Jamaal doesn’t really appreciate his new nickname, Mr. Perfect. Though he has really tried not to, he still has to keep every paper straight in his organizer and catches himself straightening up his friends’ papers. He used to feel good about himself and thought he was pretty popular and cool. But now that his stuck thoughts and rituals have gotten worse, he doesn’t go out with friends much because he just doesn’t want to hear the teasing. He has to go to school but wouldn’t if he didn’t have to. Though his friends say they’re just teasing, Jamaal doesn’t find it very funny. Having OCD is a pain.

for you to know

As if it isn’t bad enough to wrestle with stuck thoughts and rituals, for many teens these symptoms can have a big impact on many areas of their lives—particularly in friendships and self-confidence. In some ways these “side effects” can be worse than the stuck thoughts and rituals themselves.

for you to do

Get a piece of paper and answer the following questions:

• How do stuck thoughts and rituals affect your life?
• Have others—family, friends, or teachers—noticed your rituals? What kinds of things have they said about them?
• Have others pointed out that you’ve changed in some way since OCD became a bigger problem for you? Can you remember what they said?
• How do you think your stuck thoughts and rituals have impacted your relationship with your parents? Have your parents been helpful or do they make you feel worse?
• How have your stuck thoughts and rituals impacted your relationships with your friends? Have your friends been helpful or do they make you feel worse?
• Are there places or activities that make you uncomfortable or that you try to avoid because of these symptoms?
• Since stuck thoughts and some rituals are often “invisible,” only you know about them. How have these changed the way you feel about yourself?
• How do your symptoms affect the sense of control you have over your life?
• What is the single biggest change in your life that is due to OCD?
• Keep these changes in your life in mind as you work through this book, because knowing how much OCD affects your life can give you motivation to fight it.

wrapping it up

• As you went through the exercise, did you discover some ways OCD has affected your life that you hadn’t noticed before? If so, what were they?
• Can you think of any other ways that OCD has affected your social life or your self-esteem?
• How does what you’ve learned in this exercise affect your thinking and feeling about OCD?

excerpt from Free from OCD: A Workbook for Teens with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder by Timothy A. Sisemore Ph.D.