#67: Living with OCD - Shame, Guilt, and Impact on Identity

Misconceptions about OCD are widespread, often reduced to stereotypes like excessive hand washing or tidiness. 

In this episode I am dispelling myths and uncovering what its really like to live with OCD, drawing upon two decades of therapy room insights. I discuss the significant ways OCD can disrupt daily life, how it can affect mental health, and undermine a person’s sense of self and identity.

Highlights include:

04:26 OCD and other mental health issues

06:02 How OCD attacks your sense of self

08:44 OCD as a shapeshifter

*Watch the video of this episode HERE.

If you liked this episode you may like:

5 Hidden Trick of OCD

OCD, Autism and ADHD

Breaking the Cycle of Obsessional Doubts with iCBT

If overthinking and worry is draining you, start with my 30-minute mini course How to Stop Spiralling. It gives you the exact tools I teach clients to interrupt thought loops in real time.

 If you want something for the moments you’re already anxious or overwhelmed, the Spiral Rescue Kit has guided audios and a printable SOS plan you can use anywhere.

 → Get both HERE (get £5 off when you buy both or gift it to a friend!)

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The Hello Therapy podcast and the information provided by Dr Liz White (DClinPsy, CPsychol, AFBPsS, CSci, HCPC reg.), is solely intended for informational and educational purposes and does not constitute personalised advice. Please reach out to your GP or a mental health professional if you need support. 

Transcript

How OCD Steals Your Time

Speaker 1 0:02

If you're looking to improve your mental health and well-being, then keep listening. I'm Dr Liz White, a consultant clinical psychologist with over 20 years of experience. Whether you're a frazzled parent, a stressed out professional or finding your way through the challenges of midlife, you're in the right place. Through a mix of solo episodes and insightful conversations with expert psychologists and therapists, I'm bringing you evidence-based tools and strategies to help you navigate life's ups and downs with confidence, clarity and compassion. With confidence, clarity and compassion this is your space to feel seen, supported and empowered. Welcome to Hello Therapy. Have you ever wondered what it's actually like to live with OCD, beyond the of hand washing and excessive tidiness? Today, I'm taking you on a journey through what it's like to live with OCD. I explore how it eats up your time, drains your energy and even makes you question your identity and who you think you are. By the end of the episode, you'll have more insights into the hidden struggles of OCD that most people don't get to see. So let's dive in First up. Ocd steals your precious time. You can spend hours upon hours feeling like you need to clean the kitchen surface over and over again, repeat a phrase in your head or wash your hands repeatedly, and these are just some examples. But even if a particular compulsion isn't taking hours upon hours, even if it's just adding on a few extra minutes, that all adds up. For example, when John leaves his work, he feels like he has to check his work bag, check his phone, to make sure that he hasn't taken anything confidential home with him. Now this can take him a good 10 minutes because he doesn't just check once, he checks several times over Again, because obsessive doubt says well, you weren't paying attention that time, so you need to repeat it. Maybe you missed something. You better do it again. So for John, that's what an extra hour per week added on to his day. Now, if he has other compulsions that he does during his day that take five minutes here, 10 minutes there, we can easily see how it very quickly starts to add up and before you know it, OCD has taken over your life.

The Exhaustion and Mental Toll

Speaker 1 2:48

The second aspect of OCD that goes unseen is just how exhausting it is. Ocd is exhausting and this is a consistent message that I have heard from my clients over the years. Mentally it is tiring. How can it not be? You are sometimes having constant thoughts, sometimes images that just don't go away, and it can get really difficult to focus on anything else. The thoughts feel so important. You have to pay attention to them, because what happens if you don't? At least that's what OCD says.

OCD and Other Mental Health Issues

Speaker 1 3:25

Ocd convinces you that not paying attention to the intrusive thoughts or the obsessive doubt is going to lead to something really bad happening, some catastrophe, For example, in harm OCD. If you're having intrusive thoughts about harming someone else, it's natural to think about harming someone else. It's natural to think what is this? Why am I having these thoughts? Does this mean that I want to harm people? I don't want to harm people, but why am I having these thoughts in the first place? You naturally try and figure it out. You try and analyse, investigate, get to the bottom of. You try and gain certainty that you don't actually want to harm other people, that you're not a bad person. But in doing that you get further and further stuck in the OCD cycle. And not only does OCD take a lot of mental energy, it takes a massive emotional toll too the anxiety, the distress, the disgust, the shame, the guilt. And that takes me to my next point.

Speaker 1 4:27

Ocd often comes along with other problems. Ocd does not exist in a vacuum by itself. It often comes along with other mental health issues. Research shows that OCD can be comorbid with depression, generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder and social anxiety. For example, Marie was on a bus and she suddenly had the intrusive thought what if I touch the person's leg next to me inappropriately? This led to a cascade of other intrusive thoughts like what if I shout a swear word? And the more she tried to shut these thoughts down, distract away from them, the more they just kept coming and, unsurprisingly, she got very anxious and had a panic attack there.

How OCD Attacks Your Identity

Speaker 1 5:13

And then the most common scenario that I have seen in the therapy room is that OCD can have a huge impact on someone's mood and how they feel, and can often lead someone to feel depressed. And that makes sense, doesn't it? Each day you're battling with these thoughts, you feel like you have to do all of these compulsions. You start to avoid doing things that you like to do in your life. That then reduces your opportunity for enjoyment and pleasure, which also lowers your mood. Add in the fact that OCD can also come along with some very complex and distressing emotions like shame, guilt, embarrassment, and all of that becomes a recipe for feeling low. Next up, OCD makes you question who you are. Now, one of the most distressing things about OCD is that it doesn't just attack what you do in your life. It also attacks who you believe you are, so it gets right to the core of your identity as a person.

Speaker 1 6:17

Now, a really interesting study in 2021 asked a group of people who are experiencing OCD how their OCD impacted their sense of identity. The findings were striking 62% of those people felt that their obsessive thoughts brought them closer to their feared self, that version of themselves they were terrified of becoming. And what kind of person did they fear becoming? Several themes were found. Firstly, that they had a flawed or negative personality characteristic, so things like lazy, selfish, proud or arrogant. Secondly, that they were dangerous or morally bad in some way, so a liar or manipulative or just plain old being a bad person. Thirdly, that they were emotionally unstable or depressed, so insecure, fearful, pessimistic, nervous. And the last theme was around rejection driven fears, so being a person that was disgusting, repugnant, despicable. So people experiencing OCD wake up every day with the OCD whispering things like you're lazy, you're disgusting, you're a bad person.

OCD as a Shapeshifter

Speaker 1 7:32

And that is what OCD does. It attaches to your deepest fears about yourself and convinces you by the very fact that you are having those thoughts, you are moving closer to being that feared version of yourself, and for a lot of people this can be the most distressing aspect of OCD. For example, Louis always thought of himself as a morally good person. His faith was really important to him. He went out of his way to help other people. One day he was eating at a restaurant and he glanced at the waitress and just thought that she was attractive. Almost immediately an intrusive thought came in, saying thinking that that waitress is attractive is wrong and it's angered God. Louis' feared self was that he was morally bad, and OCD was successful in convincing him that just having a thought like that was morally wrong and therefore morally bad. And this led Louis to feel like he had to confess to his family and his friends and anybody that would listen that he had had this thought. My last point is that OCD is a shapeshifter. One of the things that always never fails to astound me about OCD is the way that it shapeshifts.

Speaker 1 8:52

Time and time again I've worked with clients who say that earlier in their lives they had a particular theme that it started with, but then later on it changed to another theme, and sometimes the themes are completely different. Sometimes people report cycling through different themes, eventually coming back to the same one. Another common experience is that you can have several themes going at once, or they kind of join together somehow. For example, Mabel experiences relationship OCD and she mainly has obsessive thoughts about whether her and her partner are compatible. This was her main obsession before she became pregnant. Although she was really happy that she was pregnant, she started to really worry that she would inadvertently harm her baby once the baby arrived. The more pregnant she became, the more intrusive and distressing these thoughts became, and this is a really good example of how life events can shape the theme and the subtype of the OCD that someone is experiencing shape the theme and the subtype of the OCD that someone is experiencing especially when there's a significant change in circumstances. So that brings us to the end of this episode.

Speaker 1 10:02

I hope that's given you a good overview of what it's like for someone to live with OCD, and if you want to let me know what it's like for you, then do check out our instagram page at harley clinical. We always put out social media for each episode, so do let me know in those comments. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of hello therapy. We'd love for you to join our growing community over on substack. You can sign up for free or become a paid subscriber for access to exclusive perks like never before seen video interviews and downloadable guides designed to support your mental health. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to subscribe so you never miss a new release. And if you got value from this episode, it would mean the world if you left a five star review. As always, check the show notes for my full disclaimer. Thanks again for listening.