00:01When you get to the mirror and start doing and redoing and redoing to the
00:05point that you can't leave the house and miss life, then it's a debilitating issue.
00:12The longest it ever took me to do my hair was four hours. My spike would be like it wasn't
00:19perfect and like that spot it looks weird. Over here like my sideburns look weird and
00:26everyone's gonna laugh at me. You can't see OCD so it really gets to me when
00:32people say like well I don't see you anxious, I don't see you depressed, I
00:35don't see you doing things multiple times. It's not always very obvious. Most of the
00:41time it's really secretive. It's frightening to watch sometimes depending on the
00:47compulsions and you want to make it stop, just stop. Because as a parent you want
00:53to fix things. And you can't fix this.
00:57I'm Allison, I'm 14 years old and I live with OCD.
01:12So this is my room and I have all my stuff here. Eeyore was always my favorite character in Winnie
01:19the Pooh.
01:20Because I'm like the glass half empty kind of person. So I just felt like I understood him more.
01:27Rather than the other ones which are just like silly characters. And it feels like someone gets me.
01:35I first realized I had OCD in third grade. I would rewrite and re-read, re-talk. I knew it
01:45wasn't normal because no one else was doing it.
01:47But I just felt like it had to be done.
01:52So a normal day, I would say at least three hours are spent being anxious or doing compulsions in my
02:01head.
02:02A compulsion is a behavior that you do either mentally or physically to relieve the anxiety from the obsession or
02:12intrusive thought.
02:14Most of my compulsions are like pure O, which means it's mental compulsions. So instead of tapping the wall ten
02:20times, I count my head ten times.
02:24And no one sees it, but it's definitely still there. The most I've ever done compulsions were like a day
02:30and a half without stopping.
02:33I was in fourth grade and my rewriting OCD got really bad. So I couldn't write without rewriting at least
02:41ten times each word.
02:42I would write something and erase it and write and erase and it would get me really anxious and then
02:48I would rip through the paper.
02:50And I would just like hide in the bathroom trying to like not be at school and I would try
02:56to take as much sick days as I can off.
02:59My mom tried to explain to that teacher about OCD like multiple times. And my teacher just made everything worse.
03:05She would rip up my paper, she would throw it away.
03:07Her teacher at the time wasn't really aware of what OCD was. So she would address it by saying things
03:14like you just need practice in writing.
03:17At the same time, I was getting made fun of for my OCD because I was rewriting so much. Everyone
03:24knew that and everyone knew me as a person who rewrites.
03:27Then I remember this boy was rewriting a sentence because he messed up and all the kids were like, oh,
03:32you got the Allison disease.
03:34I tried to play it off as a joke. I'm like, yeah, haha. Yeah. But when I got home, I
03:38was crying to my mom because I don't want to be known as that. I don't want to be known
03:42as the weird person.
03:45All my friends are in a regular school. They might fail a few tests, but they're okay with it.
03:51And for me, it's like I have to be in a special school with teachers that help me 24-7
03:59and it kind of makes me feel like I'm not independent and I can never do anything by myself.
04:06So the general idea, what was the whole book about if you had to put into one sentence only?
04:13Susanna, which is in a psych ward recovering from schizophrenia.
04:18So it's girls in a psych ward trying to recover from?
04:23Mental illnesses.
04:24Awesome. That would be your sentence.
04:27This book is about what?
04:29What is this book about?
04:31Oh, yeah. So my OCD is spiking right now because I have to write exactly what my mom said or
04:38else in my head I feel like it's going to be wrong.
04:40So I would just do an exposure by not doing exactly. So I would just think of what I heard.
04:46And if it's not exact, then it's not exact.
04:49And I would go out of my way to not repeat it.
04:53Exposure or ERP, exposure response prevention, is exposing yourself to the anxiety. So you would do the opposite of what
05:01you're scared of. And then it slowly gets better.
05:06So this is my camera. Packing up my case causes me anxiety sometimes because it's like I have to do
05:13it perfectly or else it's going to get ruined or I'm going to lose something.
05:17So like it sounds like a normal fear, but it just goes so over the top that it takes me
05:22a long time to pack it up.
05:23It took me maybe like an hour and a half just to figure out where to put it without being
05:28so anxious.
05:30A lot of people seem to think that if you just put things in the right order, that that is
05:34OCD. And you have everybody walking around going, oh, I'm a little OCD, too. You're not. You're so not.
05:41Everyone has intrusive thoughts, sometimes intrusive images, but it's not OCD. OCD is when you can never let go of
05:51it.
05:51It's causing you so much anxiety and it interferes with your daily life.
05:57For Alison, everything has to be perfect. And perfect is a strange thing that doesn't exist.
06:05When I take the photo, I feel like this is like the perfect moment in time. Like I want to
06:11keep this forever.
06:13I just feel free that I could take as many as I want. They could be as horrible as it
06:16can be. It's just, I could just have fun with it.
06:21But when I download them all to my phone, the more photos I have to choose from, the more it
06:28like makes me anxious because I'm like, but now there's so many.
06:31And what if one is better than the other, but I didn't choose one. So I'm going to just throw
06:36this away so it doesn't like stress me out.
06:39Usually it would take me a few minutes and I would ask a bunch of people like, which one do
06:44you like better? And when I like one picture better and they like the other one, it gets me like
06:48really stressed.
06:49Because if it's not right, then there's something not complete about me.
06:53In the past, my OCD would be worse when something wasn't just right or perfect. Now it's more like reassurance.
07:03Reassurance seeking is originally it starts out very cute, but it develops into something that morphs out of control.
07:11When she was little, she used to walk around and say, do you love me? And it's cute. You have
07:16a three year old asking you if you love them. You say, yes, I love you.
07:19And then that question would come up 150 times a day. And you think that you should answer them because,
07:26heck, your kid just asked you if you love them.
07:29But they need to make sure that they hear you. They need to be certain that they did it the
07:33right way. And that reassurance doesn't exist.
07:38Over the last 10 years, Allison has spent an enormous amount of time battling this illness with all types of
07:46medical professionals, including cognitive behavior therapy and exposure therapy and medication coming into play.
07:54We have amazing therapists in the city, but they're extremely expensive. And by extremely, it pretty much takes an average
08:03salary of the American worker.
08:05We were lucky that there was a grant. So she did get some relief through the grant. But as of
08:12right now, I think the best course of medicine is herself. She does the exposures herself. She's making progress.
08:23To go to gymnastics, I have to put it in a ponytail. When I would do the ponytail, that was
08:27when my OCD spiked a lot. And my routine would be like using the keratin mist.
08:35So it smells a little better. I'm sorry. I would use a lot of hair ties because I'd need it
08:42to be like perfect amount of like tightness. I have to do two at a time.
08:47A few months ago, I had like really bad OCD about this. So to make it easier, I got like
08:53this shaved off and I put like designs on it to make it look cute.
08:56And I only have half a head to deal with. So it made it a lot easier to conquer the
09:01OCD.
09:03I guess everyone takes a while to do their hair, but I don't think it stops you from living. If
09:09this was six to nine months ago, she would have redone the ponytail countless times by now.
09:15In fact, we've got to kind of do the opposite now. You go with as messy of hair as humanly
09:20possible.
09:20I know. And then like more of an exposure was to go out with my friends to go to gymnastics.
09:27So I have to go to places that like people can judge me at.
09:31Allison has found a place where she belongs. She enjoys gymnastics. She has always been very strong. So gymnastics has
09:40been one of those places where she can use that strength and not use her brain.
09:45So she's able to go in there and just exert all the energy that she has.
09:52Allie, I think, is going to be involved in the OCD community forever. I think that she'll find work in
10:00that space because it seems to bring her joy to help others.
10:04So this was a sign that I made. It was just a few weeks ago, actually. I went to DC
10:11for an OCD and mental health walk.
10:14I'm active on social media and I advocate for OCD and mental health in general. It helps me because I
10:22have a great community around me that makes me feel like I belong somewhere.
10:26She inspires me every day. She gets up and she battles the same demons and somehow she finds a way
10:33to just do it. It's amazing to watch. I don't think I could do the same.
10:39I don't think I'll ever be cured of OCD. It's a lifelong thing. New OCDs pop up. It could be
10:46one day not even there and then the next day it's there and it's full blown really, really bad.
10:51And you really just have to fight it back a day at a time.
11:09you
11:11you
11:12you
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