Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Counselling in Sydney
Meridian Assessment and Therapy has an experienced OCD counsellor in Sydney for treatment of compulsive disorders.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) involves the experience of unwanted intrusive, disturbing and recurrent thoughts, impulses, or images. OCD sufferers feel compelled by their anxiety to perform repetitive behaviours or mental acts which aim to magically prevent some dreaded event or situation and hence reduce their distress.
What are obsessions?
Obsessions are unwanted, intrusive, recurrent thoughts, impulses or images. They are regarded by the individual experiencing them as repugnant, horrific, unrealistic, senseless, or unacceptable and difficult to dismiss.
Common obsessions are:
- Repeated thoughts about contamination
E.g. Worry about germs, illness, poisoning or contamination. - Repeated doubts
E.g. Fears that one might have hit a pedestrian whilst driving home; repeated fears that one has left the door
unlocked or the stove on. - A need to have things in a particular order
E.g. Intense distress if objects are moved from their ‘usual place’. - Aggressive, horrific abhorrent or disturbing impulses or images
E.g. To hurt one’s child or to take ones clothes off in a public place. - Sexual imagery
E.g. A woman experiencing intrusive images of performing fellatio on a man whom she finds unattractive.
Obsessions in OCD are not simply excessive worries about real life situations as in Generalised Anxiety Disorder, and they differ from obsessive ruminations sometimes encountered in other psychological disorders where the content of the thought is relevant to the disorder (for example, obsession with food in an Eating Disorder, or obsessive guilt in Major Depressive Disorder).
What are compulsions?
Compulsions have two defining characteristics:
- They involve repetitive behaviours or mental acts or rules that must be applied rigidly in response to an obsession.
For example, washing one’s hands a specific number of times to avoid illness or retracing a route one has driven along to check that one hasn’t hit a pedestrian. - The compulsive act is aimed at preventing or reducing distress, or preventing some dreaded event or situation.
However, the act is not connected in any realistic way to what it is deigned to precent or it is clearly excessive.
For example avoiding touching doorknobs to prevent illness or contamination, or counting in a ritualistic way to prevent bad things from happening. Often the person carries out the behaviours (compulsive rituals) to get rid of the obsessive thoughts, but this only provides temporary relief. Not performing the compulsive rituals can cause great anxiety.
Often sufferers of OCD manage their anxiety through avoidance, keeping away from situations or objects that trigger obsessive thoughts. The avoidance unfortunately often results in greater disruption and impairment of the sufferer’s life, which is an important feature of OCD.
OCD is one of the most puzzling anxiety disorders. Once thought to be relatively rare, community studies have estimated an average incidence of 2.5% in the general population. The average onset of the disorder ranges from early adolescence to mid twenties. OCD can often co-occur with other mental health issues including depression, phobias, social anxiety and panic disorder.
Unfortunately, many individuals with OCD suffer for years without seeing an OCD counsellor, experiencing emotional, psychological and social impairment without seeking treatment. Due to the bizarre nature of the symptoms many sufferers worry that their symptoms signal ‘madness’, that they will be ‘locked up’ or that their children will be taken away from them.
Fortunately, whilst this condition can be profoundly debilitating, OCD treatment involving a combination of medication and psychological therapy (known as cognitive behaviour therapy) has been proven to achieve effective results. At Meridian Therapy and Assessment, we offer OCD treatment in the Hills District, Sydney.
