Portland OCD Treatment
Therapy for OCD
Specialized Evidence-based OCD Treatment For Better Outcomes.
Is OCD impacting your life?
Common symptoms include…
Are You Disstressed by OCD’s Control Over Your Life?
I offer effective OCD therapy that breaks the cycle of obsessions and compulsions
OCD is more than just washing your hands or liking things organized. It can impact any area of your life and show up in a variety of ways.
With the right treatment, you CAN live a fulfilling life that isn’t controlled by your OCD.
Break the Obsessive Compulsive Cycle with ERP
You’re in the right place.
Understand maintaining Factors that strengthen your ocd
You will learn behaviors and ways of relating to your internal experiences that is making OCD worse.
Break the ocd cycle
We will come up with more adaptive and helpful ways to move through OCD as it loses it’s control over you in treatment.
Find a new way to experience uncomfortable emotions, feelings, and thoughts
You will gain a new process for connecting with your values to make it easier when handling anxiety and distress if it shows up again.
What Is OCD?
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) is a mental health condition characterized by unwanted, intrusive thoughts (obsessions) and repetitive behaviors or mental acts (compulsions). These symptoms can cause significant distress and interfere with daily functioning.
OCD can worsen with ineffective OCD treatment. Traditional “talk” therapy, IFS, EMDR, and sometimes poorly executed exposure therapy can be very damaging to people with OCD. You can learn more about effective treatment for OCD from the International OCD Foundation.
The Many Faces of OCD
OCD is more than just washing hands and liking things organized in a particular way.
OCD can show up in any way, across any theme or domain in life.
The hallmark of OCD is the distress and anxiety related to the obsessions. People suffer because they DON’T WANT TO THINK ABOUT OR EXPERIENCE intrusive obsessions. Sometimes there may be fears of acting on these unwanted thoughts or them happening to loved ones, despite lack of evidence this would actually happen.
Harm OCD
Fear and concern over unwanted obsessions related to harm, aggression, or violence happening to self or others.
Identity OCD
Obsessions focused on gender identity, sexual orientation, or other identity themes.
Contamination OCD
Obsessions focused on fear of contamination of items, things, people, or places.
Death or Existential OCD
Obessions and fears related to death and existential themes.
Religious/Moral OCD
AKA Scrupulocity, a theme of OCD focused on fears related to religion, God, right and wrong, or a person’s character.
Sexual OCD
Unwanted/intrusive thoughts or images that are sexual in nature paired with fears of acting on harmful, unwanted thoughts.
Perfectionism/”Just Right” OCD
Focus on evenness, exactness, certainty or knowing, fear of mistakes, or something “feeling right”.
Relationship OCD
Fears and concerns about true feelings in relationship, “rightness” of partner, of focus on flaws of a partner.
These are just a few examples. How does OCD show up for you?
Are you afraid of sharing? Don’t be. OCD is weird AF sometimes. Us OCD Therapists expect it.
The Best Treatment for OCD
Did you know approximately 2.3% of people experience OCD and many never seek treatment (NIMH). It can be really difficult for people affected by OCD to get the right treatment, often because they don’t know they have it or become misdiagnosed.
Sometimes therapy can make OCD worse if a Therapist isn’t properly trained in treating OCD. Sometimes what’s popular in therapy isn’t the most effective or helpful, so it’s good to be informed.
This isn’t to say alternative therapies are always bad, harmful, or ineffective. I believe it’s best for people to be aware of treatment options, the research behind them, and a good understanding for the risks and benefits of seeking alternative treatments.
Why I use ACT, CBT, and ERP to Treat OCD
If you’d like to learn more about effective treatments for OCD, visit the APA Division 12’s website on evidence-based treatments for OCD. You will find only 3 treatments are listed as evidence-based treatments that have gone through rigorous evaluation: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, Cognitive Behavior Therapy, and Exposure and Response Prevention.
This means these interventions have the most reliable and valid research to support the effectiveness for helping people get better from OCD.
Ask me more about treatment options and discover what’s best for you.
I’m ready when you are.
How does ERP work?
We will integrate exposure and response prevention gradually at a pace that is gently encouraging, but not overwhelming. Sometimes ERP may not even involve exposures.
You’re always in charge and never asked to do anything I wouldn’t do.
Exposure
Gradual exposure to the obsessions in an intentional way. The goal is to confront these triggers without engaging in the compulsive behaviors that typically follow.
Response Prevention
During exposure, you’re guided to resist performing usual compulsive behaviors/rituals. This helps learn that anxiety will eventually decrease even without the compulsive response.
“Habituation”
Through repeated exposure and prevention, you begin to habituate to anxiety triggers, meaning anxiety decreases over time. This helps your brain learn you can tolerate the distress and the feared outcome doesn’t happen.
Let’s get started
Stop Letting OCD Bully You.
It doesn’t have to be this way.