OCD Is Not an Adjective

From the moment you wake up, there it is. Those horrible thoughts are sitting in your mind. They’re nagging, maybe even yelling. You feel this irresistible urge build up inside, begging you to do something, anything, to curb the anxiety. Some days it’s the same compulsion of checking to see if you accidentally poisoned someone. On a different day, you start thinking about blinking and focus on each individual blink. The new compulsion sticks around for whatever feels just right. It must always feel right, so you do it. Your brain is telling you that it’s the only way to make the anxiety stop, and yet, you are consciously aware that’s not true. You feel trapped in your own mind. Regardless of the apparent truth, the compulsions bring a fleeting sense of peace. And that’s what drivesyou.

“OCD is not a personality quirk. It’s not a cute trait. It’s debilitating, exhausting and life-changing.” These are the words of Alegra Kastens. Kastens is a Marriage & Family Therapist (MFT), as well as a Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC), Trainee. Based out of Los Angeles, she has turned her struggle with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) into a positive by working as an OCD advocate. Her Instagram, @obsessivelyeverafter, is a big part of this, but she doesn’t plan on stopping there; the end goal is to open OCD treatment centers around the world.

It is difficult for anyone without OCD to imagine what it must be like. Empathy has become even more difficult with the widespread, blatant minimization of what OCD means. Kasten works to debunk the many misconceptions surrounding OCD with the goal of allowing others to see they are not alone and begin treatment. To many, their only exposure to OCD is through false claims in marketing and digital media, such as advertisements for organizational products and simplistic videos on various social media platforms that claim to “satisfy your OCD.” The biggest myth about OCD is that it means being particular, liking things a certain way and keeping things extremely clean. While it’s true that these are ways OCD may manifest, there is not a limit to the ways obsessions and compulsions take form.

Another pervasive myth is that everybody is a little bit OCD. This is not true. Kastens explained, “It’s not an adjective. It’s a torturous mental illness that destroys the lives of those suffering.” People should understand that OCD is a disorder, not a personality trait. Perhaps in part to this misconception, it is also widely believed that people with OCD can simply turn off their thoughts about their obsessions. There have been many studies on OCD brains, such as a 2017 study at the University of Cambridge, which proved that the brains of those with OCD actually work differently. Therefore, it is impossible to make obsessive thoughts stop suddenly. The brain receivesfalse alarms that it perceives as danger and compulsions are the only thing that seems to help relieve the anxiety resulting from the “danger.” These false alarms are why OCD is very uncontrollable.

Further misconceptions have led many people to believe compulsions are solely physical, such as washing hands or checking that the door is locked. This is not true. They are physical and mental; just because someone is not engaging in visible compulsions does not mean they aren’t suffering. Kastens shared, “Mental compulsions are common and include rumination (thinking about their thoughts and trying to solve them), avoidance (avoiding people/places/situations that may trigger them), repeating phrases or counting in their head, “checking” their emotional responses to see if they “like” their thoughts.” The brain is a playground for OCD, and it can completely take over an individual’s thoughts.

OCD is a varying disease, so there are many different subtypes. They manifest in very different ways but are all incredibly real and crippling. Several of these subtypes include fear of harming yourself or others, unwanted pedophilic thoughts, scrupulosity (doing the right thing), somatic (hyper-awareness of bodily functions), all-consuming doubts about relationships, and obsessing over existential thoughts. These are not all the ways that OCD can manifest, but merely a sampling of lesser-known, yet common, subtypes. Because OCD attacks what you value the most, it can take many forms. Kastens shared, “You wouldn’t engage in compulsions to try and get rid of the anxiety if you liked your thoughts.”

This is why OCD is so debilitating. Not only do sufferers have fears based on something they care deeply about, but they often have compulsions that reflect those fears. For example, someone with somatic OCD who fears their automatic bodily functions will stop working may pay attention to every single time they blink or concentrate entirely on each breath they take. It leaves no room in their mind to focus on things like work, social life and hobbies.

It’s already hard to imagine how consuming these thoughts can be. The internet, as a nearly unavoidable piece of our lives, has made OCD more unimaginable than it has to be. For those with OCD, social media and other online platforms are a massive part of why many do not understand what is happening to them or feel embarrassed and diminished. On any given day, someone could be scrolling through Twitter or Instagram and see a post saying, “I’m so OCD, look how organized my room is!” or “Watch this to satisfy your OCD!” That is like someone saying that the most consuming problem in your life is cute and easily solvable. Each post and each share are telling its viewers that this is what OCD looks like. It is not a word that can be thrown around as an adjective, yet that’s exactly what people are doing. It seems that the only way to reverse this damage is to use the internet as a positive source.

This has been done successfully before, most notably with anxiety and depression. People have shared their stories and helped others via social media and other online mediums. A small bud of this is appearing within the OCD community, and Kastens is one of those emerging leaders. In fact, the reason she even got to that point was through social media.

The therapist and OCD specialist who began Karstens’s treatment, Sheva Rajaee, uses her own Instagram (@theshrinkwrap) to share “daily therapy bites,” as her bio states. “She posted about so many things that I was experiencing, such as sexually intrusive thoughts and mental compulsions,” Kastens reflected, “I thought to myself, ‘She gets it.” Education regarding OCD is gaining traction, and it’s precisely what the community needs. Social media can be used to gain access to educational resources and brings solidarity to those who feel scared and alone because of their OCD.

Currently, there is not an end-all cure for the disorder. However, it is completely possible to receive treatment and gain control over obsessive thoughts. Kastens is proof that through seeking treatment, OCD is manageable. She emphasized, “I’ll have occasional thoughts, but that’s okay. I can live with them!”

In a time when we have the internet and can reach people across the globe in seconds, it should be easy for people to feel understood. Media has gone down the path of being too reductive in many aspects, including mental illnesses, creating stereotypes left and right. There has been a gain in social responsibility to correct this, flipping the internet from being the downfall to the solution.

By Olivia Cowden

Illustrated by Jacqueline Wegwerth