My OCD story: evidence-based medicine to the rescue!

Karen Morley blogs about her experience of seeking help for her Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and how finding and using Cochrane evidence was a turning point. This blog post was originally published onEvidently Cochrane.Without knowing what it was, I had experienced episodes of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) since I was an adolescent, usually when I was particularly stressed. But it was when I was caring full time for my mother, who had multiple conditions including dementia, that I had an unusually distressing episode of contamination-related OCD. When I took to the internet I was amazed to discover that the obsessive checking, washing and acute, abnormal anxiety were symptoms of an illness with a name – and to recognize other symptoms from my past that I now realised were related to it.I read everything I could find …I read everything I could find. I knew I should be careful about my sources, but I read fairly indiscriminately from forums, charity websites and a variety of health websites – some sensible, others less so – and that was a mistake.I had a vague sense of stigma about mental illness and particularly about medication, so I was interested in talking therapies, especially Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) with Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP). What could I expect if I tried it? Unfortunately there were some out-of-date posts in which people described nightmare experiences: someone who had allegedly to sit for two hours with his hands in ...
Source: Cochrane News and Events - Category: Information Technology Authors: Source Type: news