I am going to be very candid and revealing in this article because this is something that has been a part of my life off and on for many years, so buckle up this is gonna be a long one.

Having struggled with OCD, I was surprised to learn that (according to the International OCD Foundation & The Anxiety and Depression Association of America) appx. 2.2 million people struggle with this disorder. In this article I am going to be speaking of my experience with OCD & try to give you at least a tiny glimpse into the mind of someone who lives with this disorder. This is not an easy thing to put out there for all the world to see so please bear with me.

What is OCD?
OCD is an anxiety disorder that occurs when a person struggles with a cycle of obsessions and compulsions

Obsessions are unwanted and many times unreasonable thoughts that trigger extreme anxiety in the sufferer. These thoughts, especially in times of high stress, play on a perpetual loop in your mind leaving you to try & find a way to cope with the intense distress felt at these thoughts. Most of the time these obsessions lead you to compulsions or "rituals" that your whirling mind conjures up to ease the overwhelming anxiety

Compulsions are many times repetitive or excessive activities or mental exercises that a person suffering with OCD uses to relieve anxiety & stress. These activities are performed as a stress reliever, and many times the person believes that doing this activity will prevent what ever they are in fear of from happening.
When this disorder is not dealt with in a healthy way, this cycle can lead to a never ending cycle of obsessions and compulsions that can negatively & drastically affect the persons life in every single way.

What does this cycle look like?
Later we will take a look at the 4 types of OCD but as for examples I can really only use myself as an example to somehow help you understand what these cycles look like.
Throughout the years I can remember many many occasions when I developed a new or worsening compulsion in response to anxiety. Below I will try to explain a few of them in an attempt to help you understand what OCD looked like in my life.

• When my grandmother passed away I found myself unable to join the family in her house talking about memories and finding the things that they wanted to keep to remember her by. In an effort to not make a fool of myself in a full blown emotional attack, I excused myself to hyper focus on a little barren flower garden on the side of her house to organize and clean the rocks that surrounded it. This activity did relieve my anxiety, but I was not dealing with the root cause of it which was needing to deal with the loss of a person I didn't have a clue how to live without.
• One of the biggest compulsions I had for years was "cleaning". I put that in quotations because when you think of cleaning you think of getting stuff done. When most people clean for 5 hours they end up with a clean house, when I would "clean" for 5 hours I would end up with empty cabinets with very clean bottles and an overwhelming mess that would usually just cause more anxiety. I would spend hours upon hours cleaning the stickers (and the stubborn sticker remnants) off of bottles believing I would use them again. These included everything I'm not saying that I don't still keep certain bottles, in fact they have their own little tote in my house, but today because of CBD I no longer feel the compulsion to keep and clean completely every single bottle I empty.
• Another compulsion that I struggled with was checking to make sure the car or house door was locked many many times. I would not give myself permission to relax until I was 100% certain that I was safe from threats of any kind. Many times this led to cycles that could last for hours.
• There is another side of OCD that comes with some very dark thoughts that can fuel themselves into a frenzy. These very intrusive and scary thoughts would many times come out of no where. During a very dark period in my life these thoughts consumed me and I went through a hand washing phase. Unlike alot of people who suffer from this, it was not in response to feeling contaminated, it was just something I developed as a nervous habit that snowballed out of my control sometimes. When the thoughts became unbearable I would stand and wash my hands until they were raw and I was in tears.

... and so on... and so on. It truly is a viscous cycle.

Are there different types of OCD?
Yes. There are too many "types" of OCD to even try to tackle in this article but many health care professionals categorize OCD into 4 main types. Most people who suffer from OCD struggle on some level with many many different "types" and many times fall into each of these categories. Some people struggle with just one "type", but I can assure you that it does not matter how or in which way you suffer.... it's suffering.

1. Contamination & Cleansing : Everyone hopes to stay healthy and has some sort of a personal hygiene routine, but people suffering from this type of OCD can feel fundamentally unclean and experience a deep need to cleanse. This can be hand washing, bathing, teeth brushing, excessive personal space cleaning, etc. The fuel behind this can be so many things from fear of disease to feeling mentally unclean.
2. Doubt About Harm & Checking: Most of you can go through your day like clock work & without consiously thinking of all the terrifying things that are out there. Trusting that you are safe while you are driving, trusting that no one is coming into your home to harm you, trusting that you can deal with people in your life without accidentally or intentionally harming them. People suffering from this type of OCD do not have that luxury. I have experienced this one to a large degree as well. I would be driving and all the sudden have to pull over because I would all of the sudden be terrified that I was going to accidentally hurt someone. Other thoughts that would intrude sometimes was the paralyzing fear that something was going to fall out of the sky or off of another vehicle and crash through my window. This would lead to alot of pulling over (causing me to be late alot), locking and unlocking my seat belt to make sure it was secure, and cracking the window so I could hear my surroundings better.
3. Unacceptable/Taboo Thoughts & Mental Rituals : This type is usually not accompanied by physical rituals as it is mental rituals. The person may have thoughts that directly violate their moral code & personal values. Examples would be having blasphemous thoughts, or impulses to do violent things to innocent people. These thoughts often bring extreme shame. These thoughts often lead to a great deal of the persons time trying to get reassurance from others, stop these thoughts, or sometimes "make up" for having the thoughts in the first place.
4. Symmetry, Arranging, & Counting : This type is hyper focused on symmetry, organization, and order. Many times they need things to be just so to function properly and faced with disorder they have a hard time maintaining. Some people need things in their personal space to be perfectly aligned, equidistant from each other or in order by color or size. This is often, again as in my case, accompanied by thinking that what you are doing or not doing can somehow cause catastrophe. Its sometimes referred to as "magical thinking" . When I was first coming off of all of my prescriptions (you can read that story here ) I would often have thoughts like this. My husband would be outside working in the garage or mowing and my mind would tell me that he was for sure dead and I had to go check on him, or if I didn't do certain rituals he would die. These thoughts were debilitating and very hard to deal with. The only time I felt any relief was when my husband would hug me.

All that being said there are so many other known presentations of this disorder and we haven't even scratched the surface.

So how can CBD help?
There are studies that show using a CB1/CB2 agonist has an anti-anxiety effect in animal models. As for the human variety, there are not yet enough human trials to cite. However, I can for sure speak for myself and speak to the reports of my customers, friends and family.

Anxiety is at the root of OCD. Anxiety is actually a beneficial human response. It is crucial to help us deal with threats to our safety & can help us make critical decisions in times of danger. For most people the body & mind find balance after an anxiety inducing moment... For some of us, this signaling pops up when there is absolutely no danger present & does not resolve without some sort of intervention such as compulsions. CBD has done absolute wonders to help me manage my sometimes out of control anxiety to the point where I proudly say that it has saved my life. It has by no means cured me and that is not what I'm trying to say at all with this article, however my life has so drastically improved that I rarely experience symptoms anymore and when/if I do it is very short lived and easy to course correct without engaging in compulsions.

The bottom line is that the chemical medications used to deal with this disorder are toxic to the body when used long term, can often be addictive (adding a whole new layer to the mental health disorders), and for many people they do not work. Think of CBD as your first line of defense. It has been found to be a non-toxic, effective, alternative to medications.

Please remember: For people suffering from this disorder, these obsessions and compulsions are out of their control and no amount of ignoring, shaming, or belittling is going to change that. Please please be kind to anyone you meet or know who is struggling with mental health challenges.