Recovery Overview

When it comes to OCD, the word recovery has two meanings.

The first is a short-term fix, and is primarily about reducing your anxiety enough, so that you can function in life. The main treatment that is used for this short-term fix is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). The NHS mainly offers CBT, and a large number of private therapists also provide CBT.

With these short-term fixes, patients can improve significantly in a few months, and think they are fully recovered, but at some point in the future the OCD will make a comeback. It makes a come back because the root cause of OCD has not been dealt with.

The second meaning of recovery is the true meaning of the word. That is, there is a chance that the OCD goes away and never comes back. This is because you are dealing with the root cause of OCD, which could be things like trauma and self-esteem issues. The therapy that is used to find what the root causes of OCD are is called Psychoanalysis

So, you are probably thinking ‘let’s go with psychoanalysis’. But psychoanalysis can take time to achieve results (possibly years), so it’s better to start off with CBT, as it can reduce your anxiety relatively quickly, and once your anxiety is low enough (but not fully fixed), then you can start on psychoanalysis.

This website explains how both CBT and Psychoanalysis works for OCD

The next section talks about CBT - please click the below button