OCD

Everyone has doubts now and then. Did I lock the door? You go and check, the door is locked, and that settles it.

With OCD, nothing is ever settled. You check, the door is locked, and still something keeps nagging at you. So you check one more time, just to be sure. You ask whether it was okay, someone says yes, and a little later you ask again, because that first answer had already stopped counting. You go back over a conversation: what if you did say something wrong after all?

It seems illogical: the harder you try to get rid of it, the stronger it comes back. Yet there's a clear logic to it. After checking, the unease settles, for a moment…

But what you remember isn't: the door was locked. What you remember is: good thing I checked. The checking gets the credit, so next time it seems even more necessary. The solution keeps the problem going.

And there's more. Someone can tell you it's okay, but nobody can guarantee it. Complete certainty doesn't exist, for anyone. OCD is, in a sense, the attempt to find it anyway.

Sometimes it isn't about doors or hands, but about thoughts you've never said out loud, for fear of what people would think. It's no coincidence that they feel so shameful: OCD attaches itself to what you hold most dear. Your child, your relationship, your faith, your conscience. But these thoughts are not plans, and they don't predict what you will do.

So this has little to do with willpower. But what has become so deeply ingrained can also be learned differently: not by banishing the doubt, but by learning to let it stand, without answering it.

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That's what the course I've been writing for two years is about. The first phase is almost ready.

Many people with OCD wait years before seeking help, usually out of shame. That's understandable: if you have thoughts you barely dare to think yourself, you don't just tell them to a stranger. And specialised help isn't always available, or affordable. With this course, you can start in your own time, at home, even if you haven't talked to anyone about it yet.

The course follows the same approach I use in my practice. At its core is exposure and response prevention, the most thoroughly researched treatment for OCD: you learn to allow the doubt without the ritual meant to soothe it. But OCD is also about responsibility, and about who has to say, in your place, that it's okay. So we look at that too. Not to decipher your thoughts, but to help you choose for yourself again, even without certainty.

In the first phase, you learn how OCD works, and how it works in you. In the second, you start practising: first with what you do visibly, then with what goes on in your head. That isn't always comfortable, but the discomfort is part of learning something new. It's not a sign that something's going wrong.

Not sure whether it's really OCD? That question can itself keep going round and round. Ask yourself instead what it costs you: in time, in peace of mind, in the things you'd actually like to be doing. If it costs you more than you're willing to give, this course may be for you. Want to look around first? On Instagram I share what I know about OCD in small pieces: @beyondtheloop.en

Does it take over your days completely, or is something else weighing on you as well? Then talk to your GP or a psychologist first. A course is no substitute for close, personal support.

— Charlotte Häsler, clinical psychologist and psychotherapist