OCD Education and Exposure & Response Prevention (ERP) Therapy Blog
Learn tips to stop the overwhelm of intrusive thoughts and empower yourself to get control of your life so you can experience freedom again.
ERP Part 1: What is Exposure and Response Prevention for OCD?
ERP is the most well-researched form of treatment for OCD. But what is it? When is it used? And how does it work? This is the first of a three-post series on ERP.
ERP Part 2: Identifying Values and Accepting Uncertainty
ERP helps us overcome OCD by helping us develop new skills and learn from new experiences. We have to establish the foundation on which all our later ERP-related work will rest. That foundation is understanding what values we care about that would motivate us to be willing to taking calculated risks and accept living with uncertainty without completing our safety behaviors.
Identifying Core Fears in ERP Treatment for OCD
ERP treatment involves exposures combined with response prevention. Exposures are when you deliberately confront situations that scare you and response prevention is abstaining from the safety behaviors you typically use to reduce your anxiety (e.g., checking, analyzing/ruminating, washing, avoiding, etc).
ERP Part 3: Distress Tolerance
Exposure and response prevention therapy helps us overcome OCD by giving us the opportunity to develop new skills and learn from new experiences. In this post, we’ll review one of the skills developed in ERP: Distress tolerance.
Thought-action fusion (TAF) and OCD
Thought-action fusion (TAF) is an important part of most OCD presentations. It’s very helpful to understand what TAF is and how it relates to OCD treatment because important misunderstandings found within TAF play a central role in maintaining OCD.
Mental Compulsions and OCD
OCD always includes compulsions. Sometimes compulsions are physical behaviors, like washing your hands or asking for reassurance. Other times, the compulsions are mental. What do mental compulsions look like? How do they work? And what should we do about them? Learn more about mental compulsions in this post.
ERP Part 4: Psychological Flexibility
Cognitive flexibility can include practicing deliberately participating in meaningful activities while intentionally holding intrusive thoughts in mind (and allowing the related anxious, painful feelings to be present).
What Is “Metacognition” And How Is It Related To OCD?
OCD involves “metacognitions”. What are metacognitions? How are they related to OCD? And how are they involved in OCD treatment? Learn more about this important and misunderstood subject!
Why Do I Have Intrusive Thoughts?
What are intrusive thoughts? Why do we have them? Does everyone have intrusive thoughts? What can we do to reduce them? This post reviews what intrusive thoughts are, the research surrounding them, and how this is involved in OCD treatment.
5 Tips When Selecting An OCD Therapist
As an OCD specialist, I’ve worked with so many clients who were in therapy, sometimes for years, before they realized they weren’t working with a therapist that can actually help. Here are 5 tips to help you avoid that.
Why Can’t I Stop Having Intrusive Thoughts?
Learn the reasons intrusive thoughts won’t go away and why Exposure and Response Prevention treatment is the preferred method to controlling them.
Acceptance (not approval) in OCD Treatment
Discover the crucial role of acceptance in OCD treatment and learn how embracing calculated risks can lead to significant progress and hope for those battling OCD.
Understanding OCD: The Role of Uncertainty and Imagination
Dive into the intricacies of OCD, where the mind’s ability to imagine worst-case scenarios fuels anxiety. Understand the vital role of uncertainty and how it impacts those with OCD.