Search Content

Although primary care physicians and other non-specialists in mental health feel comfortable managing less complicated anxiety-related disorders, OCD is a more complex diagnosis and ideally should be managed by a psychiatrist.  Before initiating medication, the psychiatrist will first do a thorough assessment to ensure that the diagnosis of OCD is accurate, and to determine the presence of coexisting conditions that may complicate the treatment.

Fear is one of the six basic human emotions, with a clear evolutionary purpose: to help us respond to danger and survive. In Exposure Therapy, providers create a safe environment to intentionally “expose” their clients to objects, activities, or situations they fear.

Whether we hear the term from a client, another provider, or our own classification of someone’s symptoms, “compulsions” tend carry with them some level of assumption – that this might just be OCD.

Parents of children with OCD are often not aware of how they can contribute to their child's behavior, or more specifically, how they unintentionally support the OCD through accommodating behaviors. This blog post explores the role of family accommodations in childhood OCD and provide strategies to help parents better support their child. 

Panic isn’t what you think it is. It’s not an attack at all, and that’s a misleading name for it. It’s you having an internal reaction of fear – your heart rate changes, your muscles tense up, your stomach feels bad, you have scary thoughts of calamities, and so on.

The headlines and the CDC report are indeed alarming, but they should serve as a wakeup call to all of us. Yes, we should think seriously about why we are seeing a steep decline in the mental health of teenage girls, but we have to come together now as parents, family, friends, educators, clinicians, providers, and as a society to support, enhance and establish more preventive measures for our youth.

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) can affect people of all races, color, ethnicity, gender, socio-economic status, sexual orientation and/or different cultural backgrounds, and culture can have a large influence on how someone might perceive or report their symptoms.

Friends are the people we keep in our lives by choice and not because of familial bonds, work contracts, or other circumstances. However, for those with the disorder, finding and nurturing friendships while in the thick of symptoms can be just as difficult. 

A Q&A with ADAA Member Karen Cassiday, PhD, ACT answering community questions on overcoming agoraphobia.

I’m a psychologist who treats OCD and Anxiety Disorders. When my patients get to a point in treatment when they shrug their shoulders and say to me, “Yeah, I had an intrusive thought, but ‘Whatever”, I know we have hit a home run.