Friday, October 15, 2010

What Is Obsessive Compulsive Symptoms

Obsessive compulsive symptoms often have someone such as you running to use medication because of how difficult it seems without them. The biggest problem with medications used for OCD is that they really serve to mask the symptoms, not cure them. If you do decide to take them, you may find that stopping their use could be detrimental to you as well. Stopping a medication abruptly can cause a great deal of side effects and that's not something you need on top of what you are already dealing with. When dealing with obsessive compulsive disorder, it's best to not use medication whenever possible.

You may not understand the truth about obsessive compulsive symptoms. You may believe it to be a form of condition or illness, which isn't surprising. The world makes obsessive compulsive disorder look this way. The truth about it is that it is a form of habit. Until you understand that this is the truth, you will likely not overcome it. Once you understand this truth, you will be in the right mindset to actually rid yourself of this habit. This habit requires that you use mental retraining. Once you learn how to train your brain away from its current way of responding, you'll find yourself overcoming your nasty habits.

When attempting to cure your obsessive compulsive symptoms, you will find that many out there will lack true experience with your symptoms. You want to find someone who has been through what you are dealing with and has overcome it. People who have gone through your symptoms and have overcome them are living proof that you can get over your symptoms. Listen to what they say because they have an actual understanding in regard to your habit and can help you overcome it. Know that you are in good hands with people like this.

In order to take control of your obsessive compulsive symptoms, you need to learn how to break and replace the thought processes that cause them. Your brain currently responds to things the way it does because it has programmed itself to do so. You can change this through mental reprogramming. Your brain needs to be retrained so that it learns to not respond to things the way it currently does. This is very possible, but does require a fair amount of patience and effort on your part. The brain is a complicated thing and will often fight the change at first.

If you are dealing with obsessive compulsive symptoms, you have likely considered using medication to treat it. Medications can help you in the short term, but can very likely cause more problems as well and should really just be avoided altogether much of the time. Even if you've been lead to believe that OCD is a form of illness or condition, you need to know that it's actually a form of habit.

Once you understand this, you will be more on track with the possibility of overcoming it. When trying to get past this habit, you will want to learn from people who have personal experience with what you are going through.

You will want the help of someone who has been through what you are going through and has overcome it. In order to overcome your obsessive compulsive disorder, you will need to change the way your brain responds to things through mental reprogramming. Once you do this, your brain will learn to respond to things in the proper way, which will eventually lead you to an OCD free life.

Common OCD Obsession Symptoms

Common OCD Obsession Symptoms
 
Individuals with OCD will experience uncontrollable obsessive thoughts or ideas that are unwanted and unreasonable and also tend to occur in stressful situations as well as while trying to think about or accomplish other tasks. While the obsessive thoughts that occur with OCD can be different for each individual, they are typically theme based.

For instance, one of the more common obsessive thoughts associated with OCD are the fear of dirt and germs that cause the individual to have unreasonable or unrealistic thoughts of being contaminated such as when shaking someone's hand. Another common obsession that occurs among patients with OCD is the need to have everything in order or symmetrical such as the obsession to have things organized in a specific place and a certain way at all times.

Other common obsessive thoughts that occur with OCD are the fear of having left doors unlocked or appliances left on with the need to check them over and over again. Obsessive thought patterns also associated with OCD include the fear of harming oneself or others such as accidentally running someone over while driving, or jumping from a high location such as a bridge.

Some individuals experience aggressive or impulsive thoughts such as visualizing or imagining inappropriate sexual behavior with others or the impulse to act in a socially unacceptable manner at a social event or function or some other public setting.

Common OCD Compulsion Symptoms

In order to relive their anxiety caused by the obsessive thoughts, an individual with OCD will perform repetitive or ritualistic behaviors in order to relieve their mind of these thoughts, however, this is typically only temporary as these thoughts will reoccur and they will have to perform these compulsive rituals again.

A common compulsion that many individuals with OCD experience is the need to clean the areas of their home frequently including areas that they may have cleaned just hours before or wash their hands or shower excessively which causes their skin to become irritated or raw.

Another common compulsion with OCD is the need to count in a specific pattern over and over again or perform their compulsive rituals a specific number of times. Individuals with OCD may also have the compulsion to count things such as panes of glass in a window or steps. Unfortunately, these compulsions take up many hours in the day for some individuals and significantly interfere with the quality of their life; however, there are forms of treatment that can help control the symptoms of OCD that typically include a combination of psychotherapy and medications.

How to Deal With Obsessive Compulsive Symptoms

Obsessive compulsive symptoms present in various forms. You'll have some that are just downright nasty that actually cause you physical pain. What makes it worse is that doctors won't believe you when you talk about your obsessive compulsive symptoms and you may be given a generic SSRI type medication to treat what's going on. The only problem is that these medications don't help people for the long term.

What are some of the other obsessive compulsive symptoms? There are many, such as mild to severe anxiety, you'll have rituals that will pop into your mind out of nowhere, an example of this would be: "I wonder if I should check that door another time to make sure that it is actually closed." There will be other things that you'll feel very strongly that you'll have to act on that it will feel as though it won't let up unless you perform these things, such as touch a doorknob again even though it makes no kind of sense and you are aware of that. The biggest problem that people have when they are facing these obsessive compulsive symptoms is that they feel like they won't go away unless they do them. This is an utter lie that your OCD is feeding you. In reality, you have a mistaken believe that leads you to think that is the case, but the reality of this is that it is totally untrue. People simply don't give their obsessive compulsive symptoms enough time to go away and that is important to notice right out of the gate.

So there are multiple things that you can do in an attempt to treat your obsessive compulsive symptoms, but the best thing you can do is to not freak out. You need to grasp that your emotions are not always a good measurement of what is really occurring. Think about a young teen who thinks they are in love because their emotions lead them to believe it so, but in reality, they were just emotions and it was actually only puppy love. I've been there; I think we've all been there actually.

So you can see right out the gate that obsessive compulsive symptoms vary from person to person but it is how you react to them that make all the difference! So what I would you to do in the meantime is to think about what kind of symptoms you are facing and remind yourself in the moment that they are just based in emotion and that they are not an accurate measure of what is going on in your brain.
To get cutting edge techniques to beat OCD permanently click here: Obsessive Compulsive Symptoms

Derek Soto is an ex-sufferer of OCD who teaches people how to overcome their OCD for good in a very short time using little known techniques which are usually ignored by the medical field altogether.

Derek Soto also mentors people on a wide range of subjects including how to control your thinking naturally, how to defeat anxiety, phobias and how to change your thought processes so that you will be happier and live a more fulfilling life, period.

Parenting and Obsessive Compulsive Symptoms

Obsessive Compulsive Symptoms
Cognitive-behavioral theories of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) have hypothesized central role of social learning in the development of OCD. Research shows that learning by developing key relationships such as parent-child interactions may explain the emergence and maintenance of OC symptoms in adulthood. Baumrind identified three prototypes or styles of parental rights, including permissive, authoritarian, and authoritative, which differ in the two dimensions of discipline and behavior management. Permissive parents allow their children to do what they want with little discipline, while parents with authority to implement reasonable guidelines while still providing a warm and welcoming. The third style, authoritarian parents who represents the values is rigid and strict adherence to the rules with lower levels of parenting. To date, there has been no study of these styles of parenting and OCD symptoms. The research examined the relationship between styles of parenting, symptoms (OC) obsessive-compulsive and dysfunctional beliefs related to the OC (ie, "the obsessive belief") in a nonclinical sample (N = 227) . Participants completed measures of these constructs as well as a measure of general mood and anxiety symptoms. Results showed that authoritarian parenting style was significantly associated with both OC symptoms and OC beliefs

(e.g beliefs about the importance of thought and personal responsibility), even after controlling for general distress. The analysis also revealed that OC beliefs act as a partial mediator of the relationship between the style of parenting and OC symptoms. The results are discussed in light of the implications for future research, particularly concerning the risk for developing OCD and vulnerabilities.

 obsessions, compulsions, obsessive-compulsive style of parenting, authoritarian parents, dysfunctional attitudes

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a heterogeneous disorder characterized by intrusive thoughts psychological recurrent and distressing images or impulses (obsessions) that cause anxiety and anxiety and repetitive behaviors (compulsions) performed to reduce this danger. Obsessions and compulsions can refer to various topics with the most common is the contamination, damage or injury, sex, religion, violence, and the order / symmetry (McKay et al., 2004).

Traditionally considered a rare disorder, the epidemiological findings now indicate that OCD has a prevalence of approximately 1.6% to 3.5% (Angst et al, 2004;. Kessler et al, 2005.). Research over the last decades has dramatically expanded our understanding of the phenomenology and treatment of OCD, but many mechanisms and factors involved in the genesis and maintenance of this disorder remains unknown. Biologically based research, including family and twin studies have provided evidence for the role of genetics in the development of OCD (van Grootheest, Cath, Beekman, and Boomsma, 2005, 2007; van Grootheest et al, 2008. .) What has also emerged from this research is that any number of environmental factors, or in connection with each other or as modulators of certain genotypes, may play an additional role in the etiology of OCD. With respect to specific environmental factors may be involved in the development of OCD, research has slowly begun to identify a number of variables that come into the broad category of psychosocial factors, including certain beliefs (Obsessive Compulsive Cognitions Working Group [ OCCWG], 2003), trauma (Cromer, Schmidt, and Murphy, 2007), and environmental agents such as bacterial infections (Swedo et al., 1998). This study focused on other possible factors: types of parenting.

Cognitive behavioral models of anxiety disorders, including OCD posit that social learning plays a central role in the development of these conditions (Manassis, Bradley, Goldberg, Hood, and Swinson, 1994, Vasey and Dadds, 2001). These models suggest that the family plays a crucial role in social learning in children and adolescents (Chorpita and Barlow, 1998).

Research has provided support for the relationship between changes in the family and the subsequent emergence of psychopathology (Stark, Humphrey, Crook, and Lewis, 1990). Within the general family environment, parent-child relationship is believed to provide the basis for social learning. In most families, parents not only "design" the basic structure of the family environment for their children, but also affect other opportunities for their children may have for other social learning outside the immediate family unit.

A large literature has investigated the role of parents has on child development. Two main factors or parenting dimensions have been identified, including heat / care and control of behavior. High levels of heat / aging parents show is focused on the child, accept and respond. High levels of behavioral control are indicative of the dictatorial and demanding parenting (Rapee, 1997).

Baumrind (1971) conducted laboratory-scale and naturalistic research focused on differences in styles of parenting and the two dimensions of warmth and control. Their work identified three prototypes of parental rights or permissive styles, authoritarian, and authoritative, which are characterized by high or low in the two dimensions of parenting. The permissive parenting style is high in the heat / care and under the control of behavior. This type of parenting allows children to do whatever they want with little discipline. Authoritarian parents are low in warmth and caring and very high in behavioral control, and represents parents who are rigid and the values of strict adherence to the rules with relatively less affection and care. Finally, the third style, authoritarian parenting is high on both dimensions. That is, parents with authority to enforce reasonable guidelines while still providing a warm and welcoming.

Treatment Of ODC

The easiest and most readily available Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Treatment is Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) therapy and involves the gradual resistance of compulsions, the breaking of various routines and the rationalization of obsessions. While fairly effective with compulsions, it is much harder to dispose of obsessive thoughts with this method. The same method is used with many mental disorders such as the majority of phobias.



Behavioral Therapy sessions in which a therapist will use ERP have been unsurprisingly shown to be much more effective than doing it oneself. Therapists can also help with obsessions through the use of various psychological treatments including Cognitive Therapy whereby the underlying reasons and convictions behind obsessions are explored.

Many different forms of medicine can also be prescribed or purchased to deal with OCD. While many are not specifically aimed at obsessive-compulsives, most are general anti-depressants such as Prozac which increases serotonin levels and hence helps to reduce anxiety and stress caused by OCD. (Serotonin, while the vast majority of it in your body is found in the digestive tract to regulate the movement and contractions of the gut, the rest is produced in the Central Nervous System where it regulates mood, appetite, sleep, memory and learning as well as other cognitive functions. It is a natural deficiency in Serotonin that is hypothesis to be a cause of OCD and is hence why Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs)

For Example: anti-depressants are prescribed to sufferers.

What Is OCD

Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is one of the most common mental disorders, however, is also one of the most misunderstood. It is more normal now to hear and even say things like "I'm so OCD about ..." or "I have OCD so many little", while not necessarily the most honest of the states, is becoming an increasingly common error - what the person in question is more likely to say is you are either very compulsive about certain things or have some kind of perfectionist attitude. TOC itself is primarily an anxiety disorder that clearly could be divided into two halves: the obsessions and compulsions - and this is where the misunderstanding arises usually in spite of being partly true, the obsessions do not always lead to compulsions . Obsessions tend to exist for themselves, while compulsions are many needs in fact a core obsession, but that does not mean that compulsions can not exist by themselves (sometimes confused with Tourette syndrome, OCD compulsions differ they are "voluntary" as the tics are inadvertent - You could say that Tourette syndrome is TOC coughing is to clear one's throat).

Symptoms of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder symptoms are, as mentioned above, split into the following two categories

Obsessions

As with many symptoms of anxiety disorder, obsessive thoughts can cause high levels of tension, distress and, yes – you guessed it, anxiety. Common obsessions include: concerns over cleanliness – the conviction that everything around oneself is unclean and hence harmful and needs to be cleaned before anything is done in that environment; worries over disease and ill health – constant fear or suspicion of having contracted a deadly disease, this can often appear as a strong case of Hypochondria ( Hypochondriasis); a necessity for things to be ordered or done in a certain way– there is not necessarily a logic to the order but to the person concerned failure of objects or other people to adhere to it can cause great concern despite the lack of any real consequence.

Less apparent and certainly more distressing are the kinds of obsession that obsessive-compulsives are less likely – and unsurprisingly so – to talk about as they generally involve thoughts of extreme violence either done unto them by someone else, or – much more distressingly – the thought of themselves committing these acts on their friends, family or even a complete stranger. Thoughts of a graphic sexual nature are also possible; ranging from kissing to extremes such as rape and pedophilia, these thoughts can be about anyone or indeed, anything, of any age or sex and can often lead to doubt over one's sexuality. Much though these sorts of thoughts are generally considered psychotic, although very disturbing, they are by no means a sign of Psychosis as generally they are recognized as being completely unacceptable and often lead to disgust with oneself for thinking such things. Thoughts and doubts of this nature can sometimes lead to cases of Social Anxiety Disorder in sufferers of OCD due to a lack of confidence in one's ability to withstand the temptation to give in to one's mind and a subsequent reluctance to participate in social activities. Hyperthyroidism or ‘excessive sweating as it is more commonly known can arise as another side effect of the suppression of these concepts when in public - which often serves only to increase anxiety levels and further enthuse them to stay at home.

It is possible for Obsessions to exist on their own without any sign of Compulsions, this is informally termed Pure-O OCD and is estimated to account for just over half of all cases of OCD. The problem with Pure-O is that while a casual onlooker may pick up on somebody carrying out their Compulsions and recognise that they have OCD, it is very hard to tell when somebody has Pure-O and often leads to confusion and anxiety amongst friends and family as they seek a reason or motivation for the avoidance of situations and even go so far as to put it down to some form of mild Autism.

Compulsions

As previously mentioned, many compulsions are the result of obsessions, for instance, concerns over cleanliness usually lead to excessive cleaning and – a common stereotype of OCD – the compulsive washing of one's hands throughout the day despite no immediately obvious reason for it; it may appear harmless, or might even be considered ‘playing it safe, however, it can lead to dermatitis and permanent damage of one's hands if care is not taken. Another common compulsion is the organization of objects into patterns: alphabetical, by color, size, or placing items parallel and at right angles to each other. A need to touch certain objects and people can also arise and be dangerous in certain circumstances such as when sharp objects are concerned.. Repeated actions are also common as is the obsessive counting of objects, a precise daily routine, the checking of locks and many many more.

While compulsions can often seem strange and unnecessary to other people, failure to carry them out can cause the sufferer considerable distress to the extent that it can cause panic attacks even if – as many do – they recognize them as irrational. The mental turmoil caused to people with extreme cases of OCD can produce symptoms that often draw parallels to Bipolar Disorder – sudden unexplained fits of irritation, anxiety and anger that are swiftly followed by embarrassment, sadness and guilt once the compulsion has been fulfilled. That is not to say that it is anywhere near as severe as the symptoms of Bipolar Disorder, however, similarities can certainly be drawn.

Obsessions and compulsions based around perfection, the necessity of order, routine, rules and organization are often associated with OCD and they are considered symptoms when present along with others. However, when isolated it is often a sign of Obsessive-Compulsive Personality Disorder (OCPD) or just Perfectionism.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

Obsessive compulsive symptoms

OCD is characterized by recurrent thoughts, unwanted, and intrusive called "obsessions." People with OCD try to stop the obsessive thoughts and repetitive behaviors fall into a purpose or intention, as repeated hand washing, counting the constant control and are called "compulsions."

The obsessions and compulsions are a vicious cycle and cause great stress and anxiety to a person suffering from OCD.

OCD is known as "disease of doubt." People with OCD are usually persistent self-doubt. They may try to confirm their own words and actions repeatedly to be convinced by doubt and fear underlying irrational.

The most worrying is that people with OCD know clearly that their fears are irrational but feel powerless as his mind is flooded with repeated obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviors may fall to stop the obsessive thoughts. Therefore, constant internal struggle takes place within the mind of the person suffering from OCD.

OCD is a psychiatric disorder that wreaks havoc on the lives of people. Quality of life is significantly reduced. Obsessive-compulsive symptoms are mostly hidden by patients in order to avoid embarrassment.

That their children suffer most. OCD can significantly affect performance in school. Students who had scored very good grades may lose grades and many students even drop out of school because of the OCD.

Stress increases the symptoms of obsessive compulsive disorder. Stress test usually increases the symptoms of OCD. Students with OCD may check their answer sheets on several occasions and sometimes suffer from obsessive thoughts in the test center and may stop the test without answering the question paper half due to the persistence of obsessive thoughts.

Can you imagine the emotional pain of these children? Can a college student tell the teacher and students that OCD was the real reason for leaving half open question paper or your own obsessive thoughts had stopped writing mid-exam?

The debilitating nature of OCD is not fully understood or recognized by the people. Again, this causes significant anxiety to a person suffering from OCD. A support society can go a long way in helping people suffering from OCD.

Treatment of obsessive compulsive disorder:

OCD can be treated effectively with medication. Psychiatrists often prescribe antidepressants to treat obsessive-compulsive symptoms. Most people with OCD life return to normal after medication.

Psychiatric medication should not be stopped without the psychiatrist's permission. Abrupt discontinuation can aggravate the symptoms of OCD.

SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake) are a class of antidepressants that are very effective in the treatment of OCD. Prozac and Zoloft are examples of SSRI medications.

The defeat of TOC:

Medication combined with meditation has proved a great success in treating OCD. silent meditation in the early morning relaxes and invigorates the nervous system.

Meditation allows your mind and daily practice of meditation along with medication can correct the chemical imbalance in the brain. Empower your mind with thoughts of motivation and defeat OCD.

Relationship between psychotic and obsessive compulsive symptoms in schizophrenia

The presence of obsessive compulsive symptoms (OCSS) in schizophrenia was recognized in the earliest descriptions of the disease. Studies investigating the association between schizophrenia OCSS and have defined their co-occurrence in terms of co-morbidities and patients with schizophrenia compared separated into groups according to whether or not CSOs.

However, most of these studies were not both the complexity of the phenomenology of schizophrenia and the OCSS into account. This study investigates the relationship between symptoms of schizophrenia and CSOs using a correlation approach to a three-dimensional perspective to determine how the OCSS contribute to the expression of symptoms in schizophrenia. Fifty-nine patients with schizophrenia were classified for the symptoms of schizophrenia (SAPS-SANS) and CSOs (Y-BOCS). symptoms of schizophrenia results are regrouped in four dimensional scores and other results CSOs dimensions.

The latter were introduced as explanatory variables in partnerships with dimension scores in schizophrenia using a series of stepwise regression models.

The results showed a strong positive relationship between delusions and obsessions in line with the view that they reflect manifestations of similar mechanisms. Similar results showing an association between auditory hallucinations and compulsions also suggests that share common mechanisms.

On the other hand, there was an inverse relationship between somatic obsessions and disorganization and between Hoarding / Collecting compulsions and delusions or hallucinations.

These results may reflect that these CSOs have a protective effect against disorganization and psychotic symptoms, respectively.