OCD stands for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. It is a disease where people have repetitive thoughts, ideas, or sensation that makes them do recurring compulsions. The right OCD treatment helps them overcome it. These repetitive behaviours significantly interfere with their lives and compel them to act out on certain things again. For instance, they might clean their hands and neat things over and over.
People who have OCD can have distressing thoughts on repeat as well as behaviours. This dramatically makes them have persistent thoughts and have rigid behaviours. These people won’t be able to control their actions and have to perform them. When they are unable to perform these tasks, it causes a great deal of stress in them.
Diagnosis
While many of the people do have a suspicion of their symptoms, some may have no clue. This makes them get delayed treatment. In cases where people don’t realise that their symptoms are realistic, they still have trouble disengaging. It will be difficult to distance themselves from repetitive thoughts and actions.
The doctor should see that they last for more than an hour every day. And also if the bearer has significant stress. OCD generally affects more women than men around the world and often starts in childhood. Usually, the average symptoms begin to appear at 19 years of age.
Treatment for OCD.
Cognitive-behavioural therapy is a treatment for OCD that aims to alter the behaviour and thoughts of people. Mostly this treatment is done in the therapist’s office. Usually, it is done weekly, and the therapist recommends regular exercises to do at home. CBT is done by a cognitive-behavioural therapist who is specially trained to treat OCD and its symptoms.
Exposure therapy.
This is the psychotherapeutic choice for OCD treatment and is the exposure and response prevention method. This is also a form of CBT. This treatment involves making patients exposed to situations that make their obsessions come to life. When they are in that situation, they progressively ask them to avoid that compulsion. These treatments are done at a slow pace and worked up to an advanced level, gradually.
The therapist starts gradually by first triggering the patients and then taking them to the things that bother them most. The idea behind this treatment is to allow the patient to face their fear, learn to accept, and avoid it. Gradually you can deal with the anxiety until it fades completely. These people help you to gain confidence and learn skills to control them in the future.
Imaginal exposure.
For people who are not that brave to fear their fears in real-world situations, this treatment allows them to get imaginal exposure (IE). This is also sometimes called a medicine of visualisation and is quite helpful in alleviating anxiety. In this, the therapist can build a scenario that displays anxiety that someone could experience in an everyday situation.
For instance, if someone has trouble coming down from a stairway without their perfect pattern of a walk; the therapist might ask them to imagine themselves walking differently and record their levels of anxiety. Gradually as they are allowed to envision this scenario, they can deal with the situation better.
Habit Reversal Training.
This involves awareness training, an introduction to competing responses, support socially, positive reinforcement, and relaxation techniques. These methods build awareness on how these urges develop in the first place. This allows the patients to be more aware, intervene, and make a change in their pattern.
The therapist and the patient work together to find solutions to the problem that might otherwise be not noticeable to other people. For instance, someone who suffers from a compulsion to touch things symmetrically may be guided to tense the opposite arm, hold it against their body and compel it to stop dealing with the situation altogether.
This method takes time. With diligent practice and relaxing techniques, the person drives to success. Support from family and friends helps them to get there better.
Conclusion.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder is a disease that can be treated with advanced techniques, guidance, and support. If you or anyone you know has symptoms of OCD, they should get due advice from a certified therapist. With diligent treatment, systematic techniques, help, and support, patients can quickly recover from the disorder and resume a natural routine in no time. It takes time and effort to get there, but you will get there with the right treatment, nonetheless.
