"I know my hands are clean. I know that I have touched nothing dangerous. ButÂ… I doubt my perception. Soon, if I do not wash, a mind numbing, searing anxiety will cripple me. A feeling of stickiness will begin to spread from the point of contamination and I will be lost in a place I do not want to go. So I wash until the feeling is gone, until the anxiety subsides. Then I feel defeated. So I do less and less, my world becomes smaller and smaller and lonelier by the day" (Healthy Place: OCD Community). The writer of this poem has a disease call Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).
In OCD, it is as though the brain is stuck on a particular thought or urge and just cannot let go. OCD can continue throughout a person's life, gradually worsening. If not treated, OCD can drastically affect all aspects of a person's life: work, school, friends, and family (Weiskopf). Worries, doubts, and superstitious beliefs all are common in everyday life. However, when they become so......
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Approximate Word Count: 1490
Approximate Pages: 6 (260 words per double-spaced page) |