OCD is an anxiety disorder. People with OCD have unwanted and intrusive thoughts that keep entering their minds (obsessions) and behaviors or mental acts that they feel driven to perform over and over (compulsions). When someone experiences an obsession, they perform a compulsion to make themselves feel better. But it’s only a matter of time before the same obsession returns or a different one strikes.

Having OCD is often described as being stuck in an unending cycle of worry.

One of the most traumatic aspects of the disorder is that most people who have it know that their obsessions and compulsions are irrational, yet they cannot control them. OCD is not a personality flaw—it is a medical condition that results from an imbalance of certain kinds of brain chemicals.

Too often, people with OCD suffer in silence because they are ashamed and because they don’t realize that they have a treatable disorder. While there is no cure yet, appropriate treatment can help most people gain meaningful relief from their symptoms and significantly improve their quality of life. Unfortunately, cases of OCD too often go undetected or are misdiagnosed.

What’s it like to have OCD? Check out some personal stories.


THE FACTS

Even though movies and television shows sometimes treat OCD as a joke, it’s very serious to the people who have to live with it every day and their family members. Once considered a rare disorder, doctors have learned that OCD affects millions of people around the world.

• Approximately 6 million to 9 million Americans have OCD—that’s between 2% and 3% of the population.
  
  
• If OCD affects only two other family members, that means some 21 million people in the United States are touched by the disorder.
  
  
• OCD strikes about 1 in 40 adults and about 1 in 100 school-aged children.
  
  
• OCD is the fourth most common psychiatric diagnosis, after phobias, substance abuse and major depression.
  
  
• OCD ranks among the 10 leading causes of disability worldwide, according to one international study.
  
  
• On average, people with OCD see three or four doctors over the course of nine years before getting appropriate treatment.
  
  
• One study showed that it takes an average of 17 years from the onset of OCD symptoms for a person to receive appropriate treatment.