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“What pleases God is the blind hope that I have in his mercy.”  –St. Therese of Lisieux Greatest single statement ever made by an OCDer? I vote for this powerful profession of faith by my favorite Catholic saint, Therese of Lisieux. She suffered from severe OCD that began in childhood, and eventually overcame her OCD […]

I have fought the good fight—2Tim 4:7 Are you fighting the good fight? For the OCD sufferer, there are frequent calls to battle. The word “obsession,” after all, comes from the Latin root, obsidere, meaning to besiege, as an army would attack a city. That’s certainly what it feels like when these tormenting thoughts crash […]

“I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” — Jer 29:11

“We should see how deeply God hides his face, and how we must not go by our feeling but only by his word.” — Martin Luther

The twin burdens of OCD sufferers are ruminations of past event and worries about the future. If we don’t watch it, we can live our entire lives without ever enjoying the blessings of the present moment. Since obsessions usually have a future referent, and since OCDers worry excessively anyway, the future is their major source […]

“These things may seem ridiculous to others, even as ridiculous as they were in themselves, but to me they were the most tormenting cogitations.” —John Bunyan This quote was used by the great Christian author John Bunyan to introduce his autobiographical work Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. The book describes his struggle with […]

The crucial time for dealing with OCD is the moment when an obsession strikes.  This is the moment of truth.  Whether we allow a fearful thought to take hold and stir compulsions, or whether we make progress with the disorder–it all depends on what transpires here.  We can give in to the fear, or, with […]

When people first develop OCD, their response to the disorder ranges from a nagging sense of alarm to outright terror. I’m not referring here to the sudden episodes of anxiety caused by obsessions intruding into the mind; but rather to the emotional reaction that occurs with the recognition that one has suddenly begun to have […]

Last week I was talking to an OCDer with the obsessional fear that she is not contributing enough to her church, because what she gives is less than a full ten percent tithe.  She worries that she is displeasing God. What blessings will she miss?  What if something terrible happens? When the obsession strikes, fearful […]

Two times are important when dealing with OCD: the moment an obsession hits (when we must attempt to gain a therapeutic perspective), and the time spent on exercises designed to lessen OCD’s strength. Of the various exercises that are helpful, the most proven is “exposure and response prevention,” or ERP. It employs the process of […]