in our heads or ruminating endlessly on thoughts, but for whatever reason the brain has convinced us it will help. 

This is wrong, in fact compulsions do nothing but cause us more distress, more uncertainty and less trust in our own ability to cope!

So why does our body do this? 

According to ChapGPT it serves the following purposes:

The brain prioritizes speed over nuance.
In a threat situation, the amygdala, pushes the body to act quickly. Nuanced thinking takes time; survival favours rapid, simple judgments like safe vs. unsafe, friend vs. foe, stay vs. run.

It reduces cognitive load during stress.
Under high stress, the prefrontal cortex (responsible for reasoning and complex thinking) becomes less active. The brain simplifies decisions to conserve resources.

It minimizes hesitation.
Ambivalence can be dangerous during real threats. If you’re being chased, you don’t want to think:
“Well, maybe it’s dangerous, but maybe it’s not, and perhaps I should consider my options…”
You want an immediate, decisive action.

It helps coordinate the body’s physiological response.
Fight-or-flight relies on a clear appraisal: threat = act. Black-and-white thinking helps the brain send a strong, unified signal.

Why is this an issue in OCD?

When we believe our obsessions, which are being prompted by a fault in this system and give into our compulsions, we are triggering our fight or flight response repeatedly, the cascade of issues this causes is as follows:

The brain learns:

  • Ambiguity = risk
  • Nuance = unsafe
  • Only extremes are predictable

So the nervous system keeps simplifying the world into binaries—even when there is no threat!

Our amygdala becomes hyper-reactive

A sensitized amygdala reacts to mild cues, (OCD obsessions) as if they’re major threats. This leads to rapid, black-and-white judgments like:

  • “That bump in the road might have been a person”
  • “I had a negative thought when I turned on the light, maybe I should turn it off again and make sure I think positive thoughts when I turn it on this time, just in case.”
  • “There’s a tiny mark on that apple, I should probably throw it away and get another one, it’s probably poisonous.”

The prefrontal cortex, responsible for reasoning and nuance, gets less access as chronic stress reduces blood flow and connectivity in regions that support:

  • Perspective-taking
  • Emotional regulation
  • Tolerance for uncertainty
  • Gray-area thinking
  • Long-term planning

In this state, the brain defaults to simple categories because complexity feels overwhelming.

When we have OCD, Fight-or-flight can turn into a trait instead of a temporary state!

When the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight) stays activated long-term, the cognitive style that evolved for emergencies becomes our everyday thinking. 

This is why giving into OCD compulsions, even one, is only ever going to lead to more distress, more compulsions to try and relive that stress, sending you freefalling down that rabbit hole. 

We need to realise that the compulsion is not keeping us safe and remove it’s usefulness. 

I know from years of experience with OCD that there’s always another ‘what if?’ or ‘maybe?’ and whenever I’ve given into a compulsion all I’ve done is made things worse. I become withdrawn, irritable and irrational, simple tasks get overwhelming and life becomes very challenging. 

I understand it can feel impossible at times not to just do the compulsion, ‘just once more won’t hurt, I’ll sit with it the next time’ – sound familiar?  But I know from experience that it’s never going to feel easy, it’s always going to be challenging.

However knowing that the compulsion is useless, serves no purpose and will only make things worse, helps give me the strength to not give in.

I really hope this information helps you too. Let me know what you think in the comments below.
As always,
Stay Strong xxx

Why OCD Compulsions Make it Worse!

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If you’ve landed here, you probably already know a bit about OCD but in case you don’t here are the Cliff notes.

OCD stands for: Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. 

Obsessions are: unwanted, intrusive, and distressing thoughts, images, urges, or feelings that repeatedly enter a person’s mind and cause significant anxiety. 

The resulting compulsion is a repetitive behaviour or mental act that a person feels driven to perform in response to the obsession. 

Todays blog is all about why the compulsion part of OCD is not helpful for us. 

When you have OCD completing a compulsion, whatever it may be, is done out of a need to neutralise the obsession in some way. 

Examples of compulsions include; driving back round to check that a bump in the road wasn’t a person.  Washing your hands more than once to make sure they’re clean.  Going back to check if the oven is off, or that the doors are all locked and secure. 

There are in fact endless examples, and we’re all slightly different which can make OCD a very tricky beast to catch. 

It can be hard at times not to complete a compulsion, especially if we feel responsible for others safety but I’ve found that by invalidating the supposed ‘safety guarantee’ of the compulsion, the need to do it disappears as well. We start to see it as pointless – because it is, read on to see why.

How do I know if it’s an OCD compulsion?

The real clue to whether it’s an OCD compulsion or not, is that when it’s OCD it’s normally accompanied by distress.  Afterall if we don’t mind the compulsive action, then is it an issue?

People with OCD are normally fighting an inner battle where they are trying to work out the doubt and uncertainty they are feeling – impossible by the way – and compulsions such as checking or ruminating can feel like a productive way to do this.  Well, I’m here today to confirm to you that IT IS NOT. 

We feel like the compulsions are’ ‘helping us’ and ‘keeping us safe’ but they’re doing the complete opposite, yep you heard it right, they are making everything worse!

Now I’m not a qualified therapist but I know from years of experience that as soon as you give into one of those compulsions, you are validating the faulty signal coming from the amygdala and telling the brain that there is something to worry about.  You’re basically saying,

‘hey brain, this is important, you need to be on high alert and focus all your attention on this obsession’.    

By doing this you are putting yourself into your Sympathetic Nervous System, more commonly known as fight or flight.  Once in this state you will not be thinking rationally. The logical brain switches off and passes everything over to the more primal survival part of the brain. This part of the brain is all about keeping you safe and you’ve just told it, by giving into the compulsion, that there’s something it needs to worry about. 

Basically you’ve just started to fall down the rabbit hole.  I told you last time, he might look fluffy but he’s a whole lot of trouble!

When in fight or flight you cannot think rationally and so you are in a state where the brain can convince you black is white, up is down and left is right – things you know to be impossible!  You are not able to reason or be sensible in any way in this state and giving into an OCD compulsion puts you in this state.

How do you know when you’ve reached this state?  It can be hard when you’re in it to know but I like Martha Becks phrase:

‘If you’re struggling, you’re spiralling’

basically if it’s causing you distress then you can be pretty sure you’re in fight or flight. 

At this point you need to step away and reset.  Say ‘thank you brain, that’s exactly what I wanted to hear right now’ and carry on with your day aligning with your values.

More tips on how to do this coming next week, so don’t forget to subscribe below!  

In summary, compulsions are pointless because:   

  • As soon as we complete a compulsion, we validate the faulty signal aka the obsession. 
  • This then takes us into fight or flight – as we we’ve just told the brain there’s something to be worried about
  • Once this happens, we can’t think rationally
  • This cycle is self perpetuating.

I have illustrated it below to make it clear.

Hopefully you can now see why completing compulsions is COMPLETELY POINTLESS!!!!

I really hope this helps, let me know in the comments below.
As always, Stay Strong xxx

Expect and Accept: Overcoming OCD Thoughts

Posted in Mental Health, Mental Wellbeing, OCD, OCD Awareness Week, OCD Coping Strategies, OCD GeneralTagged , , , , , , Leave a comment

‘Expect and accept’, is a new mantra I’ve been trying out recently. 

I’ve found It can be helpful when managing OCD thoughts day-to-day to have a mantra to act as a ‘switch’ for the brain, helping you to label the thoughts as OCD and move on. 

Obviously in an ideal world you wouldn’t need it but it can be so easy at times to get dragged into OCD thoughts and before you know it, you’re freefalling down a rumination rabbit hole and all sense of reality has gone.

Don’t be fooled by the cute bunny, he may appear to be your friend but believe me he isn’t!

At times like this it can be so helpful to have a little reminder, like a therapist in your ear, saying to you:

So let’s be clear here, by saying ‘expect it’, I’m not saying, lets invite those thoughts along or will them to be there.  It’s more about having an awareness that if you’re going into a triggering situation, a new environment or out of your comfort zone, then it’s highly likely that your OCD will want to come along for the ride. 

I’ve found at times that I can get frustrated with my OCD when it turns up and what I’ve learnt over the years is if you don’t want it to be there, then it’s almost guaranteed to be.

When it does, if it does, we need to accept it.  We can do this by saying, ‘Thank you, brain that’s exactly what I wanted to hear right now’.

After all OCD recovery is not about getting rid of the intrusive thoughts, this is a common mistake, remember everyone gets them. So it’s more about allowing them to be there and then carrying on with your day regardless, aligning with your values. 

I realise how hard this is, but know that you are not alone and that every time you carry on with your day, despite the thoughts, you are making progress and the brain is learning it doesn’t need to freak out at every thought that comes into your mind.  

Why not give the mantra a go this week and see if it helps you too. Let me know how you get on in the comments below.

Remember: ‘Expect it and Accept it’

As always,
Stay Strong xxx

Why Habituation is key to OCD Recovery

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Last week I posted about choice and why it’s so important in OCD recovery.  Towards the end of that post, I mentioned habituation and I felt the topic so significant for me in my recovery that it deserved it’s own post, so here we are.

What is habituation?

According to google it is:

‘the process of making or becoming accustomed or used to something.’

In Psychology specifically it’s:

‘the diminishing of an innate response to a frequently repeated stimulus.’

When applying this to OCD specifically:

We can see ‘the innate response’ as the compulsion and ‘the repeated stimulus’ as the obsession. 

Applying habituation to OCD recovery

We learn in therapy that everyone gets intrusive thoughts and so the aim in OCD recovery is not to get rid of the thoughts (obsessions) but to see them as completely irrelevant. 

We do this by recognising the trigger (obsession) when it comes in and habituating (getting used) to it, so that we no longer feel the need to complete the compulsion – whether it be mental or physical. 

This was a big turning point for me, realising that the obsession is something you can ‘get used to’.  The result of this is that the brain eventually no longer brings your attention to it – as it starts to see it as insignificant. 

For a long time I saw OCD recovery as not having the obsessions but now I see that it’s my reaction to the obsession that is the key.  I have no control over whether the thought/image/whatever appears or not only my reaction to it.

The Reticular Activating system and habituation

You only have so much mental capacity each day and the brain has an unbelievably effective filtering system called the reticular activating system or RAS for short. 

According to Jim Kwik’s book Limitless,

‘every second your senses gather up to 11 million bits of information from the world around you…
…the conscious mind typically processes only 50 bits per second. ’

‘(The RAS) also acts as the gatekeeper of information through a process called habituation, which allows the brain to ignore meaningless and repetitive stimuli’  

So the brain takes in an unbelievable amount of information every second and then decides what it’s going to bring to your attention and what it’s going to discard, mostly down to what you’re telling it you feel is important!

When you are struggling with OCD and you see the obsessions as important the brain will prioritise these thoughts above all others. Once you start to habituate yourself to the OCD triggers the brain will no longer use its finite resources on information you’re telling it is irrelevant.  It will file it as a ‘meaningless and repetitive stimuli’ and no longer bring it to your attention.

Yes, this is habituation and it’s where OCD recovery happens!   

A note here to highlight that we shouldn’t expect our obsessions never to show up again.  Every now and then the brain will throw one to the forefront of your mind and say,  ‘Remember this?  You were really obsessed with this at one point, is it still important?’ and your only job is to do absolutely nothing.  This is how we break free from OCD. 

In summary, we need to habituate to our obsessions, show the brain that they’re insignificant and carry on with our day aligning with our values. This is how we live our lives in recovery. 

Not sure on your values? Then be sure to subscribe below as that’s what next weeks post is going to be all about.

As always,
Stay Strong xxx 

Overcoming OCD: The Power of Choice

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I have recently had the pleasure of coming across the choice article written by Dr Steven Phillipson – a licensed clinical psychologist who specialises in Cognitive-Behavioural Therapy for OCD.  It’s such an extraordinary piece of work and a must read for anyone suffering from OCD.  It is quite lengthy but there is an audio version here.

The focus of the article is how we need to see OCD thoughts as irrelevant and that we DO have a choice when it comes to this decision.

I know only too well when you have OCD you can feel like you have no choice but to do the compulsion when the thoughts come in, the doubt & uncertainty that comes with not knowing 100% whether the thought is significant can feel too much to bear. 

However, we need to start to see this part of the brain as an independent system from our conscious thoughts, one that works automatically – like the systems which control automatic functioning in the body such as breathing and heartrate.  We do this by becoming aware of our automatic thoughts and autopilot, making the choice to carry on with our day, align with our values and see the thoughts as meaningless and irrelevant – because they are.  

Below is a quote from the article which I thought was helpful:    

‘what do our feelings say about our fundamental beliefs? I believe that the answer to this question is, “Not necessarily very much.” Our feelings are not a reliable measure of our self-perception. Why? Because automatic thoughts can create feelings that are just as convincing as thoughts that reflect our deeply held beliefs. So, it is vital that we do not reflexively take the thoughts and feelings that our brains send to us at face value.’

Here Dr Steven Phillipson is highlighting the fact that automatic thoughts can create feelings, these feelings can make things feel more real.  Therefore, we shouldn’t put too much emphasis on how we feel as feeling are NOT within our control. 

Why would we give up our autonomy (our right to make informed decisions about our lives) to something we have NO control over? (Remember, we cannot control our thoughts and feelings only our behaviours. )

Another great quote from the article:

‘Remember when you have OCD, you cannot use your feelings to determine if a threat is ”real”.  Doing so is a little like asking the Devil for directions to heaven’.

I always remember this quote when I’m starting to spiral as it happily reminds me that I cannot trust those feelings.

The article highlights how when one has OCD the amygdala – whose primary function is to process emotions, especially fear and anxiety – is sending us a faulty signal that there is something which needs our attention right away and cannot wait. Our job – through ERP therapy – is to become habituated (the process of making or becoming accustomed or used to something.) to this alert. 

This is no easy task and can feel very uncomfortable. Choosing to ignore your brains warning system and take the chance that it’s a false alert can truly feel like jumping out of an aeroplane not knowing whether your parachute is packed correctly. However this is the chance we have to take to show the brain that the signal was faulty, we literally do nothing about the thought and carry on with our day aligning with our values.

More on habituation coming in future posts but for now I’m going to leave you with this motivational mantra which I use all the time,

‘Every day is a new opportunity for me to show my brain that this continued prompt is meaning and irrelevant. ‘

I really hope it helps you too:
As always, stay strong xxx